264

KD
Posted on January 13, 2022 by David M Willis

264 thoughts on “KD”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    Mullins was too Rich for her

    1. ThunderNight

      you gotta build up to Mullins

      1. ANeM

        Joyce doesn’t know any other musicians so clearly some people can jump right in.

        1. Needfuldoer

          She knows other musicians! They’re just all Contemporary Christian artists.

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/03-the-butterflies-fly-away/amygrant/

        2. ValdVin

          And, from that arc, also Boys II Men.

        3. Tan

          And because I am just a huge fan of citation, here is the link for yours. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/03-the-butterflies-fly-away/ii/

        4. Tan

          See also final panel of https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/03-the-butterflies-fly-away/truce/

        5. Laura

          Not gonna lie, some of it just makes me wanna jump up and shake my ample booty… 😉
          Just finished grooving “Our God is an Awesome God”:
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdo4Eyw4DqM
          It’s adorable… someone added a synth drum track and decided that made it “techno” *LOL*.
          YouTube knows me well. It decided I’d had quite enough booty-shakin’ thank you very much and recommended some nice soft Gregorian chants to calm me down after:
          https://youtu.be/nYWJLOCh6Q8

        6. Laura

          If I’m not mistaken, though, “Awesome God” takes its chorus melody from the traditional shanty, “The Wellerman.”
          The original booty-shaker!
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84dJQ0Bx6t4

        7. Laura

          Better version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7IfKNhN1oQ

        8. Lars

          She could also Canteena banding the intro of Dexter and Monkey Master.

  2. bootshivers

    It was the pepper, wasn’t it

    1. Needfuldoer

      Should’ve used white pepper, they’ll get the same flavor but wouldn’t see the little black specks of peppercorn skin.

      1. The Wellerman

        Hey ill have to try that too!

        If it can complete chicken McNugget’s signature flavor, who knows what it’ll do to Mac and Cheese? ?

      2. David weinehall

        Black pepper and white pepper aren’t interchangeable. They take different.

        1. Needfuldoer

          Yeah, white pepper is milder.

          But knowing what we know about Joyce’s culinary habits, that’s a happy coincidence.

        2. Ryan

          White pepper is to pepper as white chocolate is to chocolate.

        3. Felix

          Too sweet?

  3. Sirksome

    Why…why is everyone so into this macaroni? Kraft is good but you’d think it was liquid gold.

    1. Andy

      In Ruth’s case it’s like the national food of Canada. I don’t entirely get it either.

      1. jmsr7

        Hey, that’s not far wrong: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TnWIICkBeE

      2. Decidedly Orthogonal

        “Kraft Dinner” is but not necesarily Kraft Dinner™. My kids prefer President’s Choice White Cheddar Macaroni and Cheese. And we _do_ put hot dogs in, otherwise no decifauna or greater died to sate their savage hunger. Also ketchup.

        1. Decidedly Orthogonal

          n b. Not _that_ president, but this one. The weston family is our resident canadian food oligarchy. That he died in Florida is… appropriate.

        2. Undrave

          President’s Choice makes some amazing desserts. You tried their Japanese style yuzu flavored cheesecake? Or the Meringata? Or the key lime pie?! Damn… now I want to go buy some of that tomorrow…

    2. Thag Simmons

      Genuinely curious if the Americans get a different, better version, because this level of praise does not match with my experiences

      1. Alaric

        Nope. I don’t get it, either, and I’m American.

        1. Thag Simmons

          Like I get why it’s so widespread, it’s quick, tasty and hard to fuck up, but it’s just Mac & Cheese.

        2. Switchchris24

          Hard to fuck up is a major thing for America lol. Many people can’t cook for shit, so this being easy to make tasty is big.

        3. Leorale

          I think the comfort food aspect is a really big part of it, too. A lot of people have nostalgia for it, it might be from their childhoods, (and totally unchanged, even!) and/or the first meal they can make all by themselves.

        4. StClair

          Mostly this, I figure.
          It was never on the menu at home – we had a different set of dishes, including “real” mac and cheese – so I don’t have the same feeling.

        5. Michelle J. Caboose

          As a kid, i had both. The instant stuff because we were on a budget, but I had family members who made the real thing whenever we had any kind of family get-togethers. As a result, I’m more nostalgic for the “made from scratch” mac & cheese.
          Also, the texture of the cheese sauce in the instant always seemed kind of gritty to me.

        6. Delicious Taffy

          Ya know what’s hard to fuck up? Meatloaf. And yet somehow I haven’t had a proper hunk of the ‘loaf in nearly a decade.

        7. Ryek Hvek

          Swanson

        8. Undrave

          Stouffer’s meatloaf is pretty good for a frozen dinner. I treat myself to one sometimes in winter.

        9. Roborat

          This. I remember when I stayed in Arizona with my parents (retired Canadian snowbirds) for a few weeks. I was amazed at the amount of restaurants in the area, and how busy they got in the evening, it seemed to me that most of the population ate out.

        10. Psychie

          It’s cheaper and significantly better tasting than any other brand of “instant” Mac & Cheese I’ve ever tried, and I’ve tried a lot of them, meanwhile it’s cheaper and significantly less work than making “real” Mac & Cheese, thus making it the perfect intersection of cheap, easy, and delicious. I don’t speak for other people, but Mac & Cheese is far and away my favorite food by a significant margin, to the point where I joke about it being my religion, and I’m not joking when I say the two greatest things in the universe are Mac & Cheese and beautiful women, and kraft allows me to enjoy the delicious, delicious Mac & Cheese for little cost, little effort, and proportionally maximum pleasure. If only I could find a woman similarly perfect (super sexy, crazy smart, shares all my interests, madly in love with me, and ideally independently wealthy, but that one’s not that important) I’d be set for life.

