“The food has to be the most important thing,” he says. And when he can’t find a specific ingredient, he improvises-like using Takis chips as the coating for mozzarella sticks, or subbing crushed Whoppers for malt powder in malted salted caramel pudding.Īnd he’s taking inspiration from one of his heroes, the late Anthony Bourdain, who was outspoken about his discomfort with “celebrity chef” culture though Merril is grateful for his social media success, he’s more focused on creating memorable experiences around cooking. Though he often takes the long walk to the shared kitchen, he has also perfected no-bake dishes like tiramisu and microwave mac and cheese. With no sink in his room, Merril regularly mixes ingredients in paper bowls. And he has found an ideal way to relate to his viewers, many of whom are also in college: his popular “Cooking in the Dorm” videos. Now, in addition to studying in the School of Hotel Administration and singing with the a cappella group Last Call, Merril posts on TikTok once a week. Merril wasn’t going to let his TikTok-ing keep him from fully experiencing Cornell. His response, he says, was that he wasn’t going to let his TikTok-ing keep him from fully experiencing Cornell-that he’d try to find a way to integrate the two. The summer before he headed to the Hill as an established influencer, he kept getting what he calls the “million-dollar question”: how would he keep up his prominent presence on social media while attending college? TikTok-ing Chimesmaster Brings Cornell Music to the World “You were literally my favorite and I was always rooting for you,” wrote another. “I loved you in middle school,” one user commented. Merril’s run led to appearances on more Food Network programs, like “Chopped Junior” and “Guy’s Grocery Games.” In 2020, he started posting on TikTok-and discovered he already had a fan base. Merril made the cut through seven episodes, winning the “Macaron Stackaron” challenge (which required the kids to bake three dozen of the challenging confections, piled five inches high) before losing in the eighth and final round. The kitchen felt like a lab to me-it was this great place where I could explore.Īfter an application and several auditions-where his longtime love of performing in youth theater came in handy-he landed on the second season. In fifth grade, after watching the debut episode of “Kids Baking Championship,” he was confident he could be a contestant. Merril was a Food Network fanatic and devoured cooking videos on YouTube to hone his technique. “Some mornings, my mom would be like, ‘Who’s in the kitchen at 7 a.m.?’ And it was 7-year-old me, making cinnamon rolls.” “The kitchen felt like a lab to me-it was this great place where I could explore,” he says. (Merril honored her on TikTok on Christmas Eve 2022-the family’s first without her-by making her recipe for caramel cookies.) It was sparked by his late grandmother, an Iraqi immigrant who put an American spin on traditional dishes like curries and baklava. Many fans grew up watching him on Food Network, where he debuted on “Kids Baking Championship” at age 10.ĭespite growing up in what he describes as a “household where neither of my parents could cook,” Merril has long had a passion for food. “Could this be the very first dorm room turkey?” he muses once he’s back in his room, slicing the succulent, nearly picture-perfect bird.ĭubbed a “culinary prodigy” by Mashed, Merril-whose TikTok channel has spurred a slew of corporate partnerships, speaking engagements, and a cookbook, Teen Baking Bootcamp-seems to have been rehearsing for his role as an online influencer long before the title existed. “This is the craziest thing I’ve ever done in my life,” he exclaims, buttering the bird with his bare hands.Īfter Merril finishes prepping, he hauls the turkey down in the elevator to the shared kitchen for roasting, to the stares of passersby. Merril, a bona fide influencer who has 2.6 million followers on TikTok, deftly wields a chef’s knife to unwrap the raw turkey he removes the gizzards, loosens the skin, and creates a butter compound with seasonings and fresh spices. He then scrubs carrots in a bathroom sink in North Campus’s Ruth Bader Ginsburg Hall before moving back to his room and-crouching next to his bed-plopping them into a roasting pan with onions. “Let’s cook a turkey in a dorm room,” Hotelie Matthew Merril ’26 declares in a TikTok video posted shortly before Thanksgiving 2022. Matthew Merril ’26 loves cooking-and his skills and enthusiasm have garnered millions of fans, especially among the college crowd Between Two Slices of Bread, an Enduring Big Red Bond
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |