A Hot Dog Is a Sandwich - How Gen-Z Killed the Cereal Industry

Episode Date: September 2, 2026

Today, Josh and Nicole discuss how Gen-Z are CEREAL KILLERS!

My beloved is dead, Josh. Dead. What's dead, Nicole? What's going on? My frosted flees. Oh, God. This is a hot dog is a sandwich. Ketchup is a smoothie.

Yeah, I put ice in my cereal, so what? That makes no sense. A hot dog is a sandwich. A hot dog is a sandwich. What? Welcome to our podcast, A Hot Dog is a Sandwich, the show we break down the world's biggest food debates. I am your Thespian today, Josh Sherry. And I'm emotionally unregulated host Nicole in Idy.

What we did was a bit of a dramatic reenactment. Yeah. Of what? Of, well, I suppose reacting to Gen Z killing Tony the Tiger. They skinned him, they flayed him alive, they disemboweled him, and they threw him in the trash. Use the hide for warmth. Yeah. What did I just, oh, I just watched The Revenant for the first time. I've always wanted to watch The Revenant.

Can I say we're going to talk about cereal. Let us get sidetracked for a second. Talk about the Revenant first. Instead, a natural tie-in. Recently? Like last week? Yeah, so Will Poulter was on last meals. Right.

Fantastic episode. Super into food. He did Weir-The Millers, Maze Runner, and the Revenant in like 18 months. Wow. And they all grossed over $250 million. Wow. Unbelievable. But anyways.

Yeah, Will Poulter, huge role in the Revenant. Yeah. It's like the third biggest. It's like Dommel Gleeson, Will Poulter, Tom Hardy, and Leo. What about the bear? Well, I thought the bear. I haven't seen it. Don't tell me.

I thought... Does the bear die? The whole movie was about the bear. I did too. Have you seen it? I did, but when I was like, why is the bear not that much in it? I thought the whole story was Leo first the bear. Because the whole trailer was about the bear.

That's how they got us. I didn't want to watch a movie about the bear. I always want to, one, I want to watch the show The Bear about cooking. And then if I'm watching an action frontier type of movie, I want to watch. I want it to be about man versus the most dangerous game of all fellow man. That's what I want. I want.

I did. No, the Revenant was fantastic. Because I was misled. I was a podcast host. I'm yelling. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But legitimately, I felt like I was misled for, like, it came up 2015 for like 11 years of what the Revenant was about.

It is the bears in it for like eight minutes at most. And it's a two-hour movie. It is more. It's two and a half hour movie. It is incredible. It is just Tom Hardy playing like man's id. Leo's will to survive and to be a father. Will Poulter just trying to do what he is.

Don't tell me anymore. Oh my God. You're ruining it for me. Please don't ruin the revenant for me in 2020. And I thought Leo just won the Oscar because he like fought the CGI bear real good. It was a CGI bear? Was a CGI bear? I don't know.

I was hoping. A real bear throwing Leo around? Do they do that? I don't know. But he was the Revenant. Yeah. Hey, welcome on 2026. We officially recommend the Revenant.

I mean, not me. I haven't seen it. Josh's vote counts more than it. It's a CGI bearer. Aw. I'm so sad about that. Other movie with great CGI animals, that's what we're doing today. Ranking movies of CGI animals.

I just watched RRR in theaters again. I haven't seen that. Oh my God. You go to Vidiates. I've always wanted to go to Vidiates. You're just saying so many words I like today. We should go to a screening. Can you also say macho latte and like chili cheese fries

because I like those words too. Go to Tommies. You get some chili cheese fries on the way to Vidiates. You get a macho latte at three sisters in Burbank. No, I got, well, my version of that is I got a black coffee, a Diet Coke, and a non-alcoholic beer. Three Bevvies.

Yeah, and it's a three-and-a-half-hour movie, and I peed five times and ruined everybody else's time. A lot of great CGI animals and RR. I recommend that as well. Okay. What CGI animal movie do you recommend? I can't think of a single movie that I've watched that has a CGI animal.