        11. Roborat

          Not in my experience, anytime I have had the opportunity to directly compare U.S. and Canadian versions of food, Canadian was better. I was astounded by the difference between U.S. and Canadian Coke (the drink, not the drug).

        12. Undrave

          American chocolate is so… bleh.

      2. The Wellerman

        If you still don’t like the dish, if you know a thing or two about emulators you can still play Kraft’s really fun Dinosaur games!

        https://oneweakness.com/quest-for-cheese

        1. Thag Simmons

          It’s not that I don’t like it, it’s fine. Just a little overrated.

          I haven’t had Kraft Dinner specifically for a long while though, and it was never a staple childhood dish in the way it was for a lot of people. Maybe I’m missing something.

        2. The Wellerman

          Yeah, it’s definitely one of those nostalgia driven things, that goes perfectly with watching Nickelodeon and / or playing on your DS under your bed covers all night long as you gorge on it with Kool-Aid or your beverage of choice — good times!!! ☺️?

        3. Needfuldoer

          You kids and your fancy backlit screens don’t know the struggle of playing games in four shades of gray under the weak yet inescapably glaring light of two subminiature Christmas light bulbs powered by additional AAA batteries.

          😛

        4. Pilgrim

          Kids these days! They don’t have the attention span to hunt & gather their own food, no, they want to sit around on their butts and watch it grow!

        5. egg egg

          Please, the real kids learned to hold a flashlight in their mouth so they could play in the dark highways with long patches of no light.

        6. Sirksome

          I think there’s definitely a nostalgia element to it. Kraft was really affordable and tasted good for the price so it’s a very common food staple. Personally I did grow up with it, more Velveeta than specifically blue box Kraft and it is good, but I also grew out of it by college. But I think that’s the joke here.

        7. Devin

          Nostalgia is a HUGE element, I would argue that it’s the driving force.

        8. Psychie

          Well, there’s your problem, Velveeta is good, but the cheese sauce has a hint of a weird after taste, and you can’t control the consistency of the cheese sauce the way you can with Kraft since it comes already in liquid form, also, at least in my area, Velveeta is more expensive, at Sam’s Club you can get a case of 18 boxes of Kraft for a little under $10, meanwhile you can only get a case of IIRC 9 boxes of Velveeta for a little OVER $10, meaning it’s more money for half the product, and an inferior product at that, even when you factor in the cost of the milk and butter (which you probably were getting anyway) that’s needed for Kraft but not Velveeta it’s not enough to offset the difference.

      3. pope suburban

        There’s a deluxe version, that has liquidy cheese in a pouch, and it’s pretty damn good. It’s not, like, mythical ambrosia or anything, but it’s better than the basic stuff IMO. Though the basic stuff is fine, and what they have here, so…

      4. John Smith

        Well, kraft dinner is tasty. It’s cheese and noodles, hard to screw up even if the cheese is fake and the noodles are of questionable providence. But more importantly it’s nostalgia. I ate that on weekends when I was like, twelve. I’ve got good associations with it!

      5. angie

        here’s why KD is so good in my opinion:

        1) nostalgia. if you’re missing this part you’re missing like half of it

        2) easy to make and hard to mess up

        3) easy to modify (not that I modify it I am a Joyce-esc picky eater, but that is an appeal of it)

        4) a big one for me is it’s a very unchallenging food taste and texture-wise. unless you’re lactose intolerant or something it goes down easy and sometimes life is just Too Much to be dealing with complicated flavours. another example is american vs canadian dominoes pizza. they’re completely different and the american one is definitely the better one, but the canadian one has such a simple flavour that is nice to have when I’m just overwhelmed with everything.

        5) expanding on 4 it’s also just good for when you’re feeling kinda sickly. my mom said it was one of the few things she could eat when she was pregnant with me without getting sick and I always eat it when I feel gross too

        1. Keulen

          Pretty much this.

      6. lia

        its also very much the kind of thing ppl with tastes like joyce’s love

      7. Azhrei Vep

        American most assuredly do not get a ‘better’ version of Kraft Dinner if yours even technically edible. The stuff is absolutely, borderline inedibly vile.

        The only way to improve it is to throw out the tiny broken shards of cheap pasta and replace it with something halfway decent. Then throw away the sauce powder packet and use something completely different. Even the Velveeta ‘cheese’ that comes with their shells and cheese would be an improvement.

        1. Victor

          Oh good. I was afraid I was the only one here who absolutely hates the stuff.

          I don’t like the concept of macaroni and cheese in general. Even if you make a homemade version with decent pasta and real cheese it’s still just… bland.

          But the yellow powder packet? Eww. That stuff tastes like industrial waste.

        2. zee

          I used to eat the stuff that came with easy Mac straight as a kid. It’s still fucking delicious tbh

        3. Undrave

          You could try a baked version. https://www.ricardocuisine.com/en/recipes/5006-mac-and-cheese—

      8. thejeff

        Must be the nostalgia, because it’s barely food to me. After all this talk about it, I went out and bought some and had it yesterday. I haven’t had any boxed mac & cheese in a few years and not unmodified for decades and even then it wasn’t Kraft, mostly Annie’s.
        I do see why people who like it don’t go with homemade mac & cheese instead, because they’re really nothing alike, to the point of not even being the same food.

      9. Matthew E Davis

        When I did my postdoc in Canada I had Kraft Dinner on hand as a quick meal, and I can say it’s pretty much the same.

        I did not use ketchup or anything, so maybe that’s what gives it a Canadian twist? I don’t know.

    3. Doctor_Who

      In Ruth’s case, she’s Canadian.It’s something of a national dish, there.

      1. BBCC

        Apparently? I had one friend who ate it a lot and I think my brother sometimes ate it with her but my family didn’t eat it.

    4. Glacidea

      It’s one of the luxury meals of college

      1. Needfuldoer

        Yet it’s cheaper than anything you can get from a dining hall on your mandatory meal plan.

