Originally published at: How I make the best popcorn | Boing Boing
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“If you put butter and salt on it, it tastes like salty butter.” ―Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
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I have a whirly pop, but it’s such a pita to clean. Depending on the amount of popcorn desired, I just use a chef’s pan like Cuisinart 3qt Stainless Steel Chef's Pan With Cover - 8335-24 : Target , or wok, and occasionally, slightly lift the lid to let the steam out. Works great, and is easy to clean (unless it’s my wife making it, because she tends to burn the ffff out of the pan)
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Mine cleans pretty easy. I just scrub it down with a typical blue kitchen sponge and soap? I dry it on the burner.
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I never feel like I can get the little spinny bit and lid clean enough… Sometimes I stick the entire thing in the dishwasher, but that takes up a lot of valuable dish cleaning space. 
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I have a 5 qt. stockpot with cover that is dubbed “the popcorn pot”. You have to shake it a few times while popping to reduce the clinker count, but the pan is super easy to clean. Only downside is you need to dump the finished popcorn in a bowl because the pot stays hot too long.
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The Whirly-pop is superfluous, the Flavacol essential!
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I dunno, maybe my eyes would be opened to what I’ve been missing if I had popcorn made in a Whirly Pop™, but I find that a plain old cookpot on the stovetop works great and doesn’t clutter my kitchen with a single-tasker.
Last time I was buying Better Than Bouillon™ chicken bouillon concentrate the cashier told me he likes to mix a dab of it with his butter before pouring it over his popcorn and it is like magic crack. He could be right, BtB is pretty good stuff. I’m planning on trying it sometime.
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Growing up we stuck to the Pops Rite brand which included a pouch of the stuff in every bag. Like, waaay more than you would need for the bag.
We used a heavy pressure cooker pot with a folded brown paper bag between the pot and the lid to let the steam escape.
Now I’m all sophisticated so I pop a blend of Amish corns (blue, red, purple and ladyfinger), in the crank popper, using butter flavored coconut oil, and the final topping is a generous shake of Spike.
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You can use those pans for roasting coffee too. I just ain’t going to wait or do that much work for my morning cup.
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Same here. The vertical shape does a great job of keeping the unpopped kernels on the bottom by the agitation of the popping corns and the occasional shake. I’ve never experienced soggy or stale popcorn, probably because, like you, I dump it into a bowl after to season with real butter and salt.
ETA: Popping corn takes, what? 30 seconds? Just cleaning a stock pot takes longer and it doesn’t have any gears or hinges.
Nope. Sorry, but I’ll take “greasy with butter” over mysterious “artificial butter flavor” any day. But I’ve never been a fan of movie theater flavor and won’t even get popcorn at a theater that doesn’t use real butter. I know it tastes more “buttery” to most people, but butter tastes plenty buttery to me.
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How I make the best popcorn
Oh boy! Let me get some popcorn…
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We only buy unsalted butter and it’s great on popcorn with or without salt sprinkled on. My go-to seasoning is granulated garlic and dill. Nothing artificial and satisfied by fortnightly dill cravings.
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We had something like this when I was a kid. From what I can remember, it made pretty good popcorn.
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A carton of Flavacol is a lifetime supply.
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We’re leaving in the morning for 6 wonderful days in our RV.
My wife has a stack of Jiffy Pop for the campfire. Is it the best tasting? Nope.
But when you toss in the campfire with freinds and family it tastes so much better.
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I’m not not listening. I’m intrigued by your theories. Perhaps I will subscribe to your newsletter.
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Stockpot for me too. Nice one from made-in. Olive oil or avocado oil. Salt ground in the mortar and pestle. Nutritional yeast ground up too. Butter drizzled in thirds over the popcorn in a bowl, tossing between. Maybe not the best popcorn, but very good. And all the B vitamins and protein in the nutritional yeast are good for our picky eater.
I am, of course, now going to check out the whirly thing tho
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