20 Things You Somehow Missed In Napoleon Dynamite

Jon Gries (Uncle Rico) noticeably wipes his mouth following each bite of his character’s beloved food (and projectile) steak. This is not to show the character saving the juices, but rather that Gries is spitting the steak out. In one of the scenes, close-watching viewers will notice him spitting chewed meat into his hand.

At the time of filming, Gries was either a vegetarian or not eating red meat (depending on the source). Either way, he would chew the steak and keep it in his mouth until an opportune time to spit it out presented itself. Perhaps in a movie with a higher budget a meat substitute would’ve been offered, nevertheless, Gries took one for the project. 

Though not enamoured by the culinary offering of steak, Gries still described the scene where he uses it to injure his on-screen nephew as his “greatest moment in acting.”