I choose to believe that they're real. I really, so whenever I watch a film, Josh, I really get into it. And I choose, that's just the world I'm existing in at that moment. Well, same. Well, it doesn't sound like it because you can notice a CGI. How about you just free fall into the film? Allow yourself to be wrapped up by it.

Yeah. So, you know, my favorite movie of all time, of course, is Avatar 3 Fire and Ash. Oh, I was going to say dumb and dumber, because that's my favorite movie. I was hoping we had similar movie. Avatar 3 Fire and Ash. Now, that has a tremendous amount of CGI animals.

It's all real to me. Very immersed in that world, especially because you know I'm watching it 4DX. I'm getting, ow, bow! I'm getting pitched around when he's riding on those little, you know, got a little seal dolphin, little blue seal dolphin things that they got. Speaking of 4DX, like boop-blub-bub. We're here to talk about how Gen Z killed the serial industry.

Yes. Yeah. Sorry, something came out of my name. knows. Moreasy? When's the last time you went down the cereal aisle? I haven't gone to a grocery store

in maybe two months. What? I... Eating rocks? No, I do a lot of delivery app services or honestly I'm very lucky my mom or my mother-in-law sometimes drops off groceries for me

because I truly don't have the bandwidth to just get up and go to the grocery store at my leisure. That makes sense. So I do, like right now I have a whole Whole Foods cart open, and I'm just thinking of things to add to it. So I haven't been to the grocery store in two months, which is so depressing because I love grocery stores so much. But I just don't have the time to do. We're all grocery heads here is the thing we love

about ourselves. I know, like, I'm in probably four different grocery stores. One of the ones I would go to sometimes somebody just last night got stabbed outside of it. Oh my gosh. I live in a safe part of town. I was watching the news today, and it was just Not intentionally. I'm just like at the gym and there's nine TVs. And it's just like, one in the morning, pavilions employee stabbed. Oh, that's brutal. And I was like, well, surely that's not.

No, that's the one near me. Oh, brutal. I'm in a lot of grocery stores. I love to just go through the chip aisle, go through the cereal aisle to see what's going on. Great. And what's going on in the cereal aisle right now is indicative of falling cereal eating rates, which is, yeah, mostly driven by young people. and every cereal now has to compete with Magic Spin

And they're trying So you don't... But there's still those like big ticket Like general mills and posts All the big cereals still exist So yeah like the cereal industry really is going through like a very rapid decline I think you can see like an X graph Between serial rates dropping and Greek yogurt rates rising

But now I think Greek yogurt rates have Paled off even not plummeted But kind of like tailed off I don't know what Gen Z are eating for breakfast these days. Something tells me, uh, egg bites. You think they're eating egg bites? I don't know. I feel like they're eating egg bites.

Are they eating? Who are the Gen Z people that we know? Trevor? Yeah. Well, he eats nothing. Yeah. Colby, Tony? They eat stuff.

No way, they're eating breakfast. They're eating breakfast. Well, no. I think maybe they're skipping breakfast. I know what Gen Zee are eating for breakfast. Leftovers from the day before? Zins. Oh, just packing it in there, huh?

White monsters and Zins, dude. White monsters? White monsters? Was that your nickname in high school? No. Because I lived in a predominantly white area. They just called me monster. We were like,

predominantly was like it's a diverse. Less diverse than if you went to North County. It's just we were, I went to school, I lived in, anyways, they called me Big Country actually, which is funny.

That's right. That was a white nickname, to be clear. Now you're like, there was a really big white basketball player named Big Country Bryant Reeves. Oh, it was. based off of someone else. Oh, I thought it was just a natural...

Pleadro, Oklahoma State, Vancouver Grizzlies. I was really hoping it was just a natural name. Very skilled. I think injuries kind of curtailed is great. I'm a little overall pick, though. What is they talking about? White monsters. What is Colby eating and what is Tony eating?

No, they come and starved. They come and starved. A coffee. A coffee? A lot of stimies. Well, let me tell you, I'm not Gen Z. I was born in 93. I'm a millennial. Yeah.

