/download (1).webp "Under the handle @FastFoodLegend, Sam Pocker has built a name for himself on TikTok, where his videos of condiment-drenched fast foods intermittently go viral. Maintaining that momentum is hard, time-consuming work.(Brian Contreras / Los Angeles Times)")
In the parking lot of a southeast Los Angeles Jack in the Box, Sam Pocker offers me some advice: In dealing with the fast-food chain’s “secret sauce,” refrigeration is key. Leave the packets in a hot car for too long and they’re liable to explode.
“I thought that was a joke,” he tells me as we pull into the drive-through, “until they started fermenting.”
When it comes to condiments, Pocker, 45, doesn’t kid around. They are, after all, his stock in trade, if not quite yet the foundation of his livelihood. Working under the handle @FastFoodLegend, Pocker has intermittently gone viral on TikTok for a series of gross-out videos that find him dumping ungodly amounts of sauces and flavorings atop hot dogs, hamburgers and more, for an effect that’s less appetizing than it is artistic.