    5. Rose by Any Other Name

      **grabs lapels and shakes all cinematic style**

      I. DON’T. KNOW!

      … also, will say again, for the record – personally can’t stand Kraft Mac and Cheese.

      Love me some quality macaroni with actual cheddar cheese, but I can’t stand that awful cheese sauce.

      1. The Wellerman

        Not even with ketchup or mustard?

        1. SuperZero

          That is absolutely disgusting.

        2. Rose by Any Other Name

          @SuperZero: Agreed. **shudders**

          @The Wellerman: I’m not sure how either of those would help.

        3. Psychie

          I don’t know why, but if it’s just the Kraft and Ketchup, then yeah it’s way worse than no Ketchup, but if you mix in chopped up hot dogs, chicken nuggets, my mother’s meatloaf, or really any other meat, the Ketchup helps to improve the flavor. I sincerely don’t get why chunks of meat changes the math on whether Ketchup is a plus or minus to the flavor, but it does make a difference.

        4. thejeff

          I can kind of see ketchup if you’ve added meat as you say, though I’ve never tried it and am firmly convinced it would be gross in the basic dish.

          Mustard actually goes well with at least homemade versions of mac & cheese. You don’t really taste mustard, it just brings out a bit more cheesy flavor somehow.

      2. thejeff

        They’re not actually the same dish. That’s part of it. Homemade mac & cheese isn’t even a close relative of Kraft Dinner.

    6. Delicious Taffy

      Willis is secretly getting that sweet, sweet Kraft money. /S

      Are there laws governing product placement in webcomics, by the by? I get the impression that they’re still more or less unregulated in most regards.

      1. Rose by Any Other Name

        Huh. You just reminded me of how one time the Kraft company got me fired with a month’s severance a week after I’d given my two week notice.

        1. Roborat

          That sounds like a strange thing to do. Can you elaborate? If you were quitting anyway, why would they give you a paid week off and an additional three weeks pay?

        2. Rose by Any Other Name

          Before I went to grad school, I spent some time working for a conveyor belt company as a phone receptionist/filler of parts orders. Companies would call in, tell me what part they needed, and I would fill out a form on the computer to get that part sent to them (and them billed for it).

          One day, a rep from Kraft called. They didn’t have a parts number and tried to describe the part to me by shape. I was like ‘sorry, I’m just a receptionist – I have no idea what the parts look like, and the guy who does is at lunch, so you’ll have to call back.’

          Instead of doing so, they called my boss’s boss and complained about me. They insisted that I be fired for ‘being rude’.

          Meanwhile, I’d been accepted to the aforementioned grad school and had informed my boss months in advance that I would be leaving, and when. I’d given already handed in my two-weeks notice and everything.

          So, I came in to work on Friday four days later… and get taken aside by my boss. My boss was super cool and really liked me cause I did a good job as was very nice to everyone (which is why they knew it was BS that I was rude), so they decided to honor the letter of the law and ‘fire’ me so that I would get severance rather than accept my already given resignation. However, that did mean that I had to leave that day and not come back for my last week.

          So someone at Kraft being a jerk gave my cool boss the ability to give me a nice monetary sendoff.

        3. Ana Chronistic

          Nice! If only every “tattle to the manager” attempt ended so well for the employee ?

    7. Amelie Wikström

      I guess to a lot of people it’s comforting, a taste familiar from childhood triggering uncomplicated pre-verbal memories of happiness, security, familial love; what they call “comfort food”.

    8. MDFification

      Kraft Dinner was invented during the Great Depression, and basically became the staple food of the Canadian working class. To this day we consume more mac n cheese per capita than any other country.

      1. Undrave

        Then they came up with that cotton candy flavored one…

    9. Dave

      Author bias. Willis loves them some Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and has even forked over the big bucks for limited edition Kraft.

    10. Sporky

      Willis famously loves garbage food. He brings up Taco Bell all the time and you’re all surprised he loves Kraft mac & cheese?

      1. The Wellerman

        Stop saying “garbage food”.

        I know it doesn’t have whatever number of essential nutrients, but what has everything really, and it just sounds so wrong, you know?

        1. Sporky

          Don’t get me wrong – I love garbage food too. I love Kraft mac and cheese and Taco Bell.

    11. Just_IDD

      the pasta sucks the sauce is ok. Like any college food its high in salt to balance the high levels of sugar intake you have from the rest of your diet.

    12. TheScreenJockey

      A LOT of it is nostalgia. For many North Americans, Kraft Dinner/Mac is one of the first cooked meals they were capable of preparing themselves and it being pretty consistently good, so it takes you back to whatever age you were when you first started using the stove.

    13. JA

      When you’re a starving college kid, Kraft macaroni may as well be gold. With pizza rolls, ramen, and hot pockets being their own respective precious metals.

    14. Alan Lafond

      Yes, it is. Fool’s Gold. 😛

      Ruth was wrong. They didn’t ruin Kraft Dinner. Kraft ruined Kraft Dinner. The stuff used to be good, now it tastes (and smells) nasty, and the noodles have no sense of cohesion. They literally fall apart into mush when you cook them. President’s Choice has sealed the final nail in their coffin by producing a FAR SUPERIOR mac’n’cheese product.

    15. moriarty70

      It’s the taste of childhood. The nostalgia is part of the appeal. The night before my dad died, after my wife and I went to be there, even though he was sedated, we grabbed some for dinner that night. There was comfort and safety in the familiar.

  4. Doctor_Who

    But she’ll still eat Kraft Dinner. And buy really expensive ketchups for it. Dijon ketchups!

    1. The Wellerman

      And mustard for that sharp-cheddar flavor!!!

      1. John Smith

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmoDc3RwrMM

    2. masterpi

      In a real green dress!