We were really big on coffee only in the morning. and no breakfast was kind of the vibe me and my friends had. Was that a little e-decoded? I don't know. Well, the kids now, they're calling it intermittent fasting. Oh, they have a name for it. I mean, like...

Eating at 12. Yeah, yeah. Coffee doesn't count. If it's black coffee, it doesn't count, but if it's coffee with like milk. Yeah, black coffee negative calories because it's stimulating your metabolism. Mm-mm-mm.

Yeah. I mean, I just remember never really eating breakfast when I was in high school. We were, cereal is one of those things And we did an episode that One of my favorite episodes that we did about the food pyramid And there are these weird little facets of American English specifically Where we got some words that are, what is it, homonyms?

It's the same word, it just means different things. I believe that's a hominem So the term corn for instance Corn. What does corn mean? Yes. Corn. So in Britain, they differentiate between corn and maize.

They literally just say, they say maize meal. Really? I thought it was corn flour. You know, like, Palanta, you know, like, it's got like the maize meal. Oh, they call it maize meal? I think so, but I know they use the term maize. The only thing I know is that they call corn starch corn flour. That's the only distinction that I know of when it comes to corn-based items. If you're British sound off, I've heard British people refer to the idea of maize more than we do.

But anyways, when we're talking about corn, you're talking about two different things that I would call sweet corn and field corn. Okay. Right? but we just use the term corn. And it's the same... We're sweet corn, but, like, people aren't using that term. People are just saying corn. Corns also, you know.

Corns for everything. Corns also and cornmeal, those are two, like, wildly different plants that have completely different uses to them. Right. You know what I mean? Right. The term cereal. When they say eat, like, 6 to 11 servings of cereal, they mean the idea of a cereal grain. Correct.

Which is, like, rice and wheat and barley and... Amaranth. Barley, man. Ooh. But the idea is like not sugar sweet and cacton Crunch is not a cereal grain. It is a cereal grain, but they're adding sugar and color and additives to it. Yeah. Captain Crunch is a heavily processed cereal grain. But what's funny, it's actually, I think really funny, is a lot of the cereals aren't.

What do you mean by that? Rice Krispies? Oh, yeah. I think it's got one ingredient. Puffed rice. He's rice. I mean, there's, I'm sure, sugar added sugar to it,

but the OG, like you get frosted rice Krispies with marshmallows, that's crazy added sugar, right? But, like, traditional rice Krispies, I'll look this up.

There's a chance that there's only, like, one ingredient in it. There are some things I remember, like, whenever I would go through, like, health food aisles and stuff like that,

they would have, like, puffed amaranes, and they would have, like, quinoa cereal and stuff like that. But I think that was, used, like you would have to cook it yourself. You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, there probably are like puffed rice cereals out there. I remember. Yeah, so Kellogg's Rice Krispies, it's rice sugar, so there is a pretty amount of sugar, and then 2% less of salt, and then check this out, malt flavor, yum, oh. But like, really, even the amount of sugar that is added to

original Rice Krispies is not that much. We kind of turned, we'll do this thing where we turn, we turn things that are already sweet, like real hyper sweet. Of course. Milk is sweet. Milk on its oval, yeah. There's sugar. There's sugar and milk.

Yes, yes. And we said, that's not enough. Here's a little bunny, and he loves chocolate flavor. It's called Nesquick. I love Nesquick as a came. I do, too. Dude, I just drank on last meals

of freaking malted milk oval teen. Oh, my God. Was it so good. Oh, my God. Is it warm? Dude, no, no, no, cold. I used to drink this. growing up, because my dad was like, Ovaldean's healthy for you, it's got vitamins.

And knowing the history of Ovalteen, it really was, and it came not long after we discovered what a vitamin was. We didn't know what vitamins were until, like, the 1910s. It's crazy. We didn't know what the macros were until Justice von Liebig in the 1860s. It's crazy how new all this is. So anyways, like, you have cereals that are cereal grains. Right. And then you have cereals that are a bunch of marmallows and food dyes.

