Panera 3 with Kimia Behpoornia

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Check it out on our YouTube channel by going to youtube.com slash Doughboys Media.

In 1981, Texas brothers Daryl Lance Abbott, a guitarist, and Vincent Paul Abbott, a drummer, co-founded a metal band initially called Gemini.

After first rebranding as Eternity, the siblings better known as Dimebag Daryl and Vinnie Paul settled on the name that would go down in heavy metal history, Pantera, pulled from the Italian word for Panther.

Joined by bassist Rex Brown and original vocalist Terry Glaze, Pantera released three albums to middling success before swapping the clean glam tones of Glaze for the guttural growling vocals of new singer Phil Anselmo.

The year was nineteen eighty seven.

Also in nineteen eighty seven, the St.

Louis Bread Company was founded in St.

Louis, though it would gain national prominence when it rebranded to a name that's one letter off of Pantera, pulled from the Spanish word for bread basket.

Both Pantera and its chain bakery simulacrum would see huge success in the early 90s, Pantera with its million-selling albums, Cowboys from Hell and Vulgar Display of Power, and St.

Louis Bread with its multi-million dollar sale to Al Bompin.

However, while the bread company would continue to thrive in subsequent decades, growing to over 2,000 locations in North America, Pantera would collapse under its own weight.

And Selmo's addition to the lineup would ultimately lead to its undoing, with his erratic behavior and far-right politics leading to intra-band tension and then its dissolution in 2003, followed by Deinbag Darrell's tragic murder by a schizophrenic fan the next year.

The bakery has had its own tragedies.

It faced wrongful death suits in 2023 after multiple customers died from consuming its caffeine-loaded charged lemonade.

But for four decades, these two institutions, established the same calendar year, have coexisted in America, occupying vastly different spheres, heavy metal and baked goods, only separated by a single letter T.

This week on Dough Boys, we return once again, not to Pantera, but to Panera.

Welcome to Doughboys, the podcast about chain restaurants.

I'm Tiger Weiger, along with my co-host,

a man with a literal chip on his shoulder, the Spoon Man Mike Mitchell.

All right, that's okay.

That's funny.

The idea of me having a chip on my shoulder is funny.

Yeah, that chip's not there for very long.

It's getting chomped.

Yeah, if I fucking, you're jumping over and chomping it.

Don't forget, he's a big boy, too.

That's true.

I do love him.

Don't forget, listeners.

We got another big boy on the boat.

Big boy who likes to eat.

I thought this would be a fitting roast since it combines two of Mitch's well-known traits, his many grievances, and his messy eating style.

Thanks for all the laughs.

Well, you know, I'll say this: I.

Burger Brigadier for life, Aaron from Ottawa, up in Ontario.

Roast at birdfuck.com.

Are you all right?

I'm fine with the tariffs now.

I was, oh,

no, I'm not all right.

Let's get that clear.

I'm tired.

What the hell?

I'm not, I'm not.

You covered me silently signaling on this audio podcast.

It was the most I ever.

You were Charlie Chaplin-esque.

Like, he was doing weird stuff.

I was trying to get the timer going.

We didn't have the visible.

We used the timer to make sure we're hitting our marks in the record.

I just wanted to make sure it was visible.

What were we talking about?

I already lost my train of thought.

I think I asked you, are you okay?

Yeah, but what was I trying to get into right before?

You were saying the tariffs were good.

All right.

You were saying you're not okay.

Yeah.

Chip on my shoulder.

Chip on your shoulder, yeah.

Oh, I was gonna say I'm not a messy eater.

You're not a messy eater.

I'm not a messy eater.

No, I'm a messier eater than you are.

Yeah, you dropped, you spilled, you did, had multiple spills today.

I got into the studio.

I was here.

I was here before anyone else.

And I, um,

you know, there's no one who actually works at Head Gum is actually here.

So like it was just, it was just me and then Chef Kevin's recording another podcast next door.

So I'm in the kitchen by myself, and I filled a glass of water and then tried to sit down and immediately spilled the entire glass

the full glass of water

bottle and then i dropped well not my my water bottle my yeti uh coffee mug i dropped this on the floor and it made such a large noise like such a loud noise that people asked me if i was okay amelia uh broke a doe boy's glass the other day too i'm telling on you yeah that's true that's fine telling on you on air that's fine that's true it did happen

and we were gonna we're gonna sit her down we're gonna have a big long conversation about it yeah we'll talk about it we'll dock your pay but it's no big deal um So I'm

the roasts are done.

Should we retire the roast at the 10-year mark?

They hurt my feelings.

Maybe, Mitch, maybe we'll, maybe we'll get to a milestone.

Maybe we'll retire the roasts.

Maybe the era of roasts is past.

There was a time when it was like,

maybe we should flip it.

Mitch, you should start doing Roast Wager.

I don't want to do more work.

You know what, though?

I mean,

so.

That is true.

We just have to figure out how it flows because that's how I introduce you right now.

I mean, if you want want to start introducing the show, but that's a lot more work for you.

No, I don't want to do that.

So I am tired.

I'm just going to get that off.

Yeah, you're tired.

You know how I woke up today?

My goddaughter.

Yep, Emmy.

How old's your goddaughter?

She's almost five.

Okay, we may need to bleep her name.

No, we don't.

They said that's okay.

Okay.

My goddaughter Emmy walked in and then crawled up into my bed and then started asking me questions this morning at about 7.45 a.m.

What kind of questions are we talking?

Um,

are you coming with us to Vegas?

We're going to Joshua Tree, we're going to have corn soup.

She was kind of talking about corn soup in Vegas.

I don't know where she got this idea about corn soup and going to Vegas.

We're going to have corn soup.

She was talking about corn soup.

She was up late too last night.

She, she, she, I can't believe she was up so early.

She's a kid's got energy, I guess.

Time difference, probably too.

7:45 is 10:45 a.m.

to her.

No, she's

from the Bay Area.

Yeah,

um, but uh, but yeah, she she uh she was just asking me all sorts of questions and where's Wally and Irma?

Which...

Wally and Irma, your cats.

Wally and Irma.

Very close to where's Wally though?

Wally and Irma, they kept him in my room

and

I had to keep them in my room.

Like I closed the door and kept him in my room and Wally

was just crying all night long.

And this is one of the things I might cut just to give you a heads up.

But I was, I have a big closet and I was like, yeah, sure.

Can I put wally in my he sleeps in there all the time i was like can i just put him in my closet is this okay i put him in my closet and i feel bad after one minute but he goes quiet and then i'm also like is he okay i google is it bad to put your cat in a closet

a million people are like that's cat abuse so i was like okay i mean he sleeps in there he's got a bed he sleeps in there it's a big it's a big enough you make fun of my stairs i got a huge closet too create dogs all the time so closets actually probably more space i put the kitty litter in there i put food in there i was there was I was like, just because I think if he doesn't see me, and then it did work immediately, he stopped meowing, but I just felt bad.

So I opened the door and then it just was chaos the rest of the night, basically.

So I got very little sleep.

That's a bummer.

And also, I'm a single, I'm a bachelor, as they say, even though I don't like that term.

I don't like that term, but I am a bachelor.

I'm a single man.

And Emmy.

Why don't you like the term bachelor?

Does it sound like a bad thing?

It makes me sound like up to no good.

Yeah, it's easy.

Right.

Like you're a little lecherous.

Yeah, yeah.

Like you're on the prowl.

Yeah.

So we're in bachelor Bachelor on the town.

Ladies, lock up your daughters.

Yes.

That sort of thing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I got it.

Yeah.

Lock up your doors, put them in the closet, put some food in a litter box in there for them.

But

I don't, you know, I don't deal with.

Look, a bachelor is just not.

I'm not going out on the town.

No, you're not that.

You're like,

you're a man who lives alone, I guess is the way.

That's more.

That sounds pretty.

You're by yourself.

Our guests reacted to that in a way where I feel like I shouldn't.

You're flying solo.

I'm flying solo.

That's great.

I'm like Maverick.

Look, that's a great thing because with Maverick, it definitely doesn't seem to be about, you know, like

bringing ladies back.

He seems very on his own work.

He's focused on his work.

Like Ethan Hunt, another Tom Black.

Like Ethan Hunt.

Yes, yes.

They're focused on this.

I got the two.

I got Wally and Irma.

Well, like Ethan Hunts?

Save it for the last roast.

You don't have to get rid of the roast.

What else are we going to do?

We might get rid of the roast.

We can get rid of the roast.

Hit him with the drop him.

I know where we're behind.

We're going to introduce our guests.

Turn him into toasts.

Anyway, here's the drop.

Wow.

Got some joke about me eating toast or something piece of shit.

Well, not anymore.

You're doing great.

You're doing great.

I couldn't think of the word quality.

How about 15 seconds of me huffing and puffing?

Okay, I was already going to blow my house down.

This is, this is very, this is, it's very, is that from the piggies thing the the uh

I think that's a little older than that okay than the piggies thing, but I mean also I would not be surprised.

Oh, Rachel Bilson just walked by.

Yeah, how about that?

Uh you never know what's gonna happen.

He already had to gum

you want to take that again?

No

yeah, it's funny.

You see more and more famous good-looking people and less and less schlubby podcasters walking through the door here at Headgum.

Pretty soon our studio is going to be a closet.

Shove the doughboys in there.

They're looking through the window.

They're like, they're using the litter box already

immediately.

Okay.

Winter, winter breath drop.

Longtime listener, first-time dropper.

Here's a chilly drop for the winter season.

Zach.

Okay.

He gave his last name.

Should I say it?

Yeah.

Or Zach

Zweffler.

Okay.

Anyways.

Not a very seasonal drop, I will will say.

No, but it works for sick because I am.

I am tired.

Yeah.

Also, I just want to say this quickly.

Yeah.

Emmy is in my house and she's screaming last night.

And I am like, oh, great.

Like the man that everyone knows lives alone.

There's just a child screaming emanating from his house, which did not make me feel, you know.

I was like, oh, I want to go outside and be like, there's like my friends are here.

There's a kid, you know, whatever.

I'm like Maverick.

I'm like Maverick.

It's not anything weird.

Mitch, we got to drops at birdfucking.com.

We got to introduce our guests, but you mentioned corn soup in Vegas.

That's what Emmy is looking for.

Don't even tell me that there is corn soup.

Hold on.

I looked it up.

I was like, are there places known for sweet corn in Vegas?

Joelle Rubouchon, which I think is like the most expensive restaurant in the city at the MGM Grand, has a sweet corn bisque on its tasting menu.

And then Estatario Milos,

I butcher the pronunciation, I'm sure, but I've actually been to this restaurant and they have a corn soup as part of a seasonal course.

But another option that came up,

today's chain, which has several locations in Vegas and is known for its summer corn chowder.

Did Emmy know I was gonna, we were talking about Panera?

I would hope she never would know about the podcast.

I'll never let her know.

Wow.

Mitch, very excited to have today's guest in our main feed from Abbott Elementary and my divorce party, Kimia Bapornia.

Hi, Kimia.

Thanks so much for being here.

Hey, thank you so much.

Thank you for coming back.

What a treat.

We had you in the Patreon feed last year.

You joined us for the Doughboys double.

We did Mink2Pank discussing Alexander Payne's Nebraska, a film you'd never seen, but you enjoyed.

Yeah, and I don't think I've seen an Alexander Payne movie since you made me watch one for this podcast.

So that's me.

You were so funny on the doubles.

You got to have you on a main feed episode.

Of course.

There's a lot of people coming for the doubles.

Ooh, they stink.

They're not allowed on the main feed ever.

Well, don't set it up like the Patreon episode is an audition for the main feed.

You graduated, you graduated to the that's not what's happening, that's not what it is.

I know you're lucky.

We're lucky to have you here.

Is the truth?

No, you started it correct.

I'm lucky too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

We're very, we're very happy to have you back.

Always happy to have you.

And as we're, uh, you know, we're in the midst right now of Mank 3, which is our sequel to Pank, uh, Mation Impalatable, where we are discussing the Mission Impossible films.

Are you a fan of the Mission Impossible franchise?

Okay, yes.

This is good.

Okay, great.

Love those movies.

I mean, honestly, this is funny.

If we had known this, we would have had you information impotable.

Shoot.

Shoot.

That's okay.

You couldn't have known.

You thought I loved Nebraska.

That's what I was giving to you.

What is your, where do you, where do you rank the Mission Impossible franchise?

Like, what, do you have a favorite in the series?

No, they all blend together for me.

I did watch them in succession

like a couple years ago.

Not even when they came out.

I just took a couple weeks to just plow through all of them at once.

What's the one where he starts just like rock climbing?

Like

free soloing?

That one's great.

That's all I think of mostly.

It's like a, yeah,

I mean, I know the films pretty well, but it is a thing of, I think of set pieces more than an actual, like a full intro.

Yeah, I couldn't tell you the plots or what he's looking for ever, but I remember he's rock climbing.

He like propels into the, you know no no no no no that's not the song you guys know it's the well the choice has the limp biscuit song that's true now i know why you want to hate me that way

cool because hate's the only thing i've ever seen lately

it does play the mission possible riff but kind of cool i guess what is who's the guy is the guitarist wes borland for the uh for i don't know the limp biscuits personally i know he might be one of those guys like the band limp biscuit is not well respected i would

say, right?

Yeah, yeah.

I think that they're like that new.

They had a couple of guitarists, but Wes Borland was one of them.

Rob Waters, Terry Belasmo, and Mike Smith.

Wow.

I think Wes Borland might be one of those guys.

It's like the band, but like he's known as a good guitarist.

Maybe I'm wrong.

I don't know.

But that's the Mission Impossible theme rocking out is kind of fun.

That's good.

It is fun.

It's fun.

It is fun.

That franchise elevates everything that touches it.

I think that's part of it.

I love that.

Hey, I like that a lot.

Yeah.

It's true.

If you guys ever do James Bond, you call me, okay?

Wait, let's talk about James Bond because I don't know James Bond very well.

Oh, my God.

Me and my dad would just watch all the James Bond.

Oh, look how I bond with my dad.

Hey, bonding is great.

Bond with Bond.

Yeah, you got it.

I remember watching.

I should get my dad on a podcast.

I was going to say this.

We don't need a month to talk about a James Bond movie.

We can come in here

and do a 007 day.

Why not?

Double 007.

We could have martinis.

That's good.

Oh, that's great.

We could have martinis and talk about a Bond movie.

That's perfect.

Nice 11 a.m.

martini.

It's great.

Why not?

Why not?

And maybe we will do a late record today.

Wait, what is your concern that it's too late in the day for you?

11 is too late for your martinis, yeah.

What is your word of the day?

Where do you rank the, like, like, or I asked your rankings from this impossibles?

Let's talk bonds.

Like, do you have favorites in that series?

Well, I think that it's a personal decision who your favorite Bond is.

For me, it was was Timothy Dalton because that's where I like that.

Just those are the movies I watched as a kid.

There you go.

That's what it is.

So my Bond was Pierce Brosnan and

so like that's just gonna be my favorite guy.

What was your gateway Bond?

Like what was your gateway movie for Bond?

It was probably Tomorrow Never Dies.

Wow.

That was maybe the first one I watched.

And then

it's kind of a bummer because if you go back to the early Sean Connery Bonds, they're so much campier than the ones we see now.

It

really went from camp to just like Mission Impossible style action movies.

And also it was kind of very racist, sexist in the camp days.

But I forgive it because it was fun.

And Wags, you and I forgive it too.

Yeah.

No, 100%.

I loved some of those early kind of, my mom loves Sean Connery.

He's my second favorite bond, yeah.

Every time

she'd be like, he was so handsome.

She always brings up.

oh yeah you guys sweating over sean connery there's always the the actor that your mom like is you know likes a little bit too much reminds me my mom is robert redford we've talked we've had this text combo before yeah there's the horny mom actor that the moms are like oh like they do that like oh they fan themselves and my mom

if my mom has one of these i can't i can't think of my mom's horny actor.

We're at the point now where some of these like stars that we knew in their prime are now aging into that demographic where it'll be like a mom, but she'll be she'll be like ooh Russell Crowe or like ooh Denzel Washington and like all these guys are you know what we we they were like prime hunks at a time, but now they're maybe a little little bit older.

I watched a prime hunk.

Actually, I mean 1975.

I don't know how old he was.

It's probably 30 years old or something, right?

Or no, maybe a little older than that, but The Man Who Would Be King.

My mom was like, I want to watch The Man Who Would Be King.

Okay.

We watched it together.

John Houston movie.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And

he looked pretty pretty damn good dang yeah mom and son had a little we were both uh

that's nice when you can both agree on the cornea that's good

we don't have a problem

she's a yeah mom moms the moms will get a little you know whatever an apollo 13 uh reference i believe is that what that is yes yeah yeah yeah houston we have a problem

don't that's it look i'm gonna say this i like that you brought it back i like that you referenced it.

You said we don't have a problem.

Because it was a thing when we were younger.

I feel like I heard that phrase a lot.

You heard it a lot.

It was in the well, because it was in the movie, but it was also like a real thing that I believe was said.

Yeah.

To mission controls.

And they'd be like that funny kid on the playout or like Houston, we have a problem.

And then run off.

Yeah, for sure.

Well, there's the Jim Carrey kid and then there was the Apollo 13 kid.

Were you either of those or no?

I told you, I've told you before that I knew a kid who became a Tim the Tool Man, switched schools and then became a Tim the Toolman Taylor kid and had, like, everyone's just like, this kid is crushing.

Like, he's so popular in his new school.

I remember this new man.

That's funny.

What is it?

Matt the Toolman.

Matt the Tool Man.

He was just going around doing like

all the time, and everyone loved it.

Wow.