      1. Dragonfire

        That’s cruel.

      2. Laura

        I attended a Barenaked Ladies concert as a teen. The audience showered them in tiny dried boxed macaroni noodles. But most boxes were donated at the door to the food bank, not thrown.

        1. Matthew E Davis

          By the time I saw my concert with them they’d streamlined that donation system so that pretty much all the boxes went to the food bank.

    3. Jeff K!

      She can keep them in the tree fort in her yard, in the little tiny fridge in there somewhere!

      1. Audkitten

        With the little pre-wrapped sausages, but not the pre-wrapped bacon

        1. The Wellerman

          Canadian bacon, right? ?

  5. RassilonTDavros

    “You ruined it. You ruined it and I’m leaving.”

  6. Subjektivity

    How are you all writing from the future?! Its still 11:56 on Jan 12th

    1. Subjektivity

      It happened to me too! Its a wormhole!

      1. King Daniel

        There’s a reason the Doctor numbers among our commenters.

        1. Doctor_Who

          It’s Ana’s fault. They we’rent satisfied with posting at 12:00:00.0001, no. Had to be even earlier. Now all of the polarity is reversed. All of it, I say!

        2. Roborat

          Was the apostrophe placement deliberate or a typo?

    2. Thag Simmons

      The site clock is out of sync.

    3. Needfuldoer

      Actually it’s December 409th, 2020. 🙁

      1. Chris

        I thought it was March 684th, 2020.

        1. thejeff

          It’s actually September 10362nd, 1993.

  7. alongcameaspider

    Willis be honest this whole plotline was a buildup to this joke wasn’t it

  8. BBCC

    This is a mortal sin. Not against the Christian God, but against Ruth, and her retaliation tends to be more immediate.

    1. Kyrik Michalowski

      I far more concerned about insulting Ruth than any deity.

      Maybe she is a deity and we just don’t know it yet.

      1. Thag Simmons

        She did die for our sins. You could make a religion out of this

        1. Needfuldoer

          no don’t

    2. Reltzik

      What’s worse, it’s a mortal sin against KM&C. Ruth might be wrathful, but some things are SACRED.

  9. alongcameaspider

    It occurs to me that Ruth doesn’t know about Joyce’s Atheism yet so she may think the music is her doing

    Whether that matters at all I have no idea

    1. Some1

      But I thought the music was her doing? That was what the “I don’t know any other music” yesterday seemed to imply.

      1. alongcameaspider

        That was in response to Dorothy saying she could change the music

        The orientation of the hand in the first panel, position of the phone on the table in subsequent panels, and Becky’s smugness/Joyce’s exacerbation all imply it was Becky who started the music

      2. Needfuldoer

        Becky started playing Rich Mullins as a passive-aggressive dig at Joyce.

        Joyce got irritated because she likes his music but not necessarily his messages anymore.

        Dorothy suggested playing something else, then Joyce realized all the music she knows is from the contemporary Christian genre.

  10. General Tekno

    Kraft Dinner’s alright, but President’s Choice macaroni and cheese is a better Canadian mac and cheese product.

    1. Ryek Hvek

      but if it’s Canadian, shouldn’t it be Prime Minister’s Choice?

      1. General Tekno

        I’ve always assumed the “President” in this case is the head of Loblaws, who owns/sells the President’s Choice brand (in addition to “No Name”, which, yes, is also a brand sold in grocery stores up here).

        1. Victor

          Bob sells mac & cheese now?

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwWAsNZTnug

  11. Dragonfire

    I was just thinking to myself yesterday (while making a box of KD for dinner) that Ruth needed to put in an appearance in this scene simply for the excuse to have the proper name Kraft Dinner show up somewhere.

    Thanks, Willis.

  12. AbacusWizard

    are… are those actual lyrics?

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Usually.

      1. Thag Simmons

        This comic generally doesn’t fuck around about the things Evangelical Christians believe and say

        1. Needfuldoer

          Or Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Dinner.

    2. Harry Johnston

      Apparently so.

      The phrase “suspiciously specific denial” springs to mind.

      1. Delicious Taffy

        “I did not make it, it’s not true! I did not make it! I did not! Oh hai, Mark 14:68.”

    3. Keulen

      Sadly, a lot of songs that fundie Christians like have lyrics like that. Which is why I generally can’t stand that music, despite liking almost every other genre of music.

      1. thejeff

        It’s funny because I don’t like any of the (limited) Contemporary Christian music I’ve heard, but I do like a lot of older gospel stuff, despite obviously having strongly religious lyrics.

        1. Scoutinthenight

          It’s been decades since I escaped the fundie life, but my memories of the majority of Contemporary Christian music were of less talented musicians aping popular secular bands. It was a cheap knock off aimed at a specific audience. Older Gospel was aimed at the same audience, but was it’s own thing rather than trying to cut into a niche audience in an existing genre.
          That might be why it’s more palatable.

  13. taekwondogirl

    Is “Kraft Dinner” a local way to refer to it? I’ve legit never encountered anyone who called it this until this story arc. It’s just “Kraft mac & cheese” or maybe even “blue box mac & cheese”; the latter of which always makes me pause for a second.

    1. Rose by Any Other Name

      I have never heard of it referred to as such.

    2. Scoops!

      It’s Canadian.

      1. Scoops!

        I went back to check and Joyce and Becky have been calling it macaroni and cheese this whole time.

    3. angie

      it’s a canadian thing pretty sure. every single person I know irl calls it kraft dinner. I only ever see people call it kraft mac & cheese online. sounds like a weirdly formal way to address it to me lmao

      1. The Wellerman

        “You know I love a Kraft Dinner, Philip!!!”

        1. Deanatay

          “Yes, Terrance, it’s been a long day, and only Kraft Dinna can calm my nerves.”

