Amy's (Ali Wong) mother is portrayed by veteran Vietnamese American actor and comedian Hong Dao who is mostly known to Vietnamese-speaking audiences globally. Beef serves as Hong Dao's Hollywood and English-speaking screen debut.
The Mystery Woman that Amy sees is modeled after Miss Viola Swamp, a character from the children's book Miss Nelson is Missing! written by Harry Allard and illustrated by James Marshall. At one point in the episode, young Amy is seen reading a copy of the book.
The title of the episode comes from the book "The Ethics of Ambiguity" by feminist author Simone de Beauvoir:
"The drama of original choice is that it goes on moment by moment for an entire lifetime, that it occurs without reason, before any reason, that freedom is there as if it were present only in the form of contingency."
The Obama victory speech on the TV suggests that the opening scene took place on November 5th 2008.