It was so easy to be a kid back then.

I know.

This new school, because where are you guys just like, Matt's like, whatever?

Yeah, he's like, yeah, he's whatever.

He's fine.

Yeah.

This new school is like super popular because he just figured something out.

He's made a strong choice.

That's all it takes.

The Austin Powers.

The austin powers kid was a big one yeah austin powers was i remember playing baseball uh i played international league baseball no big deal when very cool hit the game winning double no big deal whoa that is a big deal i'd say that's a big deal uh uh i played till i was like 16.

it was my best sport i should have continued baseball you were you must have been a power hitter Oh, yeah, baby.

Because I've seen you at the, we've been to the bowling alley together, and I nickname you Pure Power because you're just throwing stripes.

I get made fun of for how unathletic I am in Quincy, so I can't imagine what would happen if you were there.

I was like, baseball was my good sport.

And then me, Micah, and Wu went to the batting cages drunk one night at

Boston Bowl.

And I did not hit a single pitch.

It was like one of these things where it was like, you'll be the guy who did it.

And I was just like, out of breath swinging at balls, and I didn't hit anything.

It's harder as you get older.

Batting cages.

You said you were drunk, so that's probably

true.

That might be it.

Yeah, you know what?

I think Camilla maybe figured out.

You know what?

I think I figured it out.

Batting cages are hard.

You ever been to the batting cages?

Yes.

I tried playing softball for one season, and we did, as a team, go to the batting cages.

The ones at Castle Park.

Okay.

Uh, I don't think I hit, I don't think I hit one.

Yeah, they're tricky.

They can be not.

I don't know what I'm doing.

Yeah, I would like to go back to the batting cage.

It's fun.

I'm trying to be a golfer.

I've told you this, and I haven't done any, I haven't made any steps to become one.

You should play the Persona games, or you should play the Yakuza games because they got batting cages in both of those.

I don't know if that, I'm gonna be honest with you.

I don't know if it's gonna help me at all.

It's fun, though.

I had a game-winning double-wise, but also

I didn't like the high school coach, so I didn't play it.

But all the kids on that team, and I played up till I was like 15 or 16.

I guess maybe even when Austin Powers 2 came out, maybe.

But they all were quoting Austin Powers.

Right.

So that this is the era somewhat where we're progressing from yeah, baby, yeah, to get in my belly.

Get in my belly, yes.

And now I'm almost like that brings back like a visceral memory of like, oh, like they were saying, get in my belly.

So definitely Austin Power 2, Austin Powers 2, The Spy Who Shagged Me.

But

I, for that reason, I like didn't like Austin Powers as much then.

And then when I saw Austin, like, I didn't, I think I didn't even see it until it was out of theaters or something.

And now, when I watch Austin Powers 2, I'm like, it's so, it's so, it's so good.

It was just really, like, you know, like the little dweebs were like quoting it.

And they're not as funny as, they're not as funny as Austin.

Totally.

It's, you know, it's like the

apex of success is in comedy: you make something so ubiquitous that it's quoted so often that it stops being funny.

You know, something like Borat or Anchorman or Austin Powers, it's just like, it becomes such a big thing that it becomes annoying.

But, but, like, for us, it's, is it Wow?

It's not.

I mean, wow was so funny when we were saying it.

For us, it's nothing.

Yeah.

There's the, you know, Doughboys isn't like that.

Have we ever done it?

Whatever.

No.

What's our legacy?

Nothing.

Hey, don't get so sad.

Yeah, don't worry about it.

It's okay.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

Just keep going.

Just keep going.

Yeah, just keep making.

Just doing what you're doing.

Just keep keep doing what you're doing.

You're too young to be thinking about legacy.

No.

Stay your whole life ahead of you.

Oh, I don't know.

Okay.

Maybe it's just the fact that I saw a child.

So maybe I got to make a child this year.

You're going to make one this year?

Yeah, I think I might make one this year.

Okay.

We'll see what happens.

Oh,

I have another story.

What if you talk about making a child?

I was thinking about it and I was like, that's technically what you do.

You make it.

You make a child.

It's not that awful, but no one says it like that.

So that's why.

Yeah.

Sounds kind of clinical.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The main ingredient is love.

Oh, my God.

I'm like, good fuck.

Oh, my God.

Look, I'm a little loopy today.

We all know that.

So just please excuse everything I say from here on out.

I went to the Dodgers game yesterday.

I'm going to change subjects.

How fun is that?

Oh, wait.

We can't change subjects.

We're going to talk about James Bond a little bit.

Yeah,

we didn't close things up on James Bond.

So you talk about Piers Brasna is your way in.

Tomorrow Never Dies, your first movie.

What are some of your favorites in the whole franchise?

What did I just watch?

I just watched one a couple months ago.

It's the one where there's the two slinky gymnastics ladies that like hang on the lampposts and do the splits, and they have terrible names.

Terrible sexist names.

Is this a Connery one?

Yes.

Okay, so haven't seen this one.

I'm not going to remember it.

I might.

From Russia with Love.

No, it's probably

like...

I think there's bad bond names.

Oh, you're making up ones?

Well, there is one that is Pussy Galore.

Oh, yeah.

Well, because the Austin Powers movies are just parodying the James Bond movies.

Yeah, you know.

Oh, wait, or is that from Austin Powers?

No, Austin Powers is a lot of vagina.

Oh, yes.

Pussy Galore is from James Bond.

Okay, yeah.

And then later, Dixie Normous.

Oh, right.

They really did it.

They really were doing it like earnestly, which is awesome.

And that's what I want back.

Like, we're not giving that to these new Bond movies.

No.

Everyone's got a regular person name.

Yeah.

Come on.

Who is the Bond girl in Tomorrow Never Dies?

Isn't it Hallie Berry?

Ooh.

It is?

I think.

Okay, there it is.

This is a new thing I've been doing that's not going on.

Your own sound effects?

My own sound effects.

I like it.

She's very...

Oh, very.

And she's, she,

it's the short hair, right?

She has the short body.

It's her walking out of the ocean.

It's that.

Yeah, I think I recall that scene.

And that itself was a reference to an earlier Bond film, right?

Yep.

Okay, so here are all the Sean Connery Bond films in release order.

Dr.

No from Russia with Love.

It was Dr.

No.

It was Dr.

No.

So that was like the first, that was the first Connery Bond.

Wow.

What year is this?

1962.

Wow, 13 years from The Man Who Would Be King, 1975.

And we talked about Houston.

We have a problem.

Man was yet to walk on the moon.

Oh my God.

In fact,

almost all of Sean Connery's James Bond canon was pre-moon landing.

Wow.

It wasn't until he returned for Diamonds or Forever after George Lazenby's.

Isn't there a moon?

There's one where he goes to moon.

The moon.

Goes to moon.

He goes to moon.

He goes to moon in it.

There's one where he goes to moon.

Is it called

Moon Raker?

Moon Raker.

Moon Raker.

There it is.

I was still thinking Moon Raker.

Is that a Roger Moore Bond?

I think Moon Raker might have been Moore.

Yeah.

You know what I think about Roger Moore?

What about that?

Give me more.

I like him.

I thought you were going to say that.

Moonraker in 1979, and it was a Roger Moore.

Yeah.

Wow.

Did I say what I think about Roger Moore?

Yeah, you did.

Yeah, you did.

Want to say it one more time?

Yeah, give me more.

I like him.

All right.

You know what?

If Jemmy and I just fall asleep on this chair here, is that better for the episode?

You're doing great.

You're thriving.

I started off.

It's funny.

Speaking of Mission Impossible, I, when I saw Golden Eye in theaters, oh my God, life-changing.

GoldenEye, that's my, and honestly, was doing maybe like it's, it's kind of stopped the silly bond, right?

Is uh, Golden Eye is kind of like the in it right around that, did it come?

They came out the same year, didn't they?

Mission Impossible and GoldenEye.

Did they really?

Is that what I'm saying?

I think it might be 1996.

Is six too early?

I made the same mistake the other day.

1996?

Uh, I guess let me just look that up.

That would be cool if true.

But,

you know, like I am invincible, and he gets frozen.

Yeah, I mean, it had comedic elements in it, but it wasn't like sure.

Yeah.

But I mean, I'm just saying, this is why I loved it.

There was like so much stuff, and I love it.

And then Mission Impossible, I saw it.

And as a kid, I was like, this is more confusing.

And like, what's happening?

Right.

And I'm a dumb kid.

I had to think harder, but like, I think Afro Kid, I think it is a little bit more of like a kind of confusing movie.

And there's betrayals and whatever, and a knock list or whatever.

And I left being like, I love, like, GoldenEye is one of my favorite movies.

Rewatching them, Mission Impossible holds up so well.

And GoldenEye feels very much like a 90s.

Oh, I believe it.

Yeah, especially with like the bungee jumping and such.

But I don't know.

I mean, you know,

it was of its time, but as was the Nintendo 64 game.

Yeah, which was also supposed to be huge.

Were you ever into the game?

I did.

I played the game.

I was so, so bad at it.

But I played it with all of my friends.

Have you, you done Slappers Only?

Yes.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

That's good.

Yeah.

We're going to do a Doughboys episode like that.

It's kind of the, oh, good.

Just you two swapping each other.

Yeah, slappers only.

He's going back and forth.

All these sound effects for it if you want.

Mitchell.

I was actually pretty damn good at Bond.

I'm glad to ring my own bell.

At GoldenEye?

Yeah.

See, I never really got into it.

I never really got into Goldeneye because it was just like, even though I had a Nintendo 64,

I was just so used to PC first-person shooters of the era, you know?

and so it was just like playing it with a controller felt very klutzy.

Um, so I just, I just never, I never really had a reason to do it when I was like playing Half-Life.

You're chasing that ultimate first-person shooting experience.

A GoldenEye, Mitch, this is how spoiled we were at the multiplexes back in the 90s, released in November of 1995.

Uh, Mission Impossible did not release that same year, but released in May of 96.

So they were pretty close.

Okay,

within

365 days of each other.

Not bad.

For a kid, that same year.

Same year.

Pretty golden year, basically.

Totally.

So Goldeneye before Mission Impossible, 1995.

Yeah, isn't that weird?

Yeah.

But also, like, because you were saying, like, I do agree with you.

Like, when I think of Bond movies, I'm like, oh, they kind of did the Mission Impossible thing.

And you're like, well, I guess Goldeneye kind of did do that Mission Impossible thing first.

Yeah.

But I have, look,

if we were to review one Golden, I mean, one Bond movie.

And we don't have to just review one, but what would be, what is your choice?

Tomorrow Never Dies?

Probably, I mean, that's my first one, but no, I'd pick one of the Sean Connery ones.

They're just too fun and silly.

I love it.

Diamonds Are Forever is a great one.

That's great.

What's the one?

The one where the villain covers ladies in paint?

Is that Goldfinger?

Yeah, it's Goldfinger.

Inspired Gold member.

Yes.

Yes.

And so, like, I, me not knowing the James Bond cannon is much, and I, there, there's also, like, in, like, Flint is another, I guess, British spy movie that inspired a lot of the Austin Powers.

But, like, I didn't real, a lot of this, these, I'm watching these, I didn't know a a lot of these things were references you know i'm like i just knew doctor evil is doctor evil i didn't know that was referencing doctor now

yeah yeah exactly yeah so um

i don't know it's a it's it's the ouroboros of influences is fascinating how like like like you'll absorb something that's inspired by something else but not know what it's was what inspired it totally well they had a uh odd job who threw a hat yes yeah and then uh random no yeah and then random task threw a shoe threw a shoe yes and then who was it was it who's jaws who's he had the teeth right jaw is it was oh yeah it was jaws i don't remember who what the jaw what the joke on jaws was yeah i don't i don't even know if and there's sharks that have laser beams but there are there was like a shark there was it dr no had some like

vicious sharks or something these are all just straight from the campy james spons i love it it's great so good i know it's sad that that fun the fun stuff of them is gone stuff got very like dark and like gritty and it's just like i think there's a time i think we could maybe have like you know our buddy jack allison was talking about like, the Joker should just steal a diamond.

You know what I mean?

Like, like, why don't we just have like a, like, a, like a, like, hey, the Joker's going to steal a diamond and he's going to hit you in the face with a pie.

You know what I mean?

Like, why can't we just have some goofy stuff in a superhero?

I love that.

That sounds awesome.

Yeah.

And it doesn't even have to be the crown jewels.

It can be just a typical diamond.

Yeah, exactly.

That's great.

I love that.

Where does the day of stand on on movies that deal in espionage and intrigue?

I love that.

I love that.

You do, really?

What are some of your faves?

Awesome power.

Amazing.

I just like, I like anything that's a little bit of a thriller, like a little that makes you think and you're trying to like figure it out as you go and like keeps you on the edge of your seat.

The oceans movie.

Oh, yeah, those are fun.

The oceans movies are fun.

I've really been enjoying the Mission Impossibles lately.

Like, yeah, they're kind of glued into those.

So, like, really, anything that makes you go, oh, my God, oh, my God, the whole time.

I'm like for it.

And a good villain is good.

Yeah.

You need good villains in that.

That's where the Bond movies have good freaky villains.

Yes, for sure.

I'm waiting for a lady villain.

I'm waiting.

Whoa.

A lot of lists.

No.

No.

Okay, think about this.

What if it was like Sandra O is some freaky lady villain in the new Bond?

I like it.

I like that.

That's great.

I'd be afraid that eventually they have to kill Sandra O, but who cares?

That's fine.

That's fine.

Viola Davis.

Imagine.

Viola Davis is some angry, like, I don't know, give her gold teeth and something.

Give Sandra O gold teeth.

Give any of them gold teeth.

And make them a bond villain.

Yeah.

Yeah, like jaws.

They can bite something.

I don't know.

You just let them go crazy.

We let Rami Malik do whatever in that last one.

Didn't love that.

It was fine.

It's like fine.

But the last one was a little wild.

I did not like the latest Bond.

Yeah.

You could do complicated.

Yeah.

And it's like, I'm not.

It doesn't matter.

I'm going to be all the Spectre stuff.

Like, what the hell's going on here?

I know.

Bond's got a kid.

Boo.

I don't know.

Get out of here.

I got an audition for the new Bond.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

What's your role?

Bond.

You're going to be James Bond?

I'm reading from Bond.

James Bond.

Okay.

It'd be an interesting chance.

Don't messing with me?

No, no, no, no, no.

This is real.

Don't mess with me.

Do you want to want me to tell you the first line of the audition?

Yeah, sure.

Bond.

James Bond.

Okay, he's messing with me.

He got me.

He got me good.

Look, I'll earnestly believe that.

I've been so pumped.

I will tell you this.

I will never get called in to read for the role of James Bond.

You never know what if somebody's being cool and fun and making like a fun, good version of Bond, something surprising.

Wow.

This is the nicest thing anyone's ever said.

I would love to see that.

I'd love to see that.

You can take down evil, Sandra.

Oh, you could.

Wait a minute now.

I should just write a Bond.

Yeah, you should do it.

Hold on a second.

Mitch is my Bond, and then Sandra's.

There's women villains, and then I coming.

I'm like, that's like

killing.

I don't know.

No, no.

You can outsmart them without killing them.

Don't worry.

I'll write the script.

It'll be fine.

It's weirdly the perfect time for James Bond to be a big fat idiot who hates women.

He would be a sensation.

You're so right.

I could green lit so fast.

Why a big fat idiot?

What made me turn Bond into a big fat idiot, I wonder?

The roasts continue, I guess.

Did it never cross over for, you know, you love Mission Impossible.

No, yeah, I love them.

They're great.

Wow.

That genre is always good.

Just like an action-y thriller.

I love, this is a thing, and you know, when I was a kid, there was a TV show, the A-Team, that was, uh, that I, that I watched.

and like the thing they'd say in that show is, I love it when a plan comes together because so much of that show was like, we're going to figure out what we're going to do, and then we're going to watch them do it.

Yes.

And I, like, I love shit like that because that's what the old Mission Impossible TV show was, too.

It's just like, hey, we're going to put together a

the pace was was absolutely leisurely by today's standards, but like, we're going to put a caper together and then we're going to see him pull off the caper.

And again, that's what's so satisfying about the oceans movies, at least the first one.

There's a group in, did I tell you that in Quincy, that's the groups are broken down to A team and B team, and I'm on the B team.

Did I tell you that?

I got all of this this lore got explained to me by L D when I was in Quincy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

L D is probably A team.

She hangs with a B team or so.

She, yeah, she's like kind of like a day walker, I guess.

She kind of works in both worlds.

She explained to me that there is a weird hierarchy among so Mitch is Mitch's from Quincy, Massachusetts.

He has a bunch of friends with names like Micah and Chankton and L D and Ramondi,

Frailbot, Wu-Tang,

Chewy, Shieldsy.

Who am I missing?

You got a bum.

Scoop.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's awesome.

Two poops.

Those are the college friends.

Those are college friends.

Those are the college friends.

Fuxton.

They're all there.

And so the,

but I was talking to Eldie was explaining to me that within this group, there is like a striation.

There is a hierarchy, and Mitch is in the lower tier.

Yeah.

Oh, my God.

I thought you were talking about sports.

Your friend group

split into

the virus.

Oh, my God.

And I'm on the B team.

That's it.

You would think that

Chef Kevin went by.

You would think that a Hollywood, like, you know, I'm in Hollywood.

I've been in a couple TV shows and a movie or two.

You'd think it would get me into the fucking A team.

It's helpful to like graduate to the A team.

Like, can you move up over time?

Or are you going to be able to do that?

A team has discussed bringing me up as an honorary member, but I don't know if it's ever due to get brought up.

Probably become Bond, honestly.

Oh, my God.

You're so close.