      2. SuperZero

        So wait, just saying what it is (shortening the words, even) is “formal,” but calling by some weird title isn’t?

        1. John Smith

          It’s not a weird title, it’s literally what that product is branded as in Canada. So yeah, it sounds a bit weird to hear “Kraft Mac and Cheese,” in the same way it sounds a little weird to hear “Mars Chocolate Bar.”

        2. angie

          yeah what @John Smith said, calling it Kraft Mac & Cheese sounds like saying Kellogs Rice Krispies Cereal instead of just calling it rice krispies. like what are you the marketing text on an advertisement? don’t forget your little ®™ at the end. plus yeah the box actually says kraft dinner in canada

        3. thejeff

          So are other boxed macaroni and cheese products also called [Brand Name] Dinner? Or are they just mac&cheese while Kraft is special?

          Rice Krispies gets away with it, because its trademarked. There aren’t competing Rice Krispies. Normally down here, we’d just talk about mac & cheese, then add the brand name if we needed to distinguish which one.

          The Canadian approach is better marketing really, since you need to use the brand name at all times, as just having “Dinner” doesn’t tell you much.

        4. angie

          no that’s only kraft dinner that’s [brand] dinner. in my experience every other brand of boxed mac & cheese isn’t significant enough in the public consciousness to really have a specific way that they’re referred to by regular people. I genuinely could not name a single other brand of boxed mac and cheese from memory. when I hear “mac & cheese” I think the home made stuff, “kraft dinner” is the boxed stuff, and everything else is just whatever you need to say so the person you’re talking to knows that it’s not home made or kraft dinner

          though I have heard people say things like “[brand that is not kraft] kraft dinner”. like cheetos came out with a product called “cheetos mac & cheese”, but everyone I know calls it “cheetos kraft dinner” because kraft dinner is so strongly associated with cheap box-style mac & cheese. I think most people just assume the product is a collab between kraft and cheetos because who else is making boxed mac and cheese if not kraft. I know that’s what I thought at first.

          it also did take me a significant part of my life to realize that when americans talk about loving mac and cheese, they often mean kraft dinner and not home made stuff. they’re like,, not the same food.

        5. angie

          which I think also plays back into my example of kelloggs rice krispies cereal. sure there are other crisp rice cereals out there, but they’re not The Crisp Rice Cereal so it feels excessive to use the full name. there are other boxed mac & cheeses but nobody cares about them (even though they probably taste better than regular KD) and unless you personally buy and eat those brands most people wouldn’t know them

        6. angie

          OKAY ANOTHER EXAMPLE I know a lot of vagans and sometimes they’ll buy this vegan mac & cheese and I don’t think any of us could tell you the brand without looking at the box. it’s not from kraft but we all call it “vegan kraft dinner”

        7. thejeff

          I guess the difference then is that while Kraft is strongly associated with boxed mac & cheese in the US, it’s not nearly so strongly linked as it is in Canada. No one here would ever say “Cheetos Kraft Macaroni and Cheese”.

        8. thejeff

          Basically it’s the Kleenex problem. Where a brand becomes so associated with a kind of product that it become a generic term for that product.

          That’s not the case in the US for Kraft Dinner. It’s just another brand of mac and cheese.

        9. dn

          “[Brand that is not Kraft] Kraft Dinner”? Kind of like how all fizzy drinks in the US South are referred to as “Coke” no matter the actual brand or flavor?

        10. angie

          I’d say it’s more similar to the kleenex analogy than the coke analogy. if you asked the average person to name as many brands of tissues as they can, how many could name more than kleenex? most people don’t know any brands other than kraft dinner. vs if you asked somebody how many soft drinks they could name, I sure nearly everyone could name more than just coke (though I’m not familiar with areas where they call everything coke so idk maybe it is the same thing over there)

          as an aside, I’m also from an area where they’re isn’t really a universal agreement on what term to call softs drinks. it seems most people lean towards pop, but saying pop feels kinda wrong but saying soda feels fake too. I just avoid it entirely by saying carbonated beverages in a deliberately goofy way so I don’t have to commit to either

      3. Roborat

        I mostly hear it referred to as KD.

    4. Swissaboo

      Apparently yes:
      “The product known as Kraft Dinner (KD) in Canada, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese in the United States and Australia, and Macaroni Cheese in the United Kingdom is […]”

      1. Bicycle Bill

        From wikipedia (which is apparently what Swissaboo was quoting as well):
        “… a nonperishable, packaged dry macaroni product by Kraft Foods Group, traditionally cardboard-boxed with dried macaroni pasta and a packet of processed cheese powder. It was first introduced under the Kraft Dinner name simultaneously in both Canada and the U.S. in 1937.”

        So Kraft Dinner was its original name.  I’m assuming that it was changed to specifically become “Macaroni and Cheese” around 1975, the same time a version with spiral-shaped noodles debuted and they needed a way to differentiate the two.

        1. Needfuldoer

          Down here in Freedomland we like our product names clunky and descriptive, except when they use sensationalized spelling to get around food labeling laws. (See boneless frozen “chicken wyngz”.)

        2. StClair

          As a Yank and a fussy grammar person, “Kraft Dinner” sounds weird to me for a few reasons:
          (1) it implies that you can only have it for dinner;
          (2) it implies that it is their only product which can be eaten for dinner; and
          (3) while I admit this one’s a bit more of a stretch, it could be taken as a claim that it is a complete dinner.

          (with regard to #3, see also the common cereal advertisement tagline “part of this complete breakfast”, which is often and IMO more truthfully rephrased as “adjacent to this complete breakfast.”)

        3. bhtooefr

          Do note that in plenty of rural cultures in North America, the three meals of the day are breakfast, dinner, and supper. (Nowadays, in those rural areas, “lunch” is widely understood as a mid-day meal and “supper” is widely understood as a late meal, but especially when talking to an elderly person, “dinner” absolutely needs to be clarified with a time of day to determine context.)