And so there's these kind of two strangely equivocal problems. Yeah, I think when we were kids, there was so much innovation in the cereal aisle. Like, there were so much new things like honey-ohs were so cool. We would have, what is it, Lucky Charms. The big one I remember is Crave was the big innovation. Oh, I was an or. So my mom was. Orioles.

Oh, yeah. So we talked about this before a long time ago. Like, I'm a geriatric cereal lover. Like, give me that grape nut goodness, like 24-7. But sometimes my mom would let me have OreoOs, and I would feel so good. It was the most delicious cereal. I loved it so much because she would never buy an Oreo. My mother, she would never, ever, in a million years, go check out at the aisle and have Oreos in her cart.

OreoOs, though, totally acceptable. I couldn't tell you the logic. Those were quite new to us. That was cool. That just hit when we were kids. Cookie Crisp. Like, these are all cereals, like, whenever I was a kid, I'm like, this is the epitome of breakfast, you know? Remember the ad?

They would have it was a bowl of cereal, a glass of milk, and orange on the side. And then some kids roller skates. Like, and then like some roller skates in the back with like a basketball. Like that's what breakfast was to us. But that. Well, but you know why they did that, right? It inspires to buy more, of course. Well, no, but they did that.

They put all the things around it so very deliberately, including the action of like a basketball and roller skates. Because they're fun. No, not because they're fun. Why? as like a syntax, right? They were like... Oh, really? What was the phrase they used?

Part of a balanced breakfast? Part of a balanced breakfast. So they showed all this balance around literally the part that the cereal is is the sugar. And then there's like juice, which is also like sugary. But like that at least is a fruit, right? There's actual vitamin. I know when we're just... Vitamins.

You're really divorcing a lot of the fight. But anyways. But then it's like, and then look, this... child is also playing outside. You know, so this is part of a balanced breakfast. But, like, I think that type of nutritional education is, like, really sort of new. And I think our generation is the first that really started thinking about it in that way, right? And it goes into the anti-carb movement.

Oh, 100%. You know what I mean? Atkins and keto, they've absolutely influenced the way that we look at breakfast. Like, it's a perfect storm of the marketing getting very advanced, the food technology getting very advanced and then pallets just getting blown out and so you see so much sugar. I also think a lot of it has to do with like that image of like everyone sitting around the breakfast table and eating together and then you know mommy helps daddy put on the tie. Mommy stays home and plays with the kids.

But is that cereal though? Because cereal to me is the antidote to that. Really? Because like to me cereal, the reason I, did you eat cereal grown? No, you didn't like. Well, yeah. I mean like, yes, I would eat cereal. but not all the time.

It was a true. Serial was a treat in my house. That's funny. For us, cereal, I mean, God, I grew up with, a big thing when my dad became a full-time teacher, when, God, it would have been like 14 or something, we could start getting name brand cereal. Still on sale.

Of course. There's at least four different delicious cereals on sale at the point. Of course. You alternate them. Got honey bunches of oats with almonds. That's my favorite. Still are a love for me. I still have some in my cabinet.

So how the almonds really make it. Why is it the best cereal? I know. It's the blue box of the almonds. Why is that the best cereal? I'm obsessed. Sometimes that night I have a little. The honey rest is not as good.

I hated special K with the little strawberries. Ugh, disgusting. Oh, man. But what was I talking about? I don't know. Any other cereal. Oh, we used to just have the giant store brand. Oh, yeah, yeah.

You know, instead of cookie crisps, it'd be like, crispy style cookie cereal. But would your dad pour it into like a, like kind of like a dog food? Hell no. You know the dog food can take? Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, no. We would... You would take it and fold it up, maybe.

Yeah, we'd like, I'd saw it with a butter knife till there was a hole. I'd spill half of it in our cabinet. I'd roll it up, it'd get stale. Piece of shit. I didn't have a stable home life. We weren't putting things in containers. We didn't have chip clips. You just tried your best.

I just bought my first stack of chip clips. Oh my gosh, let me tell you, I feel like I've made it. Truly a mother. I said, I got chip clips in the house. Because you know what kind of person I was? I was a roller. Tucker with everything with bread, with chips, and they would get stale. But now I'm a chip clubbub.