That dumb bond.

My script is

halfway done.

Don't worry.

You're so close.

Emma, you should see

Blackbag, which is

Blackbag was great.

What a hoot.

Yeah.

Soderbergh, who did the oceans movie.

Soderbergh, who is a prolific, makes a bunch of movies.

I love the guy.

And we were just saying this.

Look, I get mad at Hollywood almost every, and I was talking about Chankton about Hollywood stuff, and I was just getting mad again.

But that idea of like, hey, instead of making like a $200 million movie and trying to make a franchise, why don't you make $20, $10 million movies

or $10, $20 million movies or anything like that?

It's like so many studios now just like gamble on a big franchise thing.

Movies don't get made.

Movies don't even get made here anymore.

Netflix is evil.

It gets really annoying.

And I will say that the, you know, that the same, a similar thing has been discussed with video games.

We don't need to get into video games too deep, but like, you know, there have been some so-called double-A games, some games that are kind of like mid-budget to lower budget games that have come out this year.

They've been really well received, like Avowed and most recently Claire Obscure, where it's the same sort of principle.

It's like, yeah, we don't need you to spend nine figures making a new Assassin's Creed.

You know what I mean?

Like we don't care about having this granular level of detail in the character models.

We don't need to see like veins on a character's face.

Spend a little bit, spend like a tenth as much money and just make a bunch of different types of games.

Thanks for translating it for our fucking nerd-ass viewers

who didn't get my version of it.

But you are right, Mitch.

But it happens and it does happen in games.

It happens in games and it happens.

And

then they try to recreate it.

Yes.

And they try with games.

And then they, like you're saying, like, hey, this indie game that was a success, now they're making like a $300 million game.

Yeah, needlessly.

Yes.

But you are right about movies.

And

I would say I'm fairly encouraged about, Kimmy, I'm curious your opinion, but I'm fairly encouraged about movies in 2025 so far.

You know, the stars are.

It's been a decent

Sinners was great.

I just saw it yesterday.

Great.

Lovely.

I'm going to see it this week.

I have not seen it yet.

I'm very excited.

It was just fun.

Just fun.

Just fun.

Just fun.

And it's an original idea

that's for grown-ups.

And it's like, that's all we want.

A huge thumbs up from me there.

Yeah.

We know what it's about.

Or no, nothing.

Vampires.

Vampires.

That's all I was going to say.

Come on.

It's so easy.

That's all we want to see.

I mean,

it's that crazy.

And it's like also like that movie was hard for him to make, I'm sure, which is insane or whatever.

For sure.

Yeah.

But you know,

Netflix is in New Mexico.

They're not even here.

No one makes movies here anymore.

It's a mess.

And

we could have, we could have those good things again.

We could have 20, $10 million movies instead of one attempt to make some new fucking Harry Potter or some stupid shit.

Yeah, exactly.

Who gives a shit?

Anyways, sorry.

I want you to get it.

I like it.

That rant was worth it.

Yeah, that was great.

Well, also, it's that sort of thing of like, it's easier to speak out on it because I'm like, oh, I'm afraid to get work.

And it's like, no one gets fucking work.

So who gives a shit?

Right.

And also, like, the work sucks.

So, like, what the fuck?

Who cares?

It's just interesting that everyone is craving some more original ideas that aren't big budgets, right?

So then, why is nobody listening to what generally everybody wants?

Didn't nobody go see the Snow White movie?

No one's going to those anyway.

This is a bad example, but like they made that movie twice for too much money and nobody went to see it.

And they're trying to blame it on what's her name's Politics.

Yes.

Yes.

But it's just because we want to see Rachel Zagler's.

Yes, yes.

It's because we want to see a two-hour vampire movie with blues music instead.

Yeah, exactly.

That's kind of it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Don't remake.

We don't have to remake the movies again.

Lion King

is one of the best animated films in my life.

You know, I mean, look, I don't think it's...

It is, it's great.

I'm not even trying to doubt that.

Why am I doubting?

Why am I running about it?

I don't have to walk it back.

Lion King's my favorite movie.

The animated Lion King.

Why do I have to see it with CGI versions?

It's the worst version of it.

I don't need to see that.

There's no reason for it.

There's no reason for it.

Nope.

It's a cash grab.

It sucks.

A live-action version that's also animated.

Yeah, I feel like I'm more likely than not, though, because I don't want the original ruined.

Yeah, like so precious in my mind.

I like won't go see that.

Here's, here's something.

I think I have narrowed it down that

I think it's like these executives are fucking morons.

I think you got it.

I don't know.

And they're fucking idiots.

It might be huge dip shit.

So it might be part of the problem.

Yeah.

They have trouble with it.

We're good, especially the ones who hire me are very smart.

Sure.

I will say they're probably scared, right?

They're like, this thing that already worked, we'll remake it because it worked, right?

And it's like, I just wish they'd be less scared.

Part of what's broken about the industry is if you're in that line of work, if you're on that side of production, your number one priority is job preservation.

And so you're like, if you take a risk and it doesn't pay off, it's just like you're just fucked.

Versus if you do something safe and it doesn't pay off, you can point at things like, well, you know, the marketplace, like you can point at someone, like, at least I didn't make the mistake of taking a risk on my end.

Right.

It incentivizes what we're seeing now, which is just an unending run of MCU movies.

Which is also, I mean, that's like so much as streaming is like we throw spaghetti at the wall and we pay people shit like poorly.

And then when there's one hit, we take credit for that hit and everything that doesn't work.

We don't really have to take the fall for it.

But then we're so fucking dumb.

I'm speaking as an executive here.

Like we're so fucking dumb that we don't realize.

I'm not sure if I'm going to get sorrows right now.

Okay, great.

Yeah,

we don't realize that what we did,

like the reason that it necessarily connected is because it felt new or because

there was a creative vision behind it.

We're just like, oh, it's exactly that.

So, what I fear with something like Sinners succeeding is not like people saying the correct takeaway is like, oh, we need to give talented people

the leeway to make their own original ideas.

Instead, they're going to be like, okay, we need 10 more vampire movies.

I know.

They always have the wrong takeaway.

You know what?

Last time we did this, I've said some Netflix stuff.

We put it behind the paywall, but I just want to say this.

Eat shit, Ted Sarandos.

He fucking, and I'm not fucking editing this out.

he he he he put this thing about how he's like the future is is like no more movie theaters yeah he's very anti-movie

and i'm like you you dumb idiot first of all you don't even make movies in hollywood you're not in hollywood you're in new mexico you piece of you're not in hollywood you took the industry away you and thousands upon thousands of people have lost their jobs the working class in hollywood is gone and it's people like you's fault so fuck you got it also just say i don't like how you look yeah you look like shit you big red-headed bald fuck.

Oh, really?

He's not bald, but still.

Red-headed.

And bald.

And actually, you know what?

That's unfair to bald people.

You piece of shit.

Bald people are beautiful.

You're a piece of shit.

You look like a bald is beautiful.

You're a beat shit.

Anyways, show me a picture of him now, please.

I'm looking for a Ted Sarandos.

Okay.

I got you.

He kind of looks like.

I don't trust you anymore.

He kind of looks like a Ted Cruz before picture.

Oh.

Yeah.

Oh, that is exactly it.

That is Ted Cruz Before.

You look like a little slimy Ted Cruz.

Fuck, I'll never work on a Netflix show guy, which is fine.

No, you will, because he's never going to listen to this.

He is

listening.

No, there's no way.

He doesn't know what shows are on Netflix.

That little beta.

Do you think he does?

I don't think he does.

That little beta incel is definitely listening to our show.

I don't like when the doughboys make fun of me.

Shut up.

The future is still because you know what?

For not just for it wasn't just the fucking 1940s or whatever, people going to movie theaters.

It was it wasn't the invention of AC.

Everyone has the theater-going experience and watching some performance.

Maybe it was, you know, it was people on stage, but that's existed for hundreds of, hundreds, thousands of years.

Since the era of the Coliseum, crowds were gathering to watch spectacle and mass.

It's a communal experience.

Yeah, they were giving thumbs ups and thumbs down, or more accurately, they were giving a thumbs up and then covering their thumb

to indicate if a gladiator should be felled.

But yes, this was happening forever.

Romulus was giving Romulus from Romulus to Ebert.

Ah, from Romulus to Ebert.

Thumbs were being given up or down.

That's correct.

Look, this is real.

And also,

I was just thinking about Happy Gilmore.

I referenced that.

Do you know what?

The reason I brought it, it's funny that you say that because I mentioned the pedantic thumb covering thing because that was a reason that Roger Ebert gave like two stars to Gladiator in his review.

Because it was inaccurately inaccurate.

Yeah, yeah.

Oh, good.

Oh, my God.

I respect that.

What a wiener.

I love Ebert.

Yeah, you know, he's what a week.

I mean, you love him.

You're a nerdiness.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then you said Ebert.

How about that?

Wow.

Life is a Herald.

Life sucks.

I was just, I was, I love the Sandman.

I do love the Sandman.

I shouldn't go into my other thing, which is I won't go into it.

Okay.

I'm just going to say this.

You said before, can I just say this?

And Kimmy was here for this.

You said before we started recording.

I was like, I may

say some stuff that needs to be edited out.

You came in a little bit early.

You know what's crazy?

It's not even this.

I wasn't even thinking of any of this.

Okay.

My thing was about Wally in the closet.

I was afraid people would get mad at that.

And a story I haven't told yet.

Sarandos does get mad at you putting Wally in the closet.

But not about all the stuff.

No, no, the other stuff he's fine.

This stuff is.

Look, I love the Sandman.

I love him very much.

And, you know, he took a deal with Netflix or whatever, and I get it.

Just the idea of going to see Happy Gilmore when I was a kid, like seeing that with a group of people in the theaters, what a blast, Wags.

Such a great time.

It's not going to be in theaters.

Happy Gilmore 2 is streaming on Netflix.

Well, this was the same thing with the Beverly Hills cop movie.

And what was that?

There was another one of those.

Oh, the

Coming to America, which I actually kind of liked, but not being only on streaming.

Is even a blip in your mind?

I'm like, exactly.

Doesn't make it nothing.

There's nothing there.

And then you get some sort of statistic, like it's like, you know, like a 12 million hour stream.

Just like, what the fuck does that mean?

I don't mean

shit.

It doesn't mean anything.

Yeah.

It also just means like you're trying to not pay people for the time that they

how much people watched it.

Yeah.

Oh, God.

It gets me fucking pissed off.

And we're lucky we have stupid podcast bullshit to do.

We're lucky that we do that.

Anyway, I.

It's important to get mad because he's essentially taking community away if you're taking movie theaters away.

Wow, I feel so silly to watch.

What am I going to watch an Adam Sandler movie in my house alone and then like laugh at the jokes?

No, I feel honestly silly doing that.

You want to do it with friends.

Yes.

It's easier to laugh when there's a bunch of people in the theater and he like pulls his pants down or whatever and you go, ha ha ha ha.

I'm like, okay, I don't feel silly.

Yes.

I would feel weird laughing at that in my house.

What am I doing?

I mean, like, you could maybe invite friends over, but this guy, I mean, like, you didn't like GoldenEye.

You didn't even have friends coming over for Goldeneye, so you're not going to have to.

What are you talking about?

It seems like you didn't like it.

It seems like GoldenEye didn't work for you because you didn't have friends coming over to play.

Because I didn't have friends?

It was a four-year-old.

It was a four-person.

I was playing four-person splits for

nature.

Nate, mom, dad, will you play with me?

It's not me.

It wasn't me, my parents, and my older brother.

It sounds like it wasn't me.

I was begging them to play Nintendo 64 with me.

No, I had friends that was playing Golden, but I was just like, I don't know.

This isn't that.

Your dad fucking destroying you at GoldenEye, I'm sure.

Nate definitely was kicking her ass at GoldenEye.

There's no doubt about that.

Yeah, I don't have to.

I got an alpha older brother.

Yeah,

again, it would have been like that for a damn thing.

Yeah.

Here's another thing.

Can I just say this?

Please.

If you're an actor and you make a lot of money, you can't do commercials anymore.

This is something I think about a lot.

They need to be shamed.

There's people that need to be shamed.

There's actors that need to be shamed for the places that they work with if they if they make big streaming movies and they take the bag you need to be shamed for it and if you make commercials if you're an actor and you're a big actor and you make and you're making commercials even if it's voiceover if you're if you're if you're you're you need to be shamed you you need to be shamed do you think they're not doing well though that's why they're doing the commercials because there's not but that's also these people these actors have made like millions of dollars you know what i mean maybe they didn't spend it right and they gotta take our money from us and do commercials i mean like i mean mean, like, this, this is the thing.

It's like they are that, like, this, these were jobs for other actors.

Yeah, there's not, instead of like being like, hey, it's the Michelobe guy.

And like, some, some character actor or some commercial actor would be the Michelobe guy, and they do have a really great year and be able to, like, pay off their house or whatever the fuck.

It's just like, hey, let's just get a celebrity.

It's Matt the Toolman from those, that Budweiser.

Exactly.

Yeah, yeah.

Matt the Tool Man.

Oh, the Toolman is crushing.

Yeah.

But that doesn't exist anymore.

No.

I'm not going to name specific actors, but

what'd you say?

Jimmy Fallon is doing like

video,

you know, those mobile games on your phone.

Oh, my God.

He's doing a mobile game ad.

He's doing a state farm ad.

He's got like a new show called On Brand.

It's just about I love brands, which is also like the name's a ripoff of, I mean, obviously not an explicit ripoff, I guess I got to say, so we don't get sued, of our friend John Marissa's podcast, On Brand.

And it's just like, yeah, it's like, what isn't Jimmy?

Stop doing it.

Did you just host the fucking out of the show?

You host the tonight show.

You're not doing fucking advice.

You're doing fine.

I've got this.

Read that.

Spend time with your family.

But also, he's an easy guy to go after because no one likes him.

Whereas, like, whereas there's a bunch of celebrities that people like that are currently doing

that are currently doing, you know, commercials.

We're watching the NBA playoffs, you and I mentioned.

We're seeing this all the time.

Every ad break is just a different celebrity shilling something else.

I've said this before on the podcast, so I feel okay with it.

But if you're a celebrity who's doing an advertising, you are now dropped down to commercial actor.

You lose your status.

You should lose your status and maybe this is a part of what's wrong with the world we're just in a post shame society there's no way to do that doesn't matter being shameless is a competitive advantage i'm shaming your asses you're embarrassing you're embarrassing yourself stop doing it

god fuck i'm so fucking mad anyways i like this energy it's not what he said

stay alive till 2025 that's what they said about this industry right and people are moving out i'm shaming you millionaires you cut the shit you fucking idiots Anyways, I went to a Dodgers game yesterday.

Yeah.

Okay.

Oh, cool.

And that's the end of that.

Ewan Chankton and Emmy and Angelica is it?

No, they went to the beach.

Emmy and Emmy and Angelica went to the beach and

Chankton and Hiro,

their family friend from Japan.

Wow.

So we went and.

Otani is, you know, is a huge sensation in Japan and here, of course.

I was at it.

This was one of those great, and

I know Kimmy also likes to walk.

I was taking the bus over to the Head Gum Studios, and I was at the bus stop, and there was a family clearly of tourists, clearly from Japan, like, you know, who were trying to make their way to Dodger Stadium.

And they asked, there was a.

a woman who was wearing a Dodger jersey and a Dodger hat clearly on her way to the game.

And they went over and like, I kind of asked her, and English is a second language, like how to get to Dodger Stadium.

And she said, follow me.

And then

she said, oh Tani.

And the whole bus stop went like, Yeah.

And I was like, so happy.

It was great.

There's so much tourism to hear to just see him play.

Oh, yeah.

It's wild.

So it's, it's, I think this week, you can help me out here.

Wise.

I think it's Golden Week this week.

I think that's what it's called.

As of this recording.

Kiro was telling me a bit about it.

And I already, that's, I, I, I didn't sleep well.

So the, the knowledge is already.

You're doing great, Mitch.

Keep going.

Thank you.

I'm not, I got too mad.

Look, I'm back on track here.

Um, you're doing fine.

We were, yes, golden week is a week of uh four national holidays and seven days in Japan.

Yeah, so this is a big, this is a big travel week from the, so, and uh, they, there was a lot of Japanese tourists at the game, and then there was a guy in a no-tani guy was in front of us, the guy who's like not Otani says, no-tani.

Yeah, I never knew about that.

Uh, and there was a like, there was a Japanese tourist in front of us that, like, I was trying to help them out.

They were bringing an umbrella and they couldn't bring an umbrella.

And I was like, trying, but it must have been so scary to see like a big guy be like, you can't, like, you got to put it in a walker.

Like, I was like running up to him, like, trying to be helpful.

and it just probably looks fucking terrifying.

That's so nice of you to run up to them to tell them about their umbrella.

You really didn't have to do that.

I was trying to help.

I'm sure it's somebody there's job to have done that.

Yeah, well, there was like a, there were, there was like a language barrier, but I don't speak Japanese.

Right, so you weren't helping me any better.

I was like, trying to tell, I was trying to tell Hero, Hero, I was like, I was like, can you tell them that like they have to put the umbrella in a thing?

And I was like, you know, very animated.

They probably thought I was Goreberger or something.

And it was fine.

A good reference.

Gorberger?

What?

You pulled out Gorberger?

Gorberger, the unseen, funnier die web series

where the character was voiced by TJ Miller from like 2011?

Bring it back.

Gorberger?

Did you know?

I was trying to think of all the kaiju you could have mentioned.

I was trying to think of the AMPM guy's name, and I couldn't think of it.

Toongis?

They probably just thought they meant Toongus.

That's funny.