          AFAIK this is because historically, dinner was the main meal of the day, but over time got shifted to later and later, such that a meal was needed between breakfast and dinner (and supper became a midnight (or later) snack)… except in those rural cultures where dinner and supper kept their times, but supper eventually became the main meal anyway.

          All of this means that in cultures that still use “supper”, “dinner” and “supper” are effectively synonyms, and “dinner” becomes acceptable for both lunch and dinner, and I wonder if that’s influencing it – some of those cultures are in Canada (although my direct experience with them is from family in north central Ohio).

        4. wwwhhattt

          So in the UK a roast dinner can be eaten at lunchtime, and the evening meal has wildly different names depending on the place. We always call it tea, which is not confusing at all.

        5. dn

          I was always under the impression that “tea” in most European cultures meant a light meal, or at least a substantial snack, taken in the mid-to-late afternoon, and clearly separate from the main evening meal eaten later. That’s what it always meant to my German grandmother, who immigrated to the US in the Fifties but continued throughout her life to sit down for tea around 4pm or so, usually with a Danish or some other sweet pastry type of snack (she basically lived for this, it was more or less her main subsistence during her last years of life).

        6. Agemegos

          When I was growing up our main meals were breakfast, lunch, and tea. Tea was often a large hunk of roast beast with potatoes, gravy, and vegetables.

          In the surrounding society, Catholics had breakfast, dinner, and tea, but Protestants had breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The light meal or substantial snack taken in the mid-afgernoon was “afternoon tea”, and one in the morning was “smoko” for outdoor and factory workers, “morning tea” at home and for office workers and in public schools, and “little lunch” for Catholic school children.

    5. michaelinasmeal

      Kraft Dinner is what its called in Canada. not a nickname for it, like literally on the box

    6. The Wellerman

      “Kraft Dinner” is the common Canadian way of referring to it.

      It’s kind of like how that which is called a “biscuit” in the U.K. is called a “cookie” in the U.S.

    7. Delicious Taffy

      I also cannot wait to inform you that Canada exists.

      1. Spencer

        We’re actually just a tax haven. Someone made a whole fake country back in the 70s and it just spiraled out of hand.

        1. Azhrei Vep

          Which ’70s?

        2. Agemegos

          1770s

        3. Delicious Taffy

          Oh, sorta like how about 2/3rds of the video game industry is somehow simultaneously based in a single storage unit in Holland so that we’re literally paying Electronic Arts to make games, using our tax dollars, while they pay essentially $0 in taxes per year and still get a refund.

  14. Mr D

    Y’know, down here in chile, we do not have much Mac and Cheese.
    What we do eat, is Caracoquesos.

    (Same thing, but with different pasta.)

    (My parents loved me too much to make that, they made actual food)

    1. JessWitt

      Roughly translated, does it mean “cheesy shells” or “cheesy jackets”? The “caraco-” part confuses me.

      1. Delicious Taffy

        “Caraco” is a German verb meaning “Eggs”.

        1. Agemegos

          Verb? As in “John eggs Michael’s house”? As in “John eggs Mary on to all sorts of naughtiness”?

        2. Findus

          Hmm no, where did you get that from? German person here, and I’ve never heard the word “Caraco”.

        3. Yumi

          It’s a joke.

        4. Delicious Taffy

          Yeah, like those pictures of Professor X with a quote from Obi-Wan Kenobi, which is then attributed to Gandalf, who is then claimed to be from Spider-Man 2. Except with IRL languages and grammar.

        5. Agemegos

          Ah!

        6. Findus

          I see… didn’t recognise that, sry

  15. anonymsly

    Watch the ruination of Kraft Dinner get blamed on Joyce. After all, of COURSE the fundie weirdo is the one playing the Christian music. Then, watch no one point out that Becky chose it specifically as a nasty dig. And then watch Becky chortle at the chaos she hath wrought.

    I am aware that my prediction is unfair, but coming as it does after a whole string of ‘Joyce should shut up and knuckle under because Poor Becky’ and ‘have you tried maybe not having an identity crisis’ strips I don’t think it’s impossible.

    1. alongcameaspider

      I could see other people in the hall getting in some digs making fun of “Joyce’s music” until she finally gets frustrated and loudly yells that she’s not Christian anymore and Becky is the one who is playing the music and that’s how other characters find out

  16. kater

    Fee Fie Foe Fum I smell kraft dinnah

  17. Slartibeast Button, BIA

    Is it acceptable to flavor KM&C with femur marrow?

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Marrow is just nature’s imitation cheese.

    2. The Wellerman

      Why not?

      I recently discovered ketchup and mustard in it, which didn’t even make any sense to me until now, but it was nonetheless very tasty!

      1. Delicious Taffy

        I can smell the albinism from here, yankee.

        1. The Wellerman

          Human, I’m afraid my origins cannot be categorized so easily.

        2. The Wellerman

          Wait, you like M&C like that too?!?!

        3. Delicious Taffy

          No, unfortunately. I like it with chipotle seasoning (boiled into the noodles) and tuna.l, though. I’m sure someone would despise it.

  18. AutobotDen

    …I put ketchup on mine. *runs*

  19. Juanoku

    “WHAT ELSE MUST YOU TAKE FROM ME”

  20. Reltzik

    A1 would have been a better garnish.

    1. Delicious Taffy

      What fer? I don’t think Kraft makes pork chops. Probably because they’re cowards.

      1. Reltzik

        A1 would have been a better garnish for Mac’n’cheese than Christian music.

    2. Roborat

      I put salsa on mine.

  21. lia

    serendipitous canadian immigrant content with questionable content tonite

    1. Amós Batista

      Absolutely Willis and Jaques are combining things between them.