Sorry. And that's on responsibility. Continue. Sorry. I would just eat like, I just eat like four bowls of cereal for breakfast. I would drink like a quart. I just like Paul Bunyan portions. It would be like half a box of cereal.

Big country portions. And again, I was like a 270, 280 pound 14 year old. And I'd just be ripping like a quart of milk. Skim. Like, no, maybe. like 2% milk. We were in a whole milk family. Because my dad was still, he was like diet conscious in the sense that he would get like

anything with the word lean in the name. You know, like lean cuisine, lean pockets. Snack well. Lean gourmet. Stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The low fat cheese it's, which what are we doing, man? But yeah, I would just down four bowls of cereal and think nothing of it.

Sure. But you think that's, but you think that's the antithesis of a sit-down breakfast with your friend? Of a parent, who cares about you? Oh, I couldn't agree with you less. I really do think that the idea of eating, I mean, at least that's what it was portrayed as. Like, yeah, we're all on the go, but we still have time to sit down and enjoy a bowl of cereal together. You're right. Like in the commercials, that was what. Yeah, that's what it was to me.

It was like, it was almost as if it was like you can still live the dream of the nuclear family and provide for your kids, but it's already made for you in a box. That's exactly what it was true. And also, if you have a picky kid that doesn't want to eat the bacon and blah, blah, blah, then you can have cereal. That's how I saw cereal ads whenever I was a kid. How much of that do you think came from being first-gen? Probably. Do you think you viewed cereal as Americana? Oh, 100%. Of course.

Serial is American. Cakes. Like even like sunny side-up eggs. Like there's something so American about a sunny side-up egg, three pancakes, and a little like, what are those little boxes? Like the little frosted flakes are a raisin brand box? You're talking about a continental breakfast at a holiday N-express? That is American to me. It absolutely is.

Because coming from me, my mom, what would she do? She put some, like, beautiful jams out. She would make one of them. The rest were all store-bought. Like, some feta cheese, a little block of butter. Sarshear. Sarsher, like, Prussian-clotted cream and, like, bread that she would get from the bakery. And I'm like, I don't want any of that, mom.

I want my honeynut shears and I want them now. Which is so, like, looking back on, like, how silly is that? even when I lived with these Italian roommates back in college, they, like, they fetishize, like, the American high school experience. They're like, how was prom? I was like, what? We did not have a prom. And then they left cereal.

Why do we have prom? I don't know. But that's the thing that a lot of people from outside of America, they see the high school experience in movies and stuff. I would love to find out the history of, like, why Americans do prom and, like, Sadie Hawkins dances and stuff like that. It really does interest me. We call that winter formal.

But anyways, yeah, the cereal, it really did. feel like something American and also something at that point in time, right? Like the movie American Pie, I was probably eating a bowl of Cinnamon Tows Crunch watching that as a nine-year-old, internalizing all the things. You should not have been watching that. Absolutely not. You give me really terrible ideas about... Stifler's mom.

Consent. It's not great, but it's American. It's American. You know? Hey, you ever eat Kashi-Golene? Koshy-Golene crunch? I never had Kashi-Golene as a kid. It scared the daylights out of me.

I don't know why. Do we think there's room for cereal in society? Eddie? No. You think Gen Z killed it for a reason? It's done. It's done. Serial is done. It's the only thing it's good for is a midnight snack. Well, well, no one is starting their mornings. Hey, what? That's what we should really be talking about. Because starting your mornings, yeah, dude, gets them, my big, Will Tennyson kind of talks about this too. It's like, front load your day with, like, the nutrition that you need. Yeah, get it out of the way. That's what I do. I, breakfast every day. And not to say, like, on a weekend, you know, all, I love hitting, like, a big workout and, like, getting,

getting like a breakfast burrito on a weekend, a wonderful time. You know what I mean? Or not even hitting a workout. Going to Sephardic Boracus, you know, just getting some bereqas, you know, dipping them with the jammy egg. It's wonderful. Yum, yum, yum. But weekdays, it's 50 grams of protein powder. It's a couple blueberries.