It would have been really funny if you said that the first time.

All I could think of is Gorberger.

I got it wrong.

Dang.

Sad.

They're sitting at their seats at the game.

Oh, a Gorberger.

Toongus.

Toongus.

Too much good stuff.

I'm going to say this.

I was at the Dodgers game.

That's right.

And I had a delicious Dodgers, Dodger Dog, wages.

A big

long.

Are you a Dodger dog man?

Can't beat a Dodger dog.

Now, Kimmy, I know you're vegetarian.

You've been vegetarian since 2018.

Is that correct?

Great memory.

Do you have a...

Do you like you're going to a ball game?

Did you not tell him that again today?

No, no, we targeted.

All right, well.

And that would be really nice if you just remembered that from last time.

But it was nice of you to pretend that he did.

You didn't have to.

I should have just let it slide.

You're like a great guy with a great memory, you know?

Yeah.

Remembers things about me.

When

you go to a ball game, you go to a movie theater.

Obviously, hot dogs are off the menu, but what kind of, what are you snacking on?

Okay, well, one, I think

maybe I shouldn't get into this, but I think a hot dog for a movie theater is a weird snack.

Wow.

Sorry.

No, I don't think that's a crazy thing to say.

Why are they there?

I will eat a movie theater hot dog, but I guess it is a little strange.

I think it is the thing that is the closest to a meal.

To a meal, yeah.

But a hot dog is like for outside in the sun, and then eating it in a movie theater is like inside in the dark.

Wow.

I don't think that that's right.

I've never actually thought of this this way, but no, that's right.

I do think like a hot dog on a roller, though, is like such a like when movie theaters started, popcorn or like make

popcorn is obviously the big one.

Popcorn is the big one.

The hot dog on a roller, I think of a convenience store, which again, you grab and you go outside, and you're outside and you're in the sun and you eat a hot dog.

Anyways, you asked me a different question when I went in on hot dogs in the movie theater.

I love this.

I think this is a, this is a thing we should drill down because, like, you're, we know, people have

talked to death about whether a hot dog is a sandwich, but this is an interesting idea.

Is a hot dog an outdoor food?

I think it is.

It might be an outdoor food.

I'm going to say this.

It's a very outdoor food.

Can it not be indoors, though?

Well,

the thing is, the thing about it, part of the issue with it being an indoor food and part of the issue with bringing it into a movie theater that I feel self-conscious about is like, this is a big, stinky, like, like, meal.

Yeah.

Like, this is really, like, people are going to smell this.

And so sometimes I'll get it.

It's like when I went that pastrami sandwich into the UCB theater, I told the story recently.

Yeah.

Where the, where Oak's gourmet was used to be, what was the deli?

I remember the name of it.

Now I forgot.

It was a deli, and I got a big pastrami sandwich, Victor's deli.

And I got a big pastrami sandwich is eating it in the theater.

It's like, you don't do that.

You can't do that.

People can smell it throughout the, and I realized that as I was doing it.

I was like 22 years old or something.

I saw someone bring Panda Express on a plane once.

I sat next to someone who did that.

Yeah.

You can't do that.

Yeah, you can't do that.

Pastrami, a lot like hot dogs, smells like hot dogs.

It's true.

It's very smelly.

So is it an outdoor food?

It might, I might go with you.

It might, that might be its place.

But you know what?

Two SoCal

lifers here.

Okay, that's true.

Yeah.

I am a Boston boy.

Okay.

And we get our hot dogs with our Boston beans wages.

And it's the wintertime and we're boiling them indoors.

We need it.

And that's fine.

I think

eating it in the dark in the movie theaters is

because you're like eating it inside, but your lights are on in your house and it's all right.

It's okay.

Okay.

I think dark and camping is fine for hot dogs.

Okay.

But because you're outside, at least.

But I think if inside and dark, no hot dog.

Okay, that feels like that feels like a line of demarcation.

You can't be indoors while it's dark.

Yeah.

I'm going to say this.

Some of our listeners are probably going to be furious.

That's okay.

Sitting in pitch black.

They're angry guys.

You said they're kind of angry anyway.

Like, there's no winning, so I'm okay to share.

They also might be mad at stuff I said being mean to actors.

Who knows what they'll be mad?

They might be mad that I was mean to Ted Sarandos.

You can never tell what will happen with them.

You just can't win that.

That's what I love about podcasting is you try to anticipate what the freaks are going to whine about.

And you're always wrong.

It's always something you weren't even thinking about.

It's like, oh, they're mad about that.

Yeah, something new.

Oh, shit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, oh, we better edit this thing out because they're going to be mad about it.

Then we do it.

And then something we leave in that we thought was innocuous, everyone's mad about.

Can't win.

You can't win.

You know what I liked?

I liked that Bill Burst spiel that he gave to the reporter.

It was like, what do do you think of this thing?

And he's like, it's not my job to tell you.

That used to be the people in the news's job.

And also, you can like, don't, we're dumb.

We're idiots.

Yes.

We're both idiots.

You're dumb too.

You're pretty stupid.

I'm going to say it was fun.

You can call me dumb.

I'm dumb too.

All three of us here are.

We're dumb.

What do you want from us?

People think I'm smart because I have like a large vocabulary, but I'm fucking dumb as shit.

I don't know.

My vocabulary's fucking teeny tiny.

Fucking micro vocab over there.

Here's all right.

So I'm not, I push back a little bit.

I think for a meal

in a theater, I think like chicken fingers and stuff like that are crazy to me.

Like in the, I guess like a personal pizza is okay.

I don't know.

I'm just kind of not eating a meal at the movies, man.

That's also fair.

That's fair.

But I would eat a meal at a Dodger game.

Like I call going to a Dodger game going to a restaurant because I don't know much about baseball, but me and my friends are just going to the restaurant when the rest of my friends go watch baseball.

So, are you doing a veggie dog?

I've gotten the veggie dog.

It's fine because I want to fit in, but it's not a great veggie dog.

Have you been to Walt's bar in Eagle Rock?

Oh, yeah.

Very good veggie dog.

Wow.

Best veggie dog.

But yeah, the ones at Dodgers are too wrinkly.

I'll get the nachos.

But here's what they won't do.

They won't give you like the loaded ones that come with the meat on top, but without the meat.

I don't know why.

I've asked two different, maybe I got to go back, but I've tried this two different times.

I've been like, yeah, can I get the nacho extreme or whatever the heck it's called?

Just no meat.

And they're like, no, no, you have to go to that other place.

And it's just like the chips of cheese spot.

Like, what are we doing?

I want the beans and the salsa and the rest of it.

Hey, you want all the fix-ins?

It can't be because it's sitting right on top.

I don't know what it is.

Someone helped me solve this.

So I just basically drink a bunch of beers and eat after.

That's also a great option.

That's it.

That's what I do at Dodger Games.

You know what that reminds me of is when we had, we did the Subway nachos nachos in recent memory, and that was a similar sort of thing.

You couldn't get it without a protein.

Or, or what it was, was like, there was no discount for getting it without meat.

It was just like,

you couldn't order it without meat.

You had to go in store and then ask for it with no meat, and they still charge you full price.

If it's the no discount thing, I'm okay with that.

I said it one time.

Also, I was like, I don't need to pay different.

I just want to eat the nachos.

Please take the meat off.

That is very frustrating.

Yesterday, I got a Dodger dog and we did the garlic fries, which I think is like the garlic fries I kind of do associate with.

I think they had garlic fries pretty early on, and I associate it with Dodger Stadium for whatever.

Oh, yeah.

No, I've had

garlic fries over a decade ago.

They've had that.

That's a staple of, and it is good.

It is, I mean, look, we were talking Draculas earlier.

That's a big, stinky garlic breath you're dealing with.

It's a lot.

Sure, yeah.

But yeah, you're not going to have any.

I mean, I guess with a day game, you don't got to really worry about Draculas.

That's usually.

Unless we're talking about the Twilight Draculas.

They love playing baseball outside.

They do.

But only if it's stormy.

Yeah.

That's true, too.

Because if the weather is clear, you're probably fine.

And also, if it's stormy, they're usually going to call it.

The game's going to be rained out.

Yeah, so you don't have to worry about it.

Okay.

So I usually go to day games that aren't stormy to avoid the Draculas.

That's good.

But you ordered the garlic fries just to be safe.

I ordered the garlic fries just to be safe.

Yeah.

I'm taking a lot of precautions.

Yeah.

I don't want a sinner on my hand.

I know nothing about the movie, but I don't want one happening.

Well, you got a piece of it right, actually.

All right, here we go.

There's some people who eat garlic fries in the movie.

Yesterday they weren't that good, but I was like, with Hiro, I was like, you like, it came in a little baseball cap, and I gave him the baseball cap.

That's the fun part of that.

The little plastic cap.

But they were not that great yesterday, but we had a hot talk.

But the thing that Hero was very excited about was getting

Cracker Jacks.

Buy me some peanuts and crackers.

Cracker Jackson.

Yeah, sure.

And was,

I don't know if you would just know this.

Is that like a market?

Was that song just a marketing ploy from Cracker Jack?

Boy, I didn't even think about it.

And here's the other sad thing:

bag of Cracker Jacks.

Wasn't even the fucking

box.

Yeah, they don't do that anymore.

That's a bummer.

That's a bummer, right?

Yeah, especially.

Well, the box is probably more recyclable, too, if we're thinking about this on levels.

100%.

What are we doing?

Yes, yeah.

Everything's gotten worse.

Worse.

Yeah.

So annoying.

Wait, oh, okay, but I want to go back to you being vegetarian.

Yeah.

Because you were talking to me about like how you got into stopping eating meat entirely.

You do eat some fish.

fish, uh, but what's interesting to me is your way in was seeing like chickens as like life form because like that was that was the sort of thing of like for me, it was always more, especially when I was not eating meat at all.

And I'm trying to eat less meat in general now, but it was always more towards like mammals.

It's easier for me to see as like, you know, like fellow occupants of spaceship Earth.

But like birds, I always thought of as like kind of like fish.

They're kind of like weird, like not really the same, you know?

I see that.

You're not wrong about that.

But I just, I watched a bunch of these videos of chickens and like their owners hugging them because the chickens like walk right up to them into their arms and want to be squeezed and held.

Like chickens like hugs.

I just watched a big compilation of chicken hug videos and I went, well, I was kind of only eating chicken at the time.

Red meat and whatever, whatever.

And so I was like, well, I can stop eating these chickens.

They seem sweet.

Did the farmers put the chicken in the closet with the litter box or no?

You know what?

You keep bringing this up and I want to relieve you of some guilt because

it is like dogs like to be created because they like their own space, and animals like alone time.

So, you probably gave your cat some peace putting him in the closet.

It was crazy that it worked almost immediately, and then I and then I did just feel bad.

And like I said, I opened the door, but it was crazy that it worked almost immediately.

I was like, Is it just because he's not seeing me and not like yelling at me?

Okay, maybe he was just relaxing.

You put water in there, it's just like a nice little dark space to just chill for a second.

So, you're a good cat parent, you're doing.

I love my walling room.

A very boss.

You really do.

Isn't there also something about like

you just you know you're safe because you're secure on all these sides?

Like nothing's going to attack you.

Totally.

Is Take Me Up to the Ball Game made by Big Cracker Jack?

Now we just need to know.

I guess I'll look it up and we're going to see if we can get any context back there at the producer's desk.

I don't know.

I thought I assume it was a more innocent time, but if that was branded content, that would be wild.

It's a little depressing.

Nothing is safe ever.

Dang.

That's so sad.

So you're like, like, you're seeing, you're looking at chickens.

You're like, these things are cute.

These things are like.

They have like some sort of emotional need.

They just need to be held.

And I'm like, okay, that's enough for me.

And now I was telling you a little bit about this.

If I travel, I'll get one meat meal because part of travel is experiencing the food of the place.

Sure, sure.

But the only meat I won't eat still is a chicken.

I've just sort of like imprinted on chickens as just

won't eat them.

That's nice because you know what?

I think so many people do the opposite.

So I think that's what I'm saying.

Yeah, like what I was saying.

It's just, I feel like that is the kind of thing of like, oh, well,

I've heard people who are like vegetarian, like identify as vegetarian, but what they really mean is, I don't eat red meat, you know, which is like,

I don't know.

I mean, it's, we, we naturally have a hierarchy of life forms in terms of what we think is okay to consume and what we think isn't.

But I, hey, we're all fellow travelers on spaceship Earth or whatever fucking weird thing you said.

That's right.

So, Take Me Out to the Ball Game was written by Jack Norworth, who was

interesting.

Cracker Jack

was inspired to write it while riding a subway train and saw a sign that's about a baseball game.

So, I don't think, I think Cracker Jacks were just a thing at baseball games, so he included it, and then it turned into great marketing.

It's just observational, like art should be.

Sure.

Unless Wikipedia is wrong, but that's what that's what I think it was.

Yeah, that sounds good.

I mean, I guess this is like 100 years over 100 years ago, but like, well, I don't know when it was.

But also,

odd coincidence, his name is Jack.

Yeah, sure.

1908.

Wow.

How about that?

120 years old.

Wow.

Whoa.

But also, isn't it crazy just like

a person to be like riding in the subway and being like, hmm, take me out to like figuring out, take me out to the ball game?

You're just thinking about baseball and you're like, that gives me an idea for a little tune.

Wow.

And you write it down.

Take me out to the ball game.

It's still sung to this day.

How about that

what a legacy amazing you could you could

maybe not in the studio maybe wait till you

maybe not

did you notice that i was searching for something yeah no i did i saw

me into the bathroom same tune you're gonna have to go

into the bathroom

So you're in, so

you're in the state where you're not eating any meat except for travel, but then you're also saying you have a little bit of flexibility for spam, specifically spam.

Yes, because I missed spam the most.

And so in December, I get to eat spam.

We call it Dispamber

in my house.

And we go to Alhambra.

We call it Al Spambra.

And we get spam

once a year just for fun.

I think that this could turn into, this sounds like the beginning of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.

You could start a movement on

Al Spambra and

Dispamber and Dispambra.

Yeah.

Disbambra and Al Spambra

I think that it does there are a lot of spots out in Al Hamra that have delicious spam you guys could do a whole theme thing wow I'll let you have that what is your because I mean I usually think of spam in in the context of like Hawaiian food or like a spam masubi but like what like what kind of is that the kind of spam that's kind of it or like just fried rice with spam oh sure yeah or a masubi that's pretty much it i've never been to hawaii i'm gonna i'm gonna i'm gonna maybe go to Hawaii in

August.

I've told you a little bit about this, that my mom and sister and I might go to.

And I'm very interested.

I don't know what island to go to, or we don't know any of that stuff yet.

But

I'm excited to eat the food there and try some spam.

So good.

Spam and just like pancakes, macadamia nut pancakes.

Oh, man.

Good, good.

It took me a while to try Masubi, right?

That's the.

And I was like, spam.

And then I was like, I don't know how this works.

Because I think the idea of spam right out of the can, which it seems like you probably do like.

No.

No.

Okay.

What?

Out of the can?

Hang on.

Here's another thing you didn't know.

I didn't grow up with it or anything.

I just sort of like, in my 20s, had a masubi, spam masubi, which is, you know, grilled, fried, salty, delicious, soy saucy.

That's kind of all that got me into spam.

Yeah.

Because you can make spam that's not

canned spam.

You can just eat spam, but you can also like you can prepare it.

I mean, that's all.

And I think the

can?

It is, but is it always from the canned meat?

Yeah, it's the same.

Yeah, it's the canned meat.

Wow.

It's always that.

Yeah.

I thought there was like, is there like higher classes of spam or no?

Is it all just spam?

I don't think there's like an elevated spam.

Spam is the brand.

It's like the brand.

The brand of this canned meat.

It's not like your friend group.

Yeah, there's no

spam.

There's no A team, B team on the spam.

Sorry.

I want elevated spam.

I think that's kind of good.

You can elevate it in recipes.

Sure.

Okay.

Yeah.

That's nice.

All right.

I had no idea.

I didn't know if there was like with like some like fancy restaurants with masubi would be like their version of spam or something.

Yeah, I mean, I'm sure you can go to some

new American restaurant that has like an elevated spam on

their own meat or something.

Exactly, yeah, for sure.

Or it's just some sort of just pork product or something.

Yeah.

But yeah, I like on my first encounter with it, like you, but it was, I was as a kid.

It was my friend's mom had made spam masubi.

And I was like, I'd never, I didn't know what I was looking at.

Yeah.

I was looking at a hunk of spam,

like a sushi roll, but with spam in it.

And I, but I didn't bit into it.

And it was like, oh my God, this is transcendent.

This is great.

It's so funny.

The only meat I miss is kind of not a meat at all.

It was processed version.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I want to talk a little bit about walking because you're a big-time walker.

You walked here.

Yeah.

I love to walk.

Mitch, you're Mitch, you're a walker.

Where do you like to walk?

I am a walker.

So probably you're a walker.

I mean, now it's the form of exercise I like the most is like the, is like what I and so suss and I will do a lot of of walks.

I am lazy and still won't do it as much as I should, of course, but like I do, I do like, I like doing it and I'm trying to do more of it.

Yeah, it's that sort of thing of like now as I lose a little bit of weight, I'm like, oh, like it's good to go out and walk around and it's nice to, I just don't like the heat, and that is an issue in LA is walking in the heat.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, today's a great day for that.

Today is beautiful, it's cloudy, um, but yeah, in the summer, you wouldn't want to walk around outside, except I do like it.

I love to steam on the streets and just walk around.

You really, I mean, you really are, if you're walking like the reservoir or something like that, like you're just in the sun.

You're cooking, basically.

The Silver Lake Reservoir here in L.A.

for people outside of the city.