      1. alongcameaspider

        I dont have much to add here but I would lime to say that I would kill and/or die for Emmet

  22. Bagge

    You can still back out, Ruth

  23. Rose Red

    Also does this imply that they’ve just been silent for the three musical phrases since Ruth stuck her head in? No one even said “hi” to her? Was the power of the awkwardness that strong?

    1. Rose Red

      And, if I were Joyce, this is the point at which I break down crying.

      (I doubt Joyce will – she’s much more towards the Fight end of the scale and I’m much more on the Flight end.)

    2. Needfuldoer

      It’s impolite to talk with your mouth full.

      1. Rose Red

        Right. That makes sense. Different cultures.

        1. The Wellerman

          Eh, “””social cues””” are a frickin guessing game anyway.

  24. Laura

    Ok, this strip made me run out and put mac n cheese on the shopping list!

  25. brumagem

    Our recipe for “Stuff”:
    -One Mac n Cheese (Kraft is good, but homemade fancy is better)
    -Some sliced cylinder meat (hot dog, chorizo, kielbasa, whatever)
    -Some peas (frozen vs canned is a hot debate in our house)
    -A healthy squirt of mustard

    1. Michelle J. Caboose

      Hmm… I love chorizo. Never thought of putting it in mac & cheese before. Sounds delicious.
      I may have to make some mac & cheese tonight, and try it out.

    2. Dara

      We call this “glop” and make it about every two weeks xD

      1. Dara

        Oh good having to reinstall Firefox has put me in the moderation queue again

        willis-sensei please let me out of moderation jail tyyyyyyyyy

  26. Sarah

    I’m just impressed Ruth recognized the Jesus tunes BEFORE god was mentioned

  27. NinjaNick

    Can you find better music suggestions, Ruth?

    1. Needfuldoer

      Literally anything that’s not whitelisted by Carol Brown.

    2. Agemegos

      Laughin’ Len Cohen’s Cohen Live.

  28. acher4

    Her cute little smile evaporating through the panels,
    is a true crime against humanity. 🙁

  29. Sombrero

    Becky (checks phone): Hey, I’ve got a message from Kraft!!

    Joyce & Dorothy: What?

    Becky: It’s a cease and desist letter.

  30. Rabid Rabbit

    Alt-text: Well, frankly, Willis, I should think it’s much easier to ruin Kraft Dinner than to make it edible.

    1. Azhrei Vep

      I’m pretty sure it’s not even possible to make Kraft Dinner/Mac ‘n Cheese edible without getting into a Ship of Theseus situation.

  31. Marrow

    The name of this strip is KD-2. What’s KD-1? :O

    1. Amós Batista

      I don’t know. But the KD-1 is here: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/02-that-perfect-girl/kd/

    2. Needfuldoer

      The one where Joyce fantasizes about being a fighter pilot.

      https://www.dumbingofage.com/kd/

      You can actually put any comic title immediately after dumbingofage.com/ like that, and the site’s content engine will figure it out!

      1. The Wellerman

        You know what I’d like?

        An actual instruction guide on how to use this site. That’d be nice.

      2. Marrow

        Huh, didn’t know that. Thank you!

  32. Spencer

    The surreal moment for me is that every preceding strip I thought they were saying Kraft Dinner in the dialogue bubbles. My Canadian brain just refused to accept otherwise.

  33. someone

    Ruth: “You’ve ruined Kraft dinner.”
    Mullins: “It is the very truth of God” [that they have ruined Kraft dinner].

  34. Alan in DC

    Read the ingredients.

    Kraft Dinner ruined itself.

  35. Rabisch

    When Ruth is right, she’s right.

  36. DarkoNeko

    a smiling Ruth ! a smiling Ruth ! this is not an exercice !

  37. AlexaSpuds

    I love the cute tiny triangle smile Ruth displayed before her usual disappointment

    1. Amós Batista

      so precious

  38. Samuel Larkin

    I am thinking about buying your Winnie The Pooh shirt. However, can you please explain the Pineapple slut sign? Thanks.

    1. someone

      Perhaps an obscure reference to a long dead webcomic about a prequel to The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion.

    2. Myles Adams

      Brooklyn nine nine reference. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DwmSpzkWoAAJawF?format=jpg&name=4096×4096

  39. TallPacked

    Jesus loves me, this I know
    Cuz my pasta is Elbow.

  40. Amós Batista

    Ruth’s changing her temper is like the Mr. Incredible meme.

  41. Spencer

    Adding anything to Kraft Dinner is the food equivalent of all that CGI bullshit in the Star Wars remasters.

    I will accept zero criticism of this assessment.

    1. Sombrero

      The Ruining KD Trilogy:

      1. The Mullins Menace.
      2. Attack of the Mustard.
      3. Revenge of the RA.

    2. zee

      I’m curious
      Thoughts on Easy Mac?

      (Easy meal of the gods, make with a cup of milk instead of ⅓cup water and i would literally inject that cheesey soup into my veins)

      1. Spencer

        I’m too loyal to the brand.

        (and also have not eaten it since I was like 15 maybe)

    3. King Daniel

      KD without additives is an abomination. I have spoken.

      1. Spencer

        There can be no peace between us.

  42. Alan in DC

    Y’know that packet of powdered cheese mix? The orange stuff?

    From 2016-20, the same stuff was used as TV foundation makeup for Donald Trump.

    1. Michelle J. Caboose

      Still is.

  43. egg egg

    This comic has been making me really want mac and cheese for the last couple days. Yesterday I tried to just have buttered elbow noodles with sprinkle parmesan (was only allowed bland foods due to food poisoning) but the craving of authentic mac and cheese is real.