It's a handful of almonds. It's some yogurt blended up. You're getting so much fiber and micronutrients and probiotics and protein out of the way. It's like working out in the morning. is better than working out at night. But doing it anyways is good. And then as you get towards the end of day, oh, it's party time, dude.

Party time. Cereal, bowl cereal at the end of the day? You can have a little bowl of cereal as a treat. That's great. Julia is the one that influenced me to have dessert every night. That's really sweet. And I do it in a lot of the times, and this isn't, it's both because we just,

we really love fruit. And we're in, we got to talk about this on podcast soon, but we're in a new golden age of fruit. Oh my gosh. Tell me about that. I ate something yesterday called a golden honeydew. Oh, yum. It's just fine, but still, the fact that...

But you made it sound really good. I know, because it looked really good. It was just fine. Honeydew, Homi melon, had a Picasso melon the other day. Nothing will ever be as good as... Sugar kiss. Sugar-kiss melon. Unbelievable.

We're in a golden age right now. We eat a lot of fruit, occasionally a fun little whipped cream. Yes. On top. Cute. Subbing in a bowl of cereal once in a row for dessert. I think it's... And you can get fun with it.

The rebrand is in, treating it no longer as a... a breakfast meal. It is not part of a balanced breakfast. It's part of a fun little midnight snack because you deserve it. Because you deserve it. You've worked so hard. You've put in the hours I'm talking to people right now. Did you notice that?

You put in the hours. You're spent. Capitalism has beaten you to a pulp. Have a small little bowl of Captain Crunch. Have a little bite of, what's that one, cereal that you like? Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Why not? I don't know.

Eat some grape nuts. Do you want to shatter your teeth at the close of day? Eat some grape nuts. Grape nuts are not that crunchy. They're not that crunchy. There's crunchier cereals out there. Are you sure? It's not just a bowl of rocks that you stumbled upon?

I love a bowl of it. If you find a crunchier cereal and grape nuts, that's like, you know, the aquarium pebbles? Yeah. That's just that. You've ever done that before? You put them in your mouth? We weren't that. There's one cereal that I meant.

We actually did this on GMM. one time where we put a bunch of really, really, really crunchy cereals next to each other. And Greenbuts was not the crunchiest. It was like some crazy, like oat, wheat, honey, oh. And those f***ing were crunchy even an hour later. You're a soaker, right? I am a soaker shout out to all of our LDS fans out there. Josh is a major soaker.

Major soaker. Yeah, what I do, what Nicole is referring to is if I'm eating especially like a cinnamon Princess Crunch or Captain Crunch, I will pour the milk into the cereal and I will mix it up, make sure it's all submerged, and then let it soak for at least like three, four minutes. I'll walk away, I'll make a coffee, I'll take a peepee, I'll wash my hands, and then... I think peepee. I'll probably not watch my hands and come back and then eat that cereal. Not if it's a Rice Krispy. And I love a Rice Krispies. I love a plain Rice Krispy. Oreos. What about it? Could I talk about Oreo's? Because I think the other thing that could save cereal is just like the right collaborations. I don't think that's true. I'm not even going to let you finish.

Well, no, okay, you're right. You're right. Collaborations are, what do you want to do? K-pop demon hunters and orioos? Get out of here. Save McDonald's. I don't think cereal has any, I don't, I think they just need a massive rebrand.

I think they need to start putting their money somewhere else. Well, moving along, move it along. Being in the cereal aisle, there is a massive rebrand and reframing of cereal, And it's a lot of people are postulating. This is going to happen with GLP1, GLP-friendly foods. Uh-huh.

Where... What does that mean? I'll tell you what it means. They're just jacking up the fiber and protein content and everything. I don't exactly know how that makes it GLP1 friendly, but they're using that as a marketing term. Interesting. And so right now you'll just walk down the aisle and there will be a similar to the burrilla pasta.