You might remember from Under the Silver Lake if you watched that movie.

Oh, good.

Now everybody knows what it is because someone made a movie.

That's nice.

That's good.

But I don't like to walk around the reservoir.

I live really close to it and it would be an easy walk.

But what I like about walking is exploring different neighborhoods or sort of just like walking the streets I normally drive by.

And then you can go into different stores or get little sweet treats from different like little coffee shops.

I never would stop by.

So that those are the kind of walks I like to do.

They're very much very like purposeful.

Like I will go discover like Boyle Heights.

I will just walk around there and see what there is.

I get bored walking around the reservoir because I'm like, I've done this a hundred times.

So if I ever do go on a res walk, I'm like, okay, I'm listening to a podcast, I guess.

That is, I feel the same way.

It's like the reservoir.

It's also a little hilly.

There's things that I don't like.

I like a walk, but I like a nice flat walk-wise.

Okay.

You'd love this book, 10,000 Steps a Day in L.A.

It'll take you around different neighborhoods.

Wow.

Yeah.

And just tell you a little bit of history about what you're looking at as you're walking.

And it's kind of just like a four to five mile little walk.

Take you one to two hours.

I love it.

Our friend Alan McLeod has a walking podcast.

He's walking about.

Yeah, Molasses Boy.

We went, and actually, since the last time we did our Patreon episode, Molasses Boy, Alan, and Eve Anderson and Gabriel and me, this is the thing Alan organized or was a part of organizing was the Great LA Walk, which was a 14-mile walk from USC campus to UCLA.

I did that this year.

What you did that?

The Great Los Angeles Walk.

Yeah, this guy does it every year.

No, I mean, there's a big group

to come out and do that.

You guys made it all the way.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Super fun.

And I went to UCLA.

We went to UCLA.

We did, yes.

So that was really fun.

To go from Boo USC to nice UCLA.

I just want to say it's a bit of stolen valor, okay?

Why is that?

Because you don't have that UCLA diploma, and I think it's fucked up.

Yeah, I didn't graduate, but I went.

That's enough for me.

Not enough for me.

You need to walk.

You need to take the tassel and put it over.

Hey, that's still brewing.

No, you're good.

Maybe we'll go back.

You can if you want.

Please, please go back to school.

You want me to go back to school?

And can I come with you?

Yeah.

Hey, everybody.

We're not going to get late.

Our back to our version.

That's from Caddyshack.

I fucked up.

I just realized.

No, it was great.

Our version of Back to School is that it's just boring.

We still play fucking video games in your dorm, but I think you should.

I think you should.

You're going all the way back, getting a dorm and everything.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

I guess the other version is dating college people, which is also seems not really.

It's pretty visual.

It's the free thing you should stay away from.

Yeah.

No need to explore that.

What do you do when you're doing a big, long,

long walk?

And I imagine you're not doing a walk of that scope very regularly, but like when you're going on a longer walk, do you bring a water bottle?

Do you bring any snacks?

Uh-huh.

Great question.

I should bring a water bottle, but I don't because I like to have my hands free.

Right.

And it's kind of a nightmare because then what happens is just like an hour or two into the walk, I pull over to whatever convenience store and then I just chug a big water because I still don't want to hold it, but I got to get water in.

And then I I just kind of do that periodically.

And then I get tummy aches because I'm chugging water and then walking.

Yeah.

It's really bad.

And then the snacks thing, I don't eat snacks because I'll stop in little shops and get myself snack treats.

Except if you're walking around a neighborhood.

I did a poll once.

I was just walking around Pasadena somewhere, South Pass, maybe.

And I was like, how kosher would it be if I walked up to one of these houses and knocked on the door and told people, hey, sorry, I'm just on a little walk and I got hungry.

Do you have a little snack I can have?

We like used to be so neighborly, right?

But I feel like people would be so freaked out if I did that today.

For sure.

And I asked my friends and they were like, yeah, probably don't do that.

They wouldn't be scared.

Yeah.

And I didn't try it, but I also think I'm like so unassuming.

Like maybe I could do it.

Maybe I feel like.

I think people would definitely be freaked out if I did it.

That's what I mean.

If you, I think you'd be okay.

Maybe if I showed up and I was like, I'm so sorry.

Do you have like a granola bar or something?

I'm just on a little bit of a walk and I didn't pack any snacks for myself.

You'd maybe you'd maybe get shot.

I think you maybe would get shot.

I was walking in the neighborhood and I'm very hungry.

Oh my God.

I think it's delivery on that.

That might be part of it.

I can't remember that aspect.

Yeah.

It's a, yeah, I've gotten into carrying a water bottle, which I also hate having not a free hand, but I'm just like, I like,

I got to hydrate at a certain point.

I feel like those water bottles sling so you can like wear it or like a backpack.

I don't want to.

I like you not having a free hand.

I'm encumbered.

I like you having both hands

put two water bottles in those hands so there's nothing going on

um i i i sometimes will get stomach aches on walking i had to i

i had to ask for susser's he has a little office and i had to ask for his login so i could go and log in myself

uh log out i guess yes is the is the uh nice uh i also just want to say to make clear i i when i say the stolen valor thing i i you know i because i i think that people are thinking i was being mean and i know you don't care one no one cares no one cares i know but i'm just saying I don't really think that I needed to be.

People have a lot of feelings today.

I know,

I mean, like, look, you can throw my diploma in the fucking trash.

I went to Ithaca, and guess who would graduate from Ithaca?

Amelia, me and one other freak in this room.

That's who's graduating from fucking Ithaca College.

Jemmy's leaving, Jemmy's going to be.

Oh, you went to Ithaca?

I gotta go.

Jemmy, where'd you, uh, what, where'd you graduate from?

The streets, baby.

That's right.

Street Smarts.

Street Smarts.

She's from Miami.

Wow.

Streets in Miami.

Whoa.

How about that?

Like Bugmane.

Bugmane was a Miami.

We know a few Miami.

There's a big film school down there.

Did you go to UCLA forth to film or not?

No, not at all.

No.

How do you know so little about me?

Yeah, you went for math.

Yeah.

Math major.

Thank you.

Oh, right.

You were a math major.

I knew that.

Because I was pretty good at math, too.

You don't remember everything about me.

No,

whatever.

I tried to get myself out of trouble, and I got into trouble.

Yeah.

You should have just left it.

I'm forgetting this stuff.

I'm tired.

What do you want from me?

We got to get into Panera, but

I did want to ask you, Baporni is a Persian name.

What do you stand on?

Do you have any favorites among Persian food?

And as someone who's eating vegetarian pescatarian, what do you go for with those restrictions?

A lot of the

soupy stews are still pretty vegetarian.

Like the ash is something that I'll go for still.

There's also like a kukusabzi, which is just sort of like an herb frittata.

Yeah.

That's something that I like to still eat.

Actually, in Silver Lake, I don't know if you guys have been to Azizam.

It's like a little cafe truly down the block that is selling like modern Persian food.

It's so good.

And then speaking of UCLA, Westwood is full of like such good Persian restaurants.

Iran.

Yes.

Atari Sandwich Shop.

Atari Sandwich Shop is the one I was going to bring up.

That place is really good.

If you're into a tongue sandwich, which I don't eat anymore, but I used to.

So good.

Wow.

They have a really good one.

And then there is another,

oh, Cafe Glacé.

Glisé, something like that in Westwood has Persian pizza, which isn't a Persian food, but they just make pizza kind of wrong, but in a way that I like.

The sauce is a little sweet.

It's more like ketchupy.

And they do the thing where they put like all the toppings and the sauce and then the cheese on top of everything.

A bit like a deep dish-esque, but it's personal pan style.

It's just like a sweeter small pizza.

Good.

I like that.

Wow.

Yeah.

I got to try that.

Tutsis is such a crazy food because you're putting it in eating.

You're putting it directly.

The food.

Yeah.

It's touching.

Don't think about it too hard.

If you do, you don't want to eat it anymore.

It's touching.

The first thing it's touching is the thing it is.

It's the only thing it does.

That's wow.

Yes.

It's a weird thing if you really think about it.

But it's the only food, unless you do you eat.

Do people eat lips?

I think people can eat lips.

You could eat lips.

You can eat anything.

So lips, I guess, is there, or teeth.

Tongue is specifically

presented as the main protein and, you know, yeah, like a tongue sandwich, certainly a lingua taco I like.

But yeah, it is.

It's because it's seasoning, right, for a lot of it?

Yeah, and it's and it's textural, but it's like if you get over the mental hurdle, you can enjoy it like any other meat.

It's delicious.

Yeah, it's very tasty.

Do people eat teeth?

No, I don't.

I don't think so.

I don't think you digest teeth.

Okay.

So teeth, then, okay.

Teeth are off the table.

Teeth are off the table.

So lips, I guess lips or tongue.

Yeah.

Yeah.

A lot of that's a lot of,

I've had lengua and I've liked it, but uh, some of that, some of uh that wouldn't be called organ meat, right?

Or is it organ meat?

I don't know.

Awful.

A tongue is an organ, sure.

I don't know if it would be.

Maybe.

Yeah.

But a lot of, a lot of stuff like that I have, I have a harder time.

That is like some of the stuff I have a harder time with.

That's fair.

Yeah.

Like I'll do like a like a a pate or like a liver pate or mousse or whatever.

Um, but I, uh, but

some of that stuff is, it's a, it's a, it's a strong, and texturally, I think it is harder for me.

But sometimes you get it cooked well and it's, and it's great.

But and also like a tongue sandwich.

A Persian tongue sandwich is pretty good.

It also is, it's just, it tastes like you're eating pastrami or something.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

And it's with like Persian pickles, and they put a little bit of like probably mayo and then lettuce tomato, and that's kind of all you need in a big dish.

I'll try it.

It's good.

I'll try it.

Cuckusabsi, which you mentioned, was a dish that I was not super familiar with, but that's the thing Nellie, my wife, will just make at home.

And she's like, oh, this is really yummy.

It's kind of like a very herby frittata, which I think is kind of how you describe it.

Yeah, yeah.

I can't cook very well.

I'm not a big cook, but I can make a cuckusapsi that's pretty good.

And if you do fresh herbs from the farmer's market, it tastes way better because my mom gets me like frozen from the Persian market, and it's, well, you don't need it.

Just chop it up.

The chopping is the hardest part.

Arm workout.

If anyone's looking for one, just drop some herbs.

I think that's actually.

I think I'm pretty good.

I think you're good, Mitch.

I like the idea of Natalie making this dinner for you, and you're sitting crisscrossed in front of a fucking minions movie.

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Panera Bread was founded in 1980 as the St.

Louis Bread Company in Kirkwood, Missouri.

It was acquired by Alban Pan in 1993.

They rebranded Stanley.

I am a fan of Alban Pan.

Well, Mitch, let me, I'll take you on a journey here.

They rebranded St.

Louis Bread Company as Panera in 1997, though in the St.

Louis area, it's still called St.

Louis Bread.

Now, you mentioned Alban Pan.

This is one of those weird corporate things where in 1997, the Alban Pan Company sells Alban Pan to concentrate on Panera.

So Alban Pan no longer owns Alban Pan.

It just owns Panera.

In 2017,

that's wild.

Isn't that weird?

In 2017, it removed artificial

preservatives, sweeteners, and colors from its menu, which is encouraging.

Also, in 2017,

Panera did.

Less encouraging, it was acquired by private equity firm JAB Holding Company.

Jab Holding?

Jab Holding, now

am I watching a fuck unboxing match?

Jab Holding

owns the following companies.

What's that?

Pete's like that.

Pete's Coffee.

Thank you, Mitch.

Pete's Coffee, Caribou Coffee, Stump Down Coffee Roasters, Intelligentsia Coffee, which is like the upscale, like Fancy Pants coffee shop.

There's one right a stone's throw from head gum, Einstein Brothers bagels, uh, Preta Mange or Preta Manger, a teaser for how do they not own, how do they not own a bomb palm?

No, sold it.

That's in the past.

That's been sold.

This is like the perfect place to own a bomb palm.

And this one I like the most: Koorig Dr.

Pepper.

That's right.

Koorig and Dr.

Pepper are one company that is owned by JAB Holding.

What?

Also, Koorig Dr.

Pepper also owns Snapple.

There are 2,000 locations of Panera these days, and we've covered twice before on Doughboys, once with Bill Oakley, and once with Monica Ruiz and Chris O'Malley.

So yeah.

I love those two.

Oh, I love all three of those.

Great past guests, great current guests.

Kimmy, I wanted to get your Panera thoughts going in because this is a, we pitched a few different options for you.

You picked this one.

I did.

Panera to me, I was talking about this a little earlier.

It's a study spot.

Panera is a study spot.

That's where I went went in high school and college.

If I had tests, I went with my friends and we sat at a table.

We got you picked twos and we took notes or we read notes and we made flashcards.

That to me is what Panera is.

It's just like just okay,

food, reliable, it's comfortable in there.

They've got free Wi-Fi.

No one's going to kick you out because no one cares.

Did they used to have Pebble ice?

I have in my memory that they did.

Wow.

I feel like they changed up their ice at a certain point, but I don't remember specifically.

The one I went to, I feel like definitely had Pebble Ice, and I was just refilling that green tea, iced tea, whatever.

And we were just studying there.

That's Panera.

What I like about you,

you are correct to point out that's part of its utility.

What I like about Panera, beyond like, yes, they tend to have reliable Wi-Fi and large footprints, like versus like a Starbucks or something.

Like if I'm going to some other, you're one of these other coffee shops that they own, it's just like sometimes like there's like six seats in here.

Oh, yeah.

You can always find a spot at a Panera.

Paneras are huge.

Yeah, there's always a spot to hang out.

Emma, you were saying that earlier, like when you were in college, that was a spot for you, a study spot for you.

Yeah, there was one.

I don't know if it's still there, right on the corner of Tremont in Boston, actually right near where we're going to be in a few weeks.

And it was like so easy to just go like grab a salad and sit for four and a half hours between classes.

And it also wasn't as expensive as a lot of other restaurants in a city.

Like you can get a Panera lunch at these then for like 15 bucks and it wasn't, and I could sit for, yeah, four or five hours.

They have a great rewards program, too.

I don't know if they still do free stuff.

I was getting so much free stuff.

And they always were like baguette or apple.

And sometimes, if the people were nice, we'd be like, give me both.

And then I'd get an apple and a baguette.

Yeah, I got a snack for later.

We got Chekhov's apples on the table here.

Those of those are from Panera that we have yet to eat.

We'll see if they get eaten before the episode is over.

They also have Sip Club, which is $15 a month, and you get unlimited basic beverages.

Our buddy chef Kevin Mitch was telling us.

Chekhov's apples.

Was telling us that.

Will they be fucked before the end of the episode?

Jesus Christ.

He was a Sip Club member.

Old reference.

Okay.

Kevin, thank you for being a valued, unlimited SIP club member.

For the past 11 months, you've enjoyed 40 cups with your annual subscription.

That was from Kevin.

That was from Kevin.

Wait, what?

Chef Kevin was consistently using the SIP club, and he got a summary email from them showing how many cups he'd had in a calendar year.

He said he'd had like 30 of those loaded lemonades.

Yes, he said 30 of them.

I'm reading his text here.

30 of them were the charged lemonade

until they said, okay, this is killing people, so we've got to stop selling these.

So he had those fatal charged lemonades back in the day.

Yikes.

So part of the impetus for covering it for our revisit is the croissant toast sandwiches, which they launched in April as part of their It Just Meals Good campaign.

They have a Croque Monsoor croissant toast and a fromage croissant toast.

I'll read the copy for each of these.

Black Forest ham, melty Provolone, and Asiago cheese, and a caramelized onion and Gruyere spread come together to make a ham and cheese sandwich that is completely reimagined.

What's going on in the Black Forest that the piggies are so tasty?

Melty.

Mitch, I'm not sure.

I don't know why Black Forest ham is given such prominence, but it is.

Is the Black Forest in Germany?

Is that right?

Yeah, it is.

Yeah.

And then we have...

What's the deal with it?

I don't know.

I don't know what's going on there.

I want to figure this out.

And then the Hamon Serrano, another thing, another European ham that everyone's talking about.

Oh, right.

Yeah.

Melty Provolone and American cheeses, caramelized onions, arugula, and garlic aioli transform a simple classic into something extraordinary.

I mean, they're basically the same sandwich, just one of them has ham and the other one has a garlic aioli.

Yeah.

So you're not eating meat.

You had the croque man sewer without the ham.

Mitch, you and I both both shared the ham version and the fromage raidles.

I'll let you start things off because I don't know if we were quite sure what to make of these.

Yeah, I think you take a bite and you go, huh, okay.

Because it's a type of sandwich where you're like, is this good or is it just buttery bread and cheese, which is always base level good?

Right.

Right.

So I don't know.

I do think without ham, I just had two kind of of the same same sandwich, except one was sweeter, the one with the caramelized onions.

Yeah, uh, it just was like the top of a French onion soup between two croissant toasts.

Yeah, that's kind of which is also good, but are we make is are we making food or am I just like eating butter and cheese?

Yeah, there's also something to the bread, so it kind of looks like a slab of French toast.

I'm not quite sure how to describe it, but with the like the you know

the folds of a croissant.

Yeah, and

it's a very strange, like, messy sandwich to eat.

It also is greasier than a normal croissant.

Like, it feels like a little bit.

The croissants are already buttery.

Already buttery.

It feels like that's amplified.

I just, I thought this was crust crazy.

It was just like things were flying off of it.

Everywhere.

You can't hold it.

Yeah, it's crumbly as shit.

And like, why not just use a croissant itself?

Like, why do we have to go the extra step of having a croissant toast?