  44. Yumi

    I know what Kraft Dinner is now, of course, but when I was younger and first heard it (in the Barenaked Ladies song), I assumed it was a brand of, like, microwave dinners. The kind with multiple sections for different foods. This wasn’t helped by the following line about ketchup, because while I firmly support adding things to macaroni and cheese, I never would have thought of adding ketchup– even Dijon ketchup– to it. Which might not be what they mean in the song, but was my understanding of it.

    Anyway, I’m going to go cook a box of macaroni and cheese now because damn this comic.

    1. angie

      no that is what they mean in the song. my mom puts ketchup in her KD and I used to too growing up until I decided I liked it better plain.

      also gets me thinking about how we have ketchup chips but americans don’t, and apparently dipping grilled cheese in ketchup is a canadian thing too. maybe canadians just like ketchup in general more?? I remember however many years back lays had a contest for uniquely canadian chip flavours and grilled cheese with ketchup was one of the finalists.

      (btw if you ever get your hands on a bag of maple moose chips from that contest don’t open it. aside from the fact that they’d be expired by now, they smelt almost as horrible as they tasted)

      1. Uly

        Some Americans have access to ketchup chips. I can get them sometimes here in NYC.

        1. angie

          oh yeah I think I’ve heard that. when I visit my bf in NJ I see all dressed chips sometimes too, though they’re usually marketed as “from canada!” on the packaging. p sure salt and vinegar chips are normal there now too, even if yours are red wine vinegar instead of white vinegar (I seem to recall them not being in the US at all when I was a kid). I remember going on trips to the US with my parents as a kid and they’d let us get whatever chips we wanted, but the only two of my six favourite flavours they ever had were BBQ and origional. our chip selection is slowly permeating the US market

        2. Roborat

          You should check the demographics of the areas carrying the chips, I suspect there would be a strong Canadian immigrant/retiree correlation. Something similar happened in Phoenix, Canadian snowbirds were complaining about the taste of American beef, so Kroger brought in Canadian beef, and it caught on with the locals to the point that the local restaurants make a point of saying they have Canadian beef now.

      2. Yumi

        Idk, what does the tomato soup market look like up there/over there? I dip my grilled cheese in tomato soup, as is common in my experience, so I guess I could see ketchup as an alternative. Think I’d prefer the soup, though.

        1. angie

          can’t speak for everyone, but I know in my family the meal is usually tomato soup with crackers + grilled cheese dipped in ketchup. they go together as part of the same meal but the soup isn’t for dipping grilled cheese.

          actually it occurs to me now that I don’t know a single thing about the grilled cheese customs of anyone other than my immediate family so I assume dipping in tomato soup is common as well. tomato soup is definitely popular here, we have a big section for it at the grocery store. all I know is that dipping in ketchup is also common enough that it’s like A Thing that canadians do

          personally I prefer ketchup for grilled cheese because it’s thicker than soup, and I like my soup to have more goldfish crackers in it than soup. tbh not a fan of the liquid nature of soups in general

        2. angie

          okay I asked two other canadians that I’m not related to and one said he used to as a kid but had so much ketchup as a kid he can barely stand it anymore so he dips in soup now, and the other said dipping in ketchup normally, dipping in soup if feeling fancy (which I assume fancy=willing to make two food items for a meal)

  45. zee

    I just woke up from a dream that included lots of things, the final one being that i was one of Mike’s highschool friends. He rearranged the apps on my phone’s home screen while i was in the bathroom as a final act of assholery before he left for college. I told him I’d probably be the only one to say this, but i was gonna miss him. I thought he was fun and to keep up being a dick. He seemed really touched and gave me a big hug. I woke up smiling.

    Pretty weird but Mike was like a worse version of some of my highschool friends, and it’s been literal years since i hugged a friend, so I’m kinda just riding high from that part

    1. Axel_Grease

      Wow that comment hit me right in the feels.

    2. King Daniel

      …out of curiosity, do you remember if Mike looked “realistic” in the dream, or were you “comicified” instead?

      1. misanthropope

        …. plays “Take on me” on the hacked muzak?

      2. zee

        Mike was a real tan blonde guy who looked nothing like in comic mike but my brain assigned him the role of Mike Warner

  46. Valentein

    canadian senses tingling

  47. Kazuma Taichi

    Uh, I don’t think I’ve ever heard any Canadian say the full phrase “Kraft Dinner”. Pretty sure we all just call it “KD” (Kay Dee). Granted I’m from west Canada so maybe things are different in Ontario.

    1. Spencer

      what fucking space alien calls it kd

    2. Spencer

      I knew western Canada was a hive of villains, but I didn’t know how deep it went!

    3. Roborat

      From Alberta and I can second that.

    4. Emily

      Same here. Also Western Canadian.

      It’s either regular old “macaroni and cheese,” “mac and cheese,” or “KD.” Not a lot of “Kraft Dinner” going on.

  48. modulusshift

    Man that Mullins song is a banger.

    1. Roborat

      If you mean the urge to destroy the phone with a hammer, sure.

  49. Huehuetotl

    ichthus that says: ΚΡΑΦΤ

  50. RoyanRannedos

    Becky: We wouldn’t have to eat Kraft dinner, but we’d still eat Kraft dinner.

    Joyce: Of course we would, we’d just eat more.

    Becky: And we’d pair it with all those fancy ketchups!

    Joyce:…

    Becky: DIJON KETCHUP! MMMMM!

  51. nothri

    I am unfamiliar with this singer. He sounds terrible. Like, even compared to normal christian rock, this seems bad.

  52. Tomn

    I know it’s more likely that nobody noticed Ruth poking her head in, but I like to imagine that everyone stopped and stared at her in silent panic for the entire duration of this strip, a tableau of frozen Kraft diners listening to Jesus rock.

  53. TheMirai

    The specifics of Ruth’s canadianness coming out by calling it “Kraft Dinner” and not “mac and cheese” is very observed.

  54. 80-watt Hamster

    You can’t ruin KD. It’s already terrible.

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