This Is What Lil Nas X Says It's Like To Cook With Gordon Ramsay
If there's an award for best panini by a celebrity chef/musical artist duo, we think it would go to Lil Nas X and Gordon Ramsay for the sandwiches they made in the summer of 2019 at Ramsay's Lucky Cat restaurant (via Time). Nas recently had a chance to tell the story of his time spent with the famous chef on an episode of Hot Ones. In between bites of spicy chicken wings, Lil Nas X told Hot Ones host Sean Evans that the Ramsay was an inspiration to the young rapper. "He was like motivating me a lot, you know, saying inspiring things. Because you know he's done so much already... and I'm just getting started on my journey." Nas said.
For the Ramsay/Lil Nas X panini collaboration, the chef seemed to carry most of the weight. A Rolling Stone profile of the young rapper said he had worked as a cashier at the fried chicken chain Zaxby's before finding fame, but a YouTube video showing his panini collab with Ramsay suggested that Nas maybe wasn't that comfortable in a restaurant kitchen. The music artist may know a thing or two about rapping about paninis, but he confessed to Ramsay he hadn't ever made one before.
Little Nas X's hit song "Panini" inspired his collab with Ramsay
Lil Nas X followed Ramsay's lead as they built their paninis on a bao bun with yuzu mayonnaise, pastrami, cheese, cabbage, and spicy kimchi. While their sandwiches were grilling in Ramsay's panini press, the duo walked to a display case full of knives and selected tools for cutting their sandwiches. Lil Nas X took a small axe, while Ramsay opted for a knife almost as long as a sword.
Ramsay, who is famous for his angry outbursts in the kitchen, was nothing but polite to Lil Nas X during their panini making session. Still, on Hot Ones, Nas joked a little about Ramsay's reputation. When Evans asked if he picked up any cooking tips from the celebrity chef, Nas quipped, "If you yell at people more, it's definitely going to make the food taste amazing."
The meeting between the famous UK chef and young rapper all started with a tweet Nas posted on June 20th, 2019: "tryna get Gordon Ramsay on this panini remix." "Panini" is the name of a hit song by Lil Nas X, and Nas was trying to duplicate the magic made when he took to Twitter to get Billy Ray Cyrus on his first major hit, "Old Town Road." "Twitter can make a lot of things happen if you get enough retweets," Nas told Rolling Stone.