It doesn't make it easier to eat.

It makes it more cumbersome.

And probably harder to make.

Yeah.

Because they could just split a croissant in half and put all the things in the middle.

But we've seen that before, parents are not going to do that, yeah, they're not going to do something you've seen before.

I mean, like, I don't know what to what quite to make of these myself.

I, I, might, myself, I, I, I was maybe enjoying it, but I was also like, this is very heavy, yeah.

Like, I feel like I maybe have a half of one of these.

I don't think I could have a whole sandwich for my lunch.

I think I'm gonna, I'm gonna need a nap after lunch,

and

yeah, it's very, very greasy and just, I don't know, I'd rather, like, I, I'd just rather have a sandwich on bread, I feel like.

That's, that's part of the issue here.

I took a bite.

Yeah.

I said, hmm.

And I, you know, I come in a little late, uh, spoiler alert there.

Yeah.

And, uh, and you, you guys are spoiling like, hmm is kind of the word here.

We're all kind of thinking, hmm.

And I,

I, I, the sweet one, I'm just going to say right off the bat, I did not like the sweet one.

And I, I, I, I, uh, just like Twisted Meadow-wise, I'm a bit of a, I'm a bit of a sweet tooth.

Uh, I, uh, I, I, I like sweet stuff.

I like sweet drinks.

And I think this drink that, uh, well, we'll get to it.

You were like, Amelia, you're like, it's too sweet.

And I like, I don't think it's sweet at all.

But that sandwich, I think when it's like savory with sweet, it's like what gets me.

And I, I did not like it.

And honestly, my favorite bite.

Another spoiler, I had a tomato soup, which I really like from Panera.

And my favorite bite is that when I took the other half of your sandwich that had no ham of it and dunked it in there, that was maybe my favorite of the sandwiches.

That's a good way to do that.

The Croque Monsieur without the ham was maybe my favorite bite.

I like the Croque Monsieur was better, but I don't think either of these work.

I don't think that they're great.

I think that they're a limited time offer for a reason and they will go away.

I mean, the Croque Mansure without the ham is basically a gussied up grilled cheese.

So that makes sense.

Which the other one kind of is trying to be too, which is with onions, but it's

the taste of that one was just not working for me.

Yeah.

It's a, yeah, I don't know.

I don't know if either of these.

I didn't dislike them, but I'm also like, I don't need to get this.

Sure, if you order it, you'll be happy because it's, again, bread and cheese.

We're good.

True.

But I wouldn't order it.

Yeah, I agree.

But it got us.

There's other things on the menu.

There's other things.

Oh, you pick two, just go for it.

Yeah.

This is the thing.

This is what got us in the building.

But what's going to have me come back to panera and keep coming back to panera is things like the u-pick too the u-pick two is just a great value you get a cup of soup or mac a half salad or a half a half sandwich you get any two of those three and i get the mexican street core corn chowder which is an lto and also the half strawberry poppy seed chicken salad another another lto both of these are uh you know seasonal items

and

I don't know.

I mean, like, I'm not necessarily even the biggest corn chowder guy.

No offense to Emmy.

Yeah.

But I, But I did think this was a good execution of it.

It's got a little bit of chili powder in there.

And, you know, I'm a bit of a heat seeker.

So like I was getting just a touch of that.

The lime juice wasn't too aggressive.

The cilantro was nice.

And the poblano peppers as well added a little bit of heat

and also a little bit of texture.

And some blue corn tortilla chips.

You just kind of put those some bitches on top.

I thought this was a nice little cup of soup.

A bowl would have been too much, but in cup form, this was a very satisfying, hot component of my lunch.

The strawberry poppy seed chicken salad, I thought, was a home run.

I thought that was great.

I thought it was delicious.

The poppy seed salad wasn't too sweet.

Interesting.

I actually had a lot of experience with home runs yesterday.

Oh boy.

Wow.

Did you see any in person?

There were some dingers?

Oh, yeah.

Wow.

Freddie Freeman.

Nice.

Wow.

That's his whole thing.

I got stuffed up there.

It sounded nervous.

Yeah.

Freddie Freeman.

I'm stuffed up.

Do you hear that?

No, I don't.

I've had a sinus infection.

I'm on antibiotics.

Sorry, this is a weird time to tell you.

It's not weirder than you talking about fucking the apples.

That is weirder to me.

This is okay.

Look, we won't get into the story.

That's also funny.

We were talking about improv and like scenes being like, my dick is, you know, we were talking about stuff like that.

And then, of course, I do it immediately.

Sorry.

It's okay, dude.

Freddie Freeman hit a

home run, a dinger.

There were multiple dingers yesterday.

I think Muki hit one too.

Wow.

How about that?

The Red Sox's biggest mistake, letting

Mookie Bets go away.

Also, had strawberries, blueberry.

It supposedly had blueberries and pineapple.

I didn't get much of those.

I just got the strawberries in there and then some toasted pecans.

And I've been having some issues with nuts, but pecans are totally fine.

Wow.

A great little crunch to it.

Yeah, I don't know.

I thought this was delightful.

Mitch, you also got the U-Pick, too.

I did, Wags.

I got the Greek salad with chicken, which honestly, I don't think I need the chicken in it because the chicken is very cheap, thin slices of chicken.

This is part of what we're like, we're dealing with.

We've talked about chicken and how

it's oftentimes like the, has the lowest floor of any product.

We talked about this a lot.

And then we're having this discussion about seeing, you know, again,

a chicken and as chickens as like having souls at agency and all that.

And it's just like, oh, maybe I, maybe I just need to eat less bad chicken.

Yeah.

There's less chicken in chicken.

You'll just make it worth it.

If those guys got to die, make them delicious.

Yeah, right.

That's a great point.

Yeah.

Marty McFly gets a little too offended when someone calls him a a chicken.

You ever think about that?

I didn't think about that.

You know what?

A buddy of mine said the chickens are actually very brave.

So being like,

Mark, you chicken is

wrong.

Not even right.

I don't know if they're brave.

They're maybe just stupid.

Like they'll walk towards a wolf, that kind of thing.

It's not like brave.

They're just like, they don't know what they're doing.

If you agitate them in a Zelda game, they'll fuck you up.

Ooi.

Yeah.

That's cool.

I like that little, I always, would you, would you, I would always, I felt bad doing it.

I do it, but I would always want to see that i would always want to you gotta beat that chicken up and see what i've been seeing i do it once to see the animation but then after that i was like i've learned my lesson let me do that again um the chicken was not uh was not great it was and but the i like the greek salad there i've i've gotten the greek salad a lot Panera's quality, though, I feel like is

it's gone downhill a little bit, right?

Panera's quality.

I don't know.

Boy, I don't know.

I mean, I remember when I was stable recently.

When I was shooting the Tamar War in Atlanta, I would go to Panera a lot, and I thought, like, the Greek salad was like a good Greek salad.

And then this felt a little airport Greek salad to me.

Yeah.

Okay.

The tomato soup, on the other hand, that which was the other part of my pick too,

I love.

Wow.

And I have good memories of shoveling at my, during COVID, shoveling at my...

at my mom's house and we got and like i got tomato soup at panero the night before and we had we heated it up and it was delicious it was delicious that's fun it's a good for for a fast food or whatever, you know, chain restaurant tomato soup.

They make a damn good tomato soup.

Was this a planned sequence of events?

You're like, I'll get Panera tomato soup tonight so that tomorrow after I shovel, shovel some snow, I'll have some soup ready to go.

That's right.

Wow.

A snowstorm was coming.

That's exactly what I was.

I was always anticipated.

Also, Emmy loves it.

I was like, I got to go to work and eat tomato soup.

And Emmy was like, I love tomato soup.

It sounds like she's a big soup fan.

It sounds like she's a soup in general.

I think she is a soup fan.

You got to get her into the pod.

Yeah.

Yeah, maybe.

I just remembered

a big Panera memory that just hit me was I had free bagels from Panera for a year when I was in college.

Wow.

Wow.

Yes.

I just remembered this.

So I went to, they were grand opening the Encino Panera or something.

And I saw online that the first like hundred people get free bagels for a year.

And I think I remember I went in at

5 a.m.

I went there

because I was like, everyone's going to want this.

I got to go at 5.

Nobody, Nobody was lined up.

It was like me and maybe one other guy.

I kind of just sat in my car until it opened at six.

And I was like, I'm not going to be the first person to walk in.

So I waited a little longer and I was like the third person to walk in there.

And they just give you this like voucher that I would just show to my local Panera.

Wow.

And they gave me a dozen a month of bagels.

And so we just kept those in the freezer.

And me and my roommates just really ate.

bagels for a whole year.

Wow.

Yeah.

That rule.

Thank you, Panera.

This is a perfect time, I feel like.

I was going to say,

you're like a hero.

I was a hero.

That's wild.

Wow.

Wow.

A dozen a month.

A dozen a month.

That's what you get?

Pretty good.

Mm-hmm.

Should have stayed in school.

The tomato soup was the highlight of the day for me.

The sandwiches were just okay.

The salad was a little wonky today.

And

I got this drink, too.

Yeah.

so we wanted to get the citrus punch, or you wanted to get the citrus punch.

A delightful citrus punch naturally flavored with lemon, mango, pineapple, and blood orange yuzu.

Unfortunately, they did not have it.

So, Amelia, you're like, you auto-bowled in store and you got something else.

You got the passion papaya ice cream tea, not realizing that that was what I ordered.

Had no idea.

Wow.

So we ended up with the same beverage.

And then Wages is like, wow, this worked out.

And took the drink and started drinking.

I was like, I want some of the fucking drink.

There was no ice.

No ice in the drink,

which was, that was.

That was a me thing, not a Panera thing.

Oh, smart.

I like it.

Yeah, because it's not going to dilute.

I get it.

Yeah, good move.

What did you think?

Because I don't think that this is that sweet.

And you seem to think it was like disgustingly sweet.

It was pretty sweet, especially I had just eaten a kitchen sink cookie.

So I went from eating a cookie to drinking that, and I still thought it was sweet.

Okay.

It was a little sweet for me, but I also like an unflavored, like I like an unsweetened iced tea.

Like,

that's how I prefer it.

And so here we got, and the, it has passion fruit and papaya and then just like, I don't know, like 150 calories of added sugar.

So it's just, it, it was pretty potent to me.

You, you don't mind it.

I don't mind it.

Yeah.

But I like sweet drinks.

That's, yeah.

Yeah.

Timmy, where do you stand on an iced tea?

Love an iced tea.

Love an Arnold of Palmer.

Arnold Palmer.

Oh, yeah.

Arnold Palmer.

We nailed it on the third one.

Yeah.

So I don't like them sweetened, sweetened though.

Yeah.

And Arnold Palmer is okay because a lemonade should be kind of sweet.

So if I'm adding it in, I expect it to be there.

But if I'm drinking an iced tea and it's sweet, I'm like, no.

We're in Arnold Palmer season.

We're coming.

This is

a great time to have Arnold Arnold.

Summertime.

Oh, baby.

Oh, yeah.

Now you can do the perfected Arnold Palmer, the Nick Weiger.

I knew you would say this.

He does the same ratio as you.

Our riot Palmer does the ratio you do.

No, my, it's.

Two-thirds iced tea, one-third lemonade.

Yeah, that's what it should be.

Yeah, exactly.

And that's what what he calls Nick Weiger.

Yes, this is the issue.

Is that he's invented?

It's like me being like, the Mike Mitchell.

I'm going to call the cheeseburger the Mike Mitchell.

It's like when you put two slices of cheese on the burger or something.

Sounds pretty good.

Oh, people do that.

People do that.

That's the point.

I can't take a cheeseburger.

You can't take the Arnold Palmer.

I'll give you the credit for that.

Create your own shit.

Create some fucking, create.

Create

some apple sandwich or something.

Create something.

Create an apple sandwich?

I'm not the take-me-out to the ball game guy.

I don't know.

I was just going what was in the room.

Create, create something.

Create it.

I did.

What?

The Nick Weiger.

No.

What's your thing?

Is that what?

An original Arnold Palmer is a half and a half?

Original is, I feel like, is 50-50.

I don't know.

I think it's just the guy just invented the mix.

Yeah.

The ratio is not important.

Also, I don't think he invented it.

I think so.

I thought he invented it.

And he named it after himself.

But God bless him.

Rest in power.

I thought

this was too sweet for me.

I like a green tea.

I like an ice cream tea, but yeah, I just don't need this much sugar.

However, when we're talking sugar.

He's a freak, too.

We're both.

He's a weirdo.

I'm normal.

I'm a normal man.

We also had some sweet treats.

We had the kitchen sink cookies and we had the tulip cookies.

Now, the tulip cookies came in a six-pack.

And Emma, I think you had the astute observation that recording this on the other side of Easter, this seemed like a way for them to get rid of Easter inventory.

They looked like Easter.

They looked Easter thin.

They definitely are Easter cookies.

And the fact that they came in six, you were 100% right.

Because I was like, oh, six-pack.

Oh, I bet these are little guys.

They were big boys.

These are big old shortbread cookies.

Like, I think we just had, we split one or two of them among the five of us.

Yeah.

And, but, delicious.

Pretty yummy.

Yeah.

I did like it.

Yeah.

Nice and soft.

Not too sweet, honestly.

Really good.

I was trying to get the,

I wanted to get the 20-pack of clover cookies.

Is this a St.

Patrick's Day thing?

What's going on?

St.

Patrick's Day cookie.

Okay.

All right.

Nice.

So

where's it going?

No.

That was it?

That was the end.

That was the end point?

You wanted to get a 20-pack of clover cookies?

Because St.

Patrick's Day was a couple months ago?

That was the entirety of your thought?

Okay.

Don't talk to me like a child.

No, I just wanted to make sure.

I just wasn't sure what I was missing.

I guess I was missing nothing.

We got it.

That's fully self-contained.

I was going to say.

hungry,

I'd given up and covered my head already.

I couldn't do it anymore.

I was going to say the 50-pack of fucking Santa cookies or something.

I just was running out of steam.

I just had nothing.

You're doing great.

That was good.

This tulip cookie I didn't like.

You didn't like it.

I thought you guys all liked it.

I didn't like it.

That was sweet enough for you.

I actually thought it was too sweet.

Okay, this is incorrect.

I think that the kitchen sink cookie.

That one was definitely sweeter.

It was sweeter, but like I liked the flavors of it more too.

So it was sweeter.

But the,

you know, a little pretzel, a little salt, and chocolate is the main flavor.

I think it's the fact that like the tulip cookie was, you know, was like a very, it was like the sweetness was like just a kind of sugary.

Yeah, it's like a grocery store cookie.

Yeah, grocery store cookie.

You compare it to like the loft house cookie that has like, yeah, the shortbread with the icing, the thick layer of icing.

And that's very much what it was.

The kitchen sink cookie, by contrast, which I love.

That's a go-to for me from Panera.

And that has semi-sweet chocolate, milk chocolate, so two types of chocolate, caramel pieces, pretzels, and then flake salt.

I mentioned one thing I like because, you know, like peanuts are tough for me these days.

A lot of times that's what adds texture to a cookie.

But you get the pretzels in there.

You get the same sort of sort of...

sensation, just minus the nuts.

And then I love the saltiness of the pretzels and the flake salt that's thrown on top of these bad boys.

Uh, you know, I heard is really good.

What's that?

Oh, those clover cookies.

I've heard the same thing about those clover cookies.

If you can get them on clearance after St.

Patrick's Day, in the 20-pack,

you're gonna get the 20-pack, but the 20-pack clover cookies I hear are pretty tasty.

Yeah, those are great.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I like the Lincoln cookies you can get after President's Day.

Those are really good.

You have to get 60 Lincoln cookies.

You have to get 60 Lincoln cookies after, but

it's a 60-pack.

You'll go right through them.

And also, it is a weird thing.

It's like post-assassination Lincoln.

Like, it's like right after he got his brain.

It's pretty good.

But they just say that because I think somebody just spilled a batch of them on the floor.

Yeah, that's it.

And they had to rebrand

real fast.

I like those kitchen scene cookies quite a bit.

I like all the textural variants.

That's a big part of it.

It's just like each bite is a little bit different.

And sometimes you get those perfect bite, that perfect bite that's got a little bit of everything.

But it is, I I think, a little bit sweeter than the tulip cookie.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No, you didn't agree with that.

No, I didn't agree with it.

But I, sure, I agree with, I agree with his thought on it.

That's, that's fair.

I, I, I like the kitchen sink cookie, and I, I just,

the, the grocery store, the sugary grocery store cookie is not my favorite type of cookie.

And that's fair.

Mine either.

Yeah, yeah.

But I, yeah, but today it was good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Amelia, you seem to respond to that kitchen sink cookie.

Oh, man.

Those kitchen sink cookies were a home run.

Whoa!

Congested.

Amila's hitting dingers behind the desk there.

We should get to our final thoughts on banana.

Unless there's anything I missed, were there any menu items we didn't hit up here?

I think we got everything.

I mean, the croissant toast was the headline.

Yeah.

And,

you know,

we'll talk about it.

So, so, Kimia, here's how this will work.

We'll each go around.

We'll, we'll give our closing argument, if you will, on this particular chain.

You can talk about this experience.

You can talk about your lifetime of Panera experiences, and then end it by giving a score from zero to five forks.

You're our guest.

We'll begin with you.

Okay.

This is me talking about Panera, right?

Yeah, Panera.

You know, Panera has only provided for me in my entire lifetime.

It's provided a space to study it's provided bagels for my friends it's provided safety a seat there's always a seat for you at a panera and it is very reliable the food I don't love now, but I did then.

It really, it satisfies.

A U-Pick 2 is a fantastic deal.

