For anyone who’s ever asked, “Why?” in the kitchen, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt is your man. After getting his start in restaurant and test kitchens in Boston, Kenji created The Food Lab, a column on Serious Eats dedicated to lassoing the laws of science and riding them to home cooking success every time. In the subsequent six years, the “Kenji method” has blown up, but despite being a cult phenomenon and bestselling cookbook author, Kenji himself is just about as cool and down to earth as you can get. He stopped by the Eater Upsell studios to talk meatloaf, space travel, and how to secretly take a professional phone call from the bathtub.