So I think generally, maybe I'm just feeling so happy and emotionally high on this Panera, but I'm like, okay, I give it a four.

It's a pretty reliable spot that, to me, gave me a lot in life.

Wow, four forks.

Look at that.

Very good score.

Mitch, go ahead and give us your closing thoughts, your fork score.

I'm going to deploy Chekhov's Apple.

Wow.

He's going to eat it, to be clear.

Thank God.

Croissant toast sandwiches didn't work out, but you know what?

I'm going to give a toast to croissants in general because they're a buttery, tasty, delight.

And I like to get a croissant sandwich at Dunkin' Donuts.

I'm a fan.

The Dunkin' Donuts sandwich, the breakfast sandwich with the croissant egg and cheese or whatever, and bacon or whatever you want to put on there,

really works well.

These did not,

they were just like too charred and too fucked up.

What is this?

You said Jab Industries?

Yeah, J-A-B.

I believe it's pronounced as an acronym.

Jab, but what Jab Industries?

Let me scroll up through my notes here.

It's a JAB holding company.

JAB holding company.

Got it.

Okay.

Now, in 2020, I was trying to avoid the JA, as you know, Wags.

Oh, boy.

But in 2025, do I avoid Jab Holding Company?

Do I, do I avoid Panera?

No, I like Panera quite a bit.

I think that the quality has declined, but I think they got, I think you can go in there and and share some bad news.

Wags, we've talked about this before.

It's a great place to go in there.

And

when I was in Atlanta, I went there for lunch and they can get like a good, healthy lunch.

I love the tomato soup, decent sandwiches you pick too.

I think I love everything it did for you when you were in college.

That's the truth.

I love the 20-pack of clover cookies.

I'm genuinely a fan.

I do think like it felt

Panera felt elevated to me at one point and now it doesn't feel that way and it kind of bums me out.

I think it's just age.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But Obam Pond doesn't that still feel kind of or actually maybe that slid too, but that felt elevated at one point.

I don't know.

These like fast cash cafes felt elevated and no longer do.

Now that I'm like over 30, I'm like, no, no, yeah.

Like food in your home.

That is, that is maybe, that is maybe what it is.

But I can't go below,

I'm going to go three and a half forks.

Yeah.

Doesn't get a four from me.

I don't think it deserves it, but I think it's a good solid three and a half forks.

I think you're more right, and I was really riding the high of my emotions.

Look,

this show is all about nostalgia and being too nice to these places that are

being too nice to a banero, a place I haven't visited for years.

And obviously.

And also, like, probably a terrible corporation on top of that, of course.

Oh, yeah.

Did you see all the places it owns?

Yeah, Jab Holdings doesn't sound like

a great company, anyways.

But wow, I can't believe you actually finished the fucking apple.

We really stalled for you to just crush that apple.

Yes,

I was more seeing if I could do it, and you did.

Yeah,

congratulations.

How does it feel?

Yeah, do you feel good?

Good apple.

Now, I noticed you chose the apple that didn't have the huge bruise on it.

See, that's nothing.

This is a fair observation.

So, one of the apples, as I finished my bite here, that Panera gave you,

because that's the one you take home.

No,

as part of Panera's,

no,

that's the first time anyone on the podcast is like, no, don't do that.

Our guests should do that more.

I want to encourage that from our guests.

Anytime we go down a road like that, just no.

As part of the Panera combo, you get your choice of an apple, a baguette, and chips.

Or 20 clover cookies.

Or 20 clover cookies.

That's a seasonal item.

However, this apple has a big bruise on it.

Now, that's not the end of the world, but just again, for something that you're getting from a restaurant, you kind of wish this one had been pruned out of that.

That's like a sliding door for a worm.

Oh, that's true.

Yeah, it is like a sliding door for a worm.

That worm's doing an architectural digest.

That's a luxury residence.

Who's that worm that wears a hat?

Oh, from Richard Scary, Busy Jack.

Oh, is that who it is?

That's who it is.

Isn't there a worm that wears a hat that lives in the Apple, too, or is that my beer?

That's him.

He drives an Apple car, the Richard Scary worm.

Oh, my God.

Lowly worm.

Yeah, Lowly.

Lowly?

Yeah.

Lowly.

L-O-W-L-Y.

What is it?

Lowly.

What is it?

L-O-W-L-Y.

Yeah.

Lowly worm.

All right.

Rule 34.

Oh, God.

No.

The worm who wears the hat.

I think he might be a resident of the White House.

Wow.

We'll be right back.

Okay, we're back.

Lowly Worm is cool as hell.

Yeah, Lowly Worm is cool.

Yeah.

He's awesome.

Lowly Worm.

Here's the thing.

I really like Panera.

I have a lot of affection for this chain.

I like that it's doing something a little bit different.

Like, there's no one who's really like.

There's no one who's actually really doing the same thing in its space.

Like everyone's either trying to be like a little bit cooler, a little bit sleeker.

They feel like they're kind of comfortable kind of being like a big, you know,

a kind of cumbersome space that's, that's almost just got too much, like it's got more real estate than it needs.

Like, you've never been inside like a packed Bonera, you know what I mean?

There's, there's, they're always like a little bit too spacious, but that's part of what you like about it.

It's kind of got a hotel lobby feel to it.

But it's also a little bit, and this, this, this goes back to what you were saying, Mitch, about it being a place to break bad news to people.

It kind of also has a sort of almost clinical feel to it.

Like it's not like it's, it's, it's homey, but it's also not too

uh

it's not too nice, you know, it's it's not too snazzy.

I don't know.

There's just something about it.

There's something about its sterility that is kind of comforting and it's uniformity.

And I think the quality of food is high enough that I'm always happy when I have a lunch there.

I think they do have, we didn't get any hot beverages here, but I think they do have good coffee.

And I'm a big coffee guy.

I got to have my Java.

And I think if you're near a Panera, the Sip Club is quite a good value.

I really like their desserts, too.

There's two guys who know a thing or two about being sterile.

It's you and I.

We got that locked down, Wax.

Also, I just want to say I am disgusted that, and look, I'm done with Rule 34.

Okay.

I'm not going to talk about it on the podcast anymore, but there is fucking lowly worm Rule 34.

There's like, why did you look that up?

You didn't have to look that up.

It all exists.

That's the point of Rule 34.

That it all is there.

Yeah.

But Lowly Worm, Rule 34.

Rule 34, in and of itself, is stating that Lowly Worm porno will exist because the whole thing of Rule 34 is if you can imagine

it existing, it's there.

So, if this is on you for looking it up, to be like, Let me see if I can prove myself wrong.

No, the rule is the rule, so you're gonna get something nasty on your phone.

I got something really nice.

Can I just read you the caption?

Okay, sure.

This is too big, it smells terrible.

That's the case, Jesus Christ.

Yeah,

okay,

show me that after the release.

You got a taker on a cash.

ask you that over this one.

Wow.

She takers.

I think a college alums.

Throw those caps in the air.

I like Panera quite a bit.

I wanted to defer for a second to Amelia because you have a little bit of a history yourself with Panera.

I've always had really fond memories of Panera.

When I was 12, my sister started dating her high school boyfriend, my older sister, and he would let me tag along on their dates and he'd take us to Panera and he'd treat me to Panera and I got the same thing every time and I got it today.

The Frontega chicken panini and a French onion soup.

How was it?

Very nice of him.

How was it today?

It was, it holds up.

Wow.

Nice.

It holds up.

And he is now my brother-in-law.

That's amazing.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Has he taken you out since?

To a Panera?

Oh, yeah.

This is something you guys should do, like every so often.

often.

And I've taken their child, my niece, back to Panera.

We got Christmas in King.

That's beautiful.

So cute.

What a lovely story.

That's really, that's very sweet.

Yeah.

If I'm going on a date with a girl, I said, don't try to bring your kid's sister along, okay?

I last time.

I don't really go on any dates.

That wasn't clear.

No, yeah, we established it earlier when you insisted that you're not a bachelor.

You're a lonely man.

I have

last time we reviewed this chain,

I mentioned on the podcast that I lost a baguette in my car and

still never found, not to this day.

It's amazing.

No idea.

I didn't know a man could lose a baguette until it happened to me, but here we are.

We're living in the aftermath of that event, but I am still a fan of Panera, nevertheless.

I am going to go Four Forks.

I'm in a hand-holding club with our guests because I think this is a...

Wow, I kept it out of the golden plate.

You did, Mitch, but you also were true to your evaluation, and that's the whole point of this exercise.

I like, I do.

This is a good adding for Panera.

And hey, I'll have that memory of that

snow shoveling day and that hot tomato soup with my mom.

I'll have that.

See, that's the thing.

Panera has a little memory for everybody, huh?

It does.

That's kind of nice.

And it's mostly, I have bad news for you, is usually what it is.

It's a memory.

A memory is a memory.

A memory is a memory.

It's a core, a core memory.

Yeah, that's where we fired you, song, right?

I believe so.

I think I said this before, too, but I've since like bad moments in my life, I've thought of just being in a Panera.

Like I've retconned it.

When I'm thinking of like a white void, it is like sitting in a Panera where I'm like getting this, you know, some sort of bad news.

But also,

I think it is a place where you can sit down and it's like a place where you can take that news.

That's another part of it.

It's an ante-chamber to oblivion.

Kind of a purgatory on Earth.

Yay.

On this little spaceship we call Earth.

That's right.

Hey, that was our review of Panera.

It's time for a segment.

This is Two Truths and a Fry.

This is a food-based

Two Truths and a Lie.

We're mitching Kimmy, must guess which of these are.

I was just about to say this podcast sucks before you said the segment.

Which of these three food facts is in fact food fiction?

So I will read a topic.

I will read three quote-unquote facts.

You identify which of the three was made up by your associate producer, Amelia Marino.

And we can all change.

We can say say which one is a fry.

Yeah, so say which one is a, I mean, you can also just say lie, but say what it's typically what you choose.

Okay, it's fry.

Okay, great.

First up, the topic is doughnuts.

Okay.

A, the original purpose of a donut hole was to save dough and yield more product.

B, the world's heaviest donut was made in Utica, New York and weighed over 3,000 pounds.

Whoa.

C, National Donut Day was established in 1938 to honor the women of the Salvation Army who served donuts to soldiers during World War I.

I have an answer.

Go ahead, Mitch.

Oh, I go first?

You go first this time, and then Kimmia can go first next time.

Okay, cool.

I think B is a fry.

Mitch says B, the world's heaviest donut.

Oh.

Kimia, what do you think?

Sounded kind of good to me.

I think C is a fry.

Yeah, C does seem like a fry.

Oh, well.

I'm surprised to tell you that you were both wrong.

The original purpose of a donut hole was to save dough is a lie.

It was a fry route.

It is to ensure the dough is fried evenly.

I knew that.

You knew it.

And I knew it but i went everyone's a cheapo these days huh yeah and i thought myself out of it i mean a part of me was just like oh yeah i guess you would have but like i guess you can make a donut whatever the hell you want those donuts that don't have i can't believe i sided with the cheapos and not with the women

dang next topic water A, hot water freezes faster than cold water.

B, water is heavier in ice form than in liquid form.

C, 1% of the Earth's water is suitable for drinking.

Kimia, you go first.

What?

Can I say, as you read all those, I kind of, my brain went, I don't care.

The water facts, I went, I don't know.

I'll read them again.

Hot water.

No, please don't.

Okay.

I'm just going to make one.

By the way, siding with the cheapos and not the women is like, that kind of sums up the dope boys fuck.

Coming on the dope boys.

Yes.

No, no, you guys are good.

I'm going to pick A because it doesn't matter.

A, hot water freezes faster than cold water.

Mitch, what do you think?

I say,

I'm going to say B because it's just the, is this a properties thing where frozen water

shouldn't, like, should, like, shouldn't ice weigh the same as the water?

Uh, is my guess?

Yes, Mitch, you are correct.

That was the fry.

Water is heavier in ice form than liquid form.

You get a point.

Next up, honey.

Okay, I'm back on board.

I'm back on board, too.

A, honey can ferment if it absorbs too much moisture from the air.

B, bees must visit over 2 million flowers to produce one pound of honey.

C, honey is naturally vegan since it's made by bees, not from them.

C

is true.

Oh, wait, I'm looking for a fry.

A

also watch TV false.

Can we pick the same one?

Yeah, sure, yeah.

Can you read A again?

A, honey can ferment if it absorbs too much moisture from the air.

That sounds bad.

Yeah, it does, but it also sounds boring.

So, like, I'm, you know.

I agree with you.

B is bees.

Bees are what a B.

B is something that's.

I just want that one to be true because they're such hard workers.

B, bees must visit over two million flowers to produce one pound of honey.

It can't be that.

It can't be that, but I'm going to leave it as true.

I think it might be.

I think it is true.

I'm going to go A as well.

I'm going A.

All right, let's see.

The one that is a lie, or a fry rather, is honey is naturally vegan.

Is that true?

Yeah, I looked it up again to be sure.

It says honey is not vegan.

It's technically an animal product, and those following a vegan diet can exclude any food that is

a hardcore vegans won't eat honey.

Wow, that's wild.

Interesting.

Even if the bees are just like making it anyways, it's pretty rare.

I think most vegans are okay with it.

It's like very staunch hardcore vegans that won't touch it.

I guess it's an animal product.

Fair, but I'm not like you also can't give honey to be honey.

Yeah.

Oh, what happens?

There's like a bacteria that can grow in honey that most human beings are like, we're all fine with.

It doesn't bother us, but it can kill babies.

Whoa, and babies can't drink water either.

No.

The previous thing we heard facts about.

All right.

Wow.

Next topic.

This is, this is, I,

all right.

Hey, it is a fun topic.

Pizza.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Hey, in the U.S., 350 people eat 350 slices of pizza every second.

I'll take that again.

300.

Yeah.

300.

Did I write that right?

This is what you wrote.

I think I wrote it.

In the U.S., somehow, but we'll see what happens.

In the U.S., 350 people eat 350 slices of pizza every second.

Sure.

What is a fry?

A fry.

I'm going to give everyone a point because there's no way that's true.

What is B and C?

It might be a million people.

Okay.

So that was.

350 slices of pizza are eaten every second.

That sounds right.

Maybe it should just be people eat 350 slices of pizza.

There's an extra 350.

I must have like edited the sentence and forgot to get rid of that.

That one, I'll I'll just say that was this will just be a 50-50 because that one is true.

It was just at a typo.

So the other two are,

you know, it's a coin flip here.

B, in 2001, the Russian space agency was paid over a million dollars by Pizza Hut to deliver a pizza to one of their astronauts in orbit.

That is true.

C, the first pizza to be delivered by drone was delivered in the U.S.

in 2020.

Oh, shitter, is that true?

Uh, well, these are good fries if

one of these is a fry.

one of them is true, one of them is made up.

Um,

it feels how much did they say they paid Pizza Hut?

One million dollars.

I don't think it's that

I don't think that.

Yeah, I guess I should deliver that like Doctor Evil.

Go ahead.

One million dollars, really good,

really good.

Yeah, yeah,

20 clover cookies.

Oh

my gosh.

Just hammer it home.

If it made everyone uncomfortable and didn't make sense when you first did it, you just got to hammer it home.

Do we have a guess?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yes.

The million dollars.

You're guessing a million dollars.

I'm going to guess the drone.

C is a fry.

Yeah, Mitch, that one was a fry.

It actually happened years earlier in New Zealand.

Now that's the kind of fry I don't like when it's like, true, and then all you did was change the day.

You know what?

It's not on you.

No, it is.

It is on you.

No, no, no.

No, it is on you.

I'm choosing women, and I'm blaming the cheapos.

Okay,

is honey the only product a bug makes?

Webs.

Yeah, webs.

Webs are huge.

Shit, you're right, though.

Silk, yeah.

Silk.

Yeah?

Silk.

Oh, I guess the only one that we eat, right?

Probably.

There's got to be another bug thing that we eat.

We eat some bugs.

We eat bugs.

But do we eat something that bugs make, or is it just honey?

Yeah, what else do bugs make?

I mean, honey is the big one.

Honey's definitely the big one.

You know, honey never expires.

It's good forever.

Oh, yeah.

It just gets crystally, but you can eat it forever.

Wow.

That's good.

All right, next up, pancakes.

That's cool.

Ooh, pancakes.

Hey, William Shakespeare was a big fan of pancakes and mentions them in two of his plays.

Boy, this is an unfair advantage to Mitch because of his vast knowledge of Shakespeare's candidates.

I know Shakespeare.

When does he say pancake?

B, the biggest consumers of pancakes in the United States are people from the Northeast eating 32.5% of all pancakes consumed.

C, pancakes were invented by the Romans in first century A.D.

Can you say two and three again?

B, the biggest consumers of pancakes in the United States are people from the Northeast eating 32.5% of all pancakes consumed.

And C, pancakes were invented by the Romans in first century AD.

C is a fry.

Kimia says C.

I'm going to say B is a fry, but I don't know.

Mitch, you do know because that one is a fry.

You're running away with it.

You are.

Yes.

This is, this is, that was pure.

That one was pure.

I'm not, I'm not caring enough, you know.

I'm just not a fucking me.

Because I really just want to get to the answer and know which ones are facts and which is

to sleep perchance to dream.

There you go.

The immortal bard.

Next up, coffee.

A, bees are attracted to coffee plants and enjoy the effects of caffeine.

B, the caffeine extracted from decaffeinated coffee is sold to tobacco companies to put in their products.

C, coffee's popularity in the U.S.

boomed after the Boston tea party.

Too fast for me.

I've got it.

You went too fast.

Bees are attracted to coffee plants.

Another bees one.

Bees are attracted to coffee plants and enjoy caffeine.

Seems like she was on some sort of bee website.

Caffeine is.

B movie.

B.

Caffeine extracted from decaf coffee is sold to tobacco companies.

C, coffee's popularity in the U.S.

boomed after the Boston Tea Party.

Ooh, C seems real.

I pick B as a fry.

That's a good choice.

Thanks.

I'm going to go A, and I don't know.

Kimia takes it.

Nice.

It is, in fact, a fry that decaffeinated coffee caffeine is sold to tobacco companies to put in cigarettes.

What do we do?

Oh, yeah.

Why would you see it?

That seems very fake.

Yeah.

Last one, hot sauce.

Hot sauce, okay.

Yeah, I'm a bit of a heat seeker.

We're back on board again.

All right, here we go.

Kimmy, are you something of a heat seeker?

Do you like spicy boots?

Yes, I do.

I love it.

A, research has shown that over-consuming hot sauce can permanently numb your taste buds.

B, hot sauce does not cause ulcers.

C, the current world record holder for hottest pepper is Pepper X at more than at more than 2.69 million Scoville heat units.

Whoa.

Okay, I know B is true because my dad was told to stop eating hot sauce at the ER because he got a bit of an ulcer.

Wow.

It was that they were like,

what have you been doing?

And he was like, well, I did just go on a trip and drink a bunch of whiskey and eat a bunch of hot sauce.

And they were like, okay,

I think we nailed it.

There's a hole in your stomach because of those two things.

Sounds like a hell of a trip.

Yeah, man, you guys got to hang out with my dad.

Holes in our stomachs.

Chugging Jack Daniels and crystal hot sauce.

It's like a blast.

I also feel like we must have holes in our stomachs anyways, you and I, but you know, whatever.

Yeah, sure.

It would be good to

don't, we should, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It would be good.

Don't eat Pepper X, which I also think sounds real, right?

Pepper X does sound, it does sound like Elon's new pepper, but it is, it is a, it is a real pepper.

Yeah, I didn't even think about the, the nexus of, like,

tech bro guys and like, like, hot guy, like spice guys.

Yeah, it's definitely like the same sort of guy.

The hot guy.

He's a terrible guy I never want to meet.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Trying to prove something with everything they do.

What about Joe Hotter?

We like like Joe Hotter.

We like Joe Hotter.

Hotter sauces, of course.

They're not all tech froze.

Not all sauce guys are tech froze.

But that's a different thing of like, hey, here's a spicy sauce.

Here's a good, well-rounded, flavorful sauce that's also got some heat to it versus like, this is the hottest fucking thing you could ever possibly eat.

I don't need to try Pepper X ever in my life.

Exactly.

It's not some sort of like, like, I'm, I'm, you know, some sort of pissing contest to say, like, I can endure more spice than you.

And like, I can have a super spicy pepper and be be like, that's not actually that spicy.

You know, like that's that's a, that's a different type of guy.

I think I'm going to go one or a

two.

Oops.

Yeah, let's do it.

Same one.

Why not?

Hey, you know what?

You are both right.

You're both winners.

Congratulations.

You are correct.

Pepperex, yes, is a real pepper.

2.69 million Scoville heat units.

By comparison, an Abonero pepper averages around 100,000 Scoville units.

Wow.

Wow.

Way hotter than it needs to be.

What did we get right?

What was the truth?

Research has shown that consuming hot sauce can permanently nub your taste buds.

Oh, that's not true.

That's a fry.

That's the fry.

That's fry.

Yeah.

Got it.

I said, I meant to say numb your taste buds.

I kind of said nub your taste buds.

No, we got it.

Okay.

Hey, just like a restaurant via your feedback.

Let's go to the feedback.

Today's email is from Corey from Glossall Park, Los Angeles.

Corey writes, When we were very young, my sister and I loved hometown buffet.

I remember taking home their weekly menu so I could convince my parents to go on the most exciting days.

Thursday was rib day.

For many years, it was my favorite restaurant.

At some point, it dropped out of the family rotation.

One night, probably around high school, my parents surprised us with dinner at Hometown Buffet.

We had to break it to our parents that we just weren't into it anymore.

I think we went to Red Robin instead.

What restaurant dropped off your favorite restaurant list as your taste buds matured?

Keep eating fresh.

Great question.

Thanks, Corey.

This is a great question.

You know what, honestly?

I had a similar relationship with Hometown Buffet specifically.

There's a hometown buffet in Lakewood, California by the Lakewood Mall that we would go to.

And I love, as a fat little boy, I loved it because I could get so much food.

I could keep going back and back.

And then later on, you're just like, this food is bad.

This is like low-quality food.

And they can sell you, you know, like six trays worth of it because they're making it for, you know, 10 cents a unit or whatever the fuck.

You know, it's, it's really.

It's so that was definitely a thing.

Like I, as I've gotten older and my appetite has gotten smaller, I'm less interested in buffets in general.

I can do like a, I, you know, soup plantation has

disappeared, but like that suit plantation I could do because they had like soup and salad.

And so like it wasn't as much of an indulgence, but a place where it's like, how, like, like stuff yourself, I'm less into that.

Right.

I don't know if I have an answer for this.

And it's like maybe

helpful because like not helpful.

It's maybe I'm maybe in that lucky spot of like some of those chains that I, that I held dear to my heart

went away, which is sad.

Yeah.

But also I'm like, oh, I never got to see them become, you know, I never got to see my hero become the villain or something like that.

But funny enough, Subway, which I did not, oh, actually, I have, I do have answers, but they're all later in life stuff.

Because when I went back to Ithaca,

there's a place called Deepy Dough.

Yes, we've discussed Deep Dough.

We've discussed Deepy Dough.

Wait, give us a refresher on what Deep Dough is.

Deb-Dough is like a cow zone place, and they have a thing called the Buffer Zone, which is like a Buffalo Chicken Calzone.

They have like a million, they have like 50 cal zones, right?

I'm looking at a million because Ithaca alums know Deep Dough.

It's like open all night.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You can get them delivered to like 4 or 5 a.m., which I did happen quite a bit.

Why are they called Deep Dough instead of like the zone?

You feel like there's a more elegant punch.

There is.

There are things called like the zone in like

there are like, well, buffer zone.

There's like a lot of different zones, but I don't know why it was called Deep Dough.

I have no idea.

But maybe the guy's name was DP or something.

I have no idea.

That was it.

It's their initials.

Their people that made it was a guy and his mom, Dan and Penny.

That's cute.

That is cute.

Yeah.

That is cute.

Still, though, should have been like in the zone.

Wouldn't it have been more catchy?

Yeah.

We don't know how bad Dan and Penny are, but it is cute.

Right now, it's cute.

It's adorable.

They have an ice station at their fucking, who knows?

They might be monsters.

That's all.

That's all I'm saying.

Sure, anyone can be a monster.

They opened in the 80s, so I want to believe that everybody was chiller in the 80s.

Yeah.

The 80s are super chill.

But when I went back to Ithaca and I went and spoke to some of Amelia's classmates, she didn't go.

And she knew about it too, right, Amelia?

Isn't that a part of it?

She didn't go.

But she didn't know you at the time.

Sure, but it was a sketch group from Ithaca.

And then she also went on to tell me that she went to the Dave Franco and Mick Lovin appearance instead.

Hey, I worked on that.

Oh, great.

I think I've said this on the podcast before.

That was a branded campaign for like Verizon or whatever the fuck.

Yeah.

And so they had, they had people, they had writers come in to like pitch on stuff they could do.

Elizabeth Nonas, my favorite professor, my screenwriting professor, I got back and I went to this talk and I was like, hi, Professor Nonas, is Mike Mitchell.

And she didn't remember who I was.

And she was like, where's Mike Hanford?

She remembered Hanford, which, of course, she remembered Hanford.

How do you not forget?

How can you forget Hanford?

And then I was like, I was like, oh, it's like kind of a good crew here.

There was like 40 people.

And she's like, you should have seen it when Mick Lovin and Dave Franco were here.

There was a line.

This is also like a nice older woman who's saying this.

She's like, there was a line out the door and they chased them to their cars.

And I was like,

this sucks.

Wow.

Well, you're blacked out in a haze chasing them to their car.

I wonder if this is the thing.

I was like, I just to deflate that a little bit, I wonder if the chasing them their cars was part of the brand new campaign.

It probably was.

I bet that was a bit that someone wrote and they were like, they just got a bunch of unpaid college students to help them out with something they shot and turned into an ad.

Dave Franco and McLovin's Verizon campaign.

Yeah.

When I went and spoke.

Could have been T-Mobile.

Doesn't matter.

Sorry.

Apologies to T-Mobile Mobile.

I went back and me and kind of a harbinger of what we, the current day.

Yeah, 100%.

Everything's an ad now.

Everything's an ad now.

And honestly, they were in the right to do it at that time, probably.

Maybe Dave Franco was borderline.

But

whatever, Franco.

I'm not holding the T-Mobile campaign against you, Franco.

Am I pissed at you for other reasons?

Like how you got a way bigger crowd at Ithaca, where I went, yeah, a little annoyed.

Uh, but me, Chris, and Jeff went there, and uh, your buddies, Chris, Van R.

State Lynn, and uh, Jefferson Dutton

also went to Ithaca, and we spoke there, and it was nice.

But, um, I went back to my hotel and I was like, I'm gonna get a DP Dough and get a buffer zone.

There's no way that this is like good, and I had it, and it was fucking awesome.

It was like so fucking good.

It was, I was like, this is like as good as I remember it in college.

And I was like, I did have some drinks, to be fair, but I was like, it was fantastic other for me in la wages this is the big one

there's there's actually three that i can think of i never liked subway as a boy and then i started to like it and now i'm like i never really want subway i was sick a week ago and i like wanted just cheese on bread and i got subway and it worked and i don't

people got there was a couple people got too mad at us because of subway and they're like subway is actually not bad uh actually you can never tell what people are going to get upset about what are you talking about subway sucks you don't have a fucking Subway.

Subway has gone on.

You're going to get on the internet and you're going to type that Subway is good.

What are you doing with your time?

This is your one and only life.

What are you doing?

They've made you eat yoga mat bread.

Yeah.

Bread.

Right.

Fake tuna.

Like, it can be bad.

Yeah, it sucks.

There's a message board about our show that's not on Reddit, and I don't let people know about it because they're the good ones.

That's true.

And someone in that board was

upset about this.

What is this board?

What are you talking about?

And how did you find this?

How did you find this?

How do do you find this?

I'm not telling you about it.

Off social media for you.

I like these guys.

I sometimes say hi to them.

They're cool.

True social.

It's out of here.

Everyone's just hitting.

Everyone's doing the everyone's pulling off the noise better than I am.

My tongue is weak today.

I can't do it today.

I usually have a very strong.

Oh, it's too dry up there.

So, okay, sorry.

Subway, one that I liked it and then it's faded.

And then two for me, because it's funny, these are adult ones, but El Pollo Loco.

Oh, yeah, sure.

And Baja Fresh.

Okay.

Yeah.

Two that I'm like, these, those are like, if I went there now, I'd be like sad that I, I would not be happy getting either, probably.

Oh, man, we went to El Pollo Loco a couple weeks ago.

It was hitting.

I think El Pollo is back, but Baja Fresh is a place that declined partly because it was

acquired by another one of these onerous corporations.

But Kimi, I want to give you a little bit of a game.

El Pollo Loco just seems, seems, seems like a much cheaper quality place, which is, and I, I, it has its place.

Don't get me wrong.

Yeah.

It's, and like, like Jack in the Box.

And like, we were talking Jack in the Box and what's happened with Jack in the Box.

I'd put it in a different category from Jack in the Box.

And I think it's a place where also you can get like a working classic value game.

I knew, I knew you were going to say this, and I agree with that.

I think that it is a good place for working class people.

and it is like, you can get an affordable meal there.

I'm just saying, like

for, for, for what it is, like in when we talk about like chicken that can be the quality of chicken, I just think of El Pollo Loco as like not being the highest quality.

That's all.

It's weird to have, to land here when our guest

so, you know, eloquently described the

chickens as, you know, deserving of our respect and they shouldn't be harvested for their meat.

And yet.

But I think we might need to revisit El El Pollo Loco because I think it's maybe

back.

That's okay.

Yeah.

My mom loves that place, so that's fair.

I do love that they're, well, I never see commercials from anymore, but it just is technically the crazy chicken is what they're saying.

El Pollo Loco, the jingle is really good.

Yeah, it is.

It's great.

Okay, is that my answer?

Yeah.

Okay, here's what I got.

So I recently, oh, in December, I got a Numero Uno Pizza because I remember those pizzas.

That's where like all the cast parties growing up were at a Numero Uno Pizzeria.

And when I was little eating that, I was like, this is so good.

In December, I got it to meet up with some of my friends that I used to do like plays with when I was little.

And I was like, remember this?

And everybody was like, we don't remember these cast parties.

So it was actually a bad thing that I brought over.

And then I was forced to eat a slice.

And it's so sweet.

Oh, wow.

It's like really sweet.

pizza.

It's crazy you say

it's crazy you say this answer because

in that place when I first moved to Los Angeles, there was a subway, El Puella logo, and across the street was Numero Pizza.

And in my head, I was like, Numerono Pizza is like the type of thing I was thinking.

But for me, trying Numero Onu Pizza for the first time gave me that feeling of like, oh, a lot of the pizza I liked when I was a kid was shitty.

And I was just thinking

when you said it.

It's crazy.

Yeah.

Pizza I loved as a child, but this is gross.

And here's another thing I was thinking of.

I think Girl Scout cookies used to be good and now are bad.

Wow.

I can completely buy that.

I bet they.

What's going on?

I bet they've cheaped out on the ingredients or made them more processed or something.

I bet it's happening.

Whoa.

Yeah.

Cause I used to love them.

I do think that they are like dry or they're like a, or like they feel a little icky.

Tastes like a fake cookie and it used to like be a cookie to me and it's not anymore.

I love, I love this taste.

I wonder if anything's changed.

Yeah.

Also, like there is like so much crossover.

There was just a frosty with a, with like a, the thin mixed frosty.

They're starting to license the Girl Scout cookies a little bit more.

And probably, you know, it's what they need to do to survive, but it's a little little bit of a bummer.

That lessens its wholesomeness to some degree, you know, when you see it at a fucking Wendy's.

Two great answers, but also our listeners might be furious.

You never know.

That's okay.

And I don't care.

Be mad at me.

That's a good way to, that's a good, that's why I should learn a lesson from you.

I did think of another one for me, and this just becomes, this is just my palate changing over time and me liking sweets less.

We, last year, Mitch, we visited a seize candy, which you may be, as someone also in Southern California, this is a West Coast chain.

And I used to love it.

I used to look forward to seize candy so much.

And now I'm just like, I don't really need to ever have this again.

Yeah.

Wow.

This, just these, all these chocolate novelties.

It's just too much for me.

That's funny because there's like Phillips Candy House in Boston, but they also do make really good candy still.

You know what I mean?

Yeah.

I'll get my mom like some dark chocolate turtles.

Pecan turtles, which you can have.

Yo, I should take you to Phillips.

You would love it.

I think there's one left.

I was going to say, there's only like, there's only a few of them.

The one in Dorchester.

There might be a couple more than that, but there's not many left.

Well, I gotta go.

Um, I'm flying to Boston just for this.

Please do, please.

I, I would, I would, I would love whatever.

Here I go.

I would, I would love for you to see Boston.

A great city.

I've been to Boston.

Love Boston.

It's a great, it's a fun city.

I have had a great time in Boston.

Pizza, I think, is a great answer because as a kid,

you, I knew sometimes you knew you were eating not as good pizza, but like all fun.

It's like when you're a kid, a pizza is like a Harold.

Even when it's bad, it's good.

Whoa, this

Harold sex and pizza.

I hate that saying.

We've talked about this before because it's like, even when it's bad, it's good.

And you're like, not true about sex or pizza.

It's that's not true.

It's just not a true thing.

That's not true, yeah.

Especially not true about the Harold.

I mean, definitely not true.

Even when it's good, it's bad.

No one sees that shit.

Yeah.

I mean, none of it, none of that is true.

This is from Sharna Alpern's book, Truth in Comedy.

I don't know if you ever read that improv tome from back in the day.

Last book I read.

I think pizza is just like a great, because that like

a sweet, shitty sauce is like, as an adult, if you have like that like lunchables type sauce, like a marinara sauce, you're like, I can't.

What am I eating?

You get past that at one point.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Good answer.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, good answers.

Hey, if you have a question or comment about the World of Chain Restaurants, you can email us at feedback at birdfuck.com or leave us a voicemail at 830Goto.

That's 830-463-6844.

Our producer is Emma Erdbrink.

Our associate producer is Amelia Marino.

Holding it down for our absent supervising video producer, Casey Donahue.

Our video editor is Mike Dorfman.

Doughboys apparel and merchandise.

You can find at kinshipgoods.com/slash Doughboys.

And hey, to get the Dough Boys double our weekly bonus episode, plus our entire 2018 back catalog.

Subscribe at patreon.com/slash Doughboys.

Right now, over there, we are doing Mank3 Mason Impodoble.

Come here, Bet Pornia.

Thank you so much for being here.

Thank you so much.

What a treat.

Please come back to the pod.

Please, yeah, we'll talk to him spond.

I'm forcing you to.

I love it.

Anything you would like to plug?

No, you can just follow me on Instagram at TroudClown.

If there's a plug there, you'll find it.

But you know, there's nothing here now.

Wow.

There you go.

Hey, that'll do it for this episode of Doughboys.

Until next time for the Spoonman Mike Mitchell, I'm Tiger Weiger.

Happy Eating.

See ya.

That was a hit gun podcast.