It'll just be a Cheerio's box and it'll say Cheerios protein, 10 grams of protein per serving, six grams of fiber. It's in a box that's about 60%. is big and it costs 45% more. And that's what's happening with the cereal and chip aisle right now. I mean, it happened with a pasta. It's happening with chips, happening with cereal.

You're seeing the same thing in the soda industry. Dude, well, soda, not with protein. I mean, they're doing some clear protein sodas and they are gross. Yeah, sounds gross. But no, every soda needs a functional line, right? They need a prebiotic, probiotic,

postbiotic, antibiotic, antibiotic, to just get that amoxicilicola in there? Why? Why can't people just enjoy things anymore? Everything needs to serve a purpose. We're all sort of hyper-optimized now. Why are we so obsessed with optimizing everything? It's weird.

I know. I mean, where does optimization start and joy end? Like, where are we in the span of, like, food isn't fun anymore? It's really not. It's a burden. It's a taxing. Serial, you see to be so much fun. Are you kidding me?

They had mazes on the back. Freaking Tony, the tiger, and that silly little turtle guy. Not Franklin, another turtle guy. And now it's all just like... There's a cute little turtle mask. I remember. For us a place? No, for another cereal.

Who had a turtle? Do you know what I'm talking about? The Smacks frog? Yes. It's a frog. He had no shell. Did you have like a backpack that you felt as a shell? I think he had a cute little...

Also, smacks? They were really funny... I hate honey snacks. Oh, well, so. They've gone through, like, I think like six different names, and I can never keep track. They were called sugar smacks. They're called smacks. They were called, like, and they've gone through a bunch of different.

Smacks are so good. They have this, like, crazy, like, barley malt flavor. I hate honey snacks. What are the ingredients in smacks? They're so good. There's like this deep, roasty malt. It's roasted, it's roasted honey flavored. It's like caramelized honey flavor.

There's no way that honey would be too expensive. It's called honey smacks. They're called honey smacks now? What do you mean now? They've always been called honey smacks. No, they've gone through so many different names. No, I don't believe you. So it's a puffed wheat here.

God, I love smacks. I don't love smacks. You know what? I like, they also have cool names like pups, kicks, tricks. Like I miss that so much. Now all the foods are like adaptogenic granola bar. Like, shut up, I'm mad at you. So honey smacks formerly known as sugar smacks, known simply as smacks in other markets.

I don't believe you. Yeah. Slice. They're doing this. Huh? Slice. What is Slice? Slice was a soda that I grew up drinking. Oh my God.

I remember Slice. Orange slice. They had like a citrus and I think maybe a grape. Stop. Did they do some prebiotic, probiotic, BS? Stop it. So Slice, and they had a very, like, Y2K-style branding. Remember they made, like, Slice-slavered candies?

I don't remember which soda company was behind Slice. Discontinued it, I think, in like, the mid-2000s, revived it. and made it just purely a pro-prebiotic. Yeah, and it just like tastes bad. There's nothing slice about it. I mean, slice was just a new can design with a citrus soda in it. But like now it's just, yeah,

they're taking a name that hopefully they can get some press out of and then find shelf space and it's just like bad. Well, all the slice drinkers are older now, right? So they're trying to adapt to the slice drinkers of the past. There was enough slice drinkers around that they wouldn't have needed a discontinue slice. But they brought it back for the purpose of adaptogenic. And now we need to bring back corny snaps and we need to put a bunch of CO-10 and creatine in it. Oh my gosh, are you taking CO10 right now?

No. We've all had those chaotic weeknights where dinner needs to happen now. But you open the fridge to find zero protein on hand. Story of my life. I used to gamble on last minute grocery runs only to end up with bland. and overpriced meat or spoiled leftovers. That all changed when I stocked up my freezer with Omaha Steaks. It's like having a trusted butcher and gourmet food shop right at home.

Omaha Steaks has spent over 100 years perfecting its craft through meticulous aging and vacuum-sealed individual packaging. Last week I seared up their ribeye burgers and the flavor, oh my gosh, and the tenderness be any steakhouse burger I've had without the steakhouse prices. Beyond incredible steaks and juicy burgers, they've got chickens, seafood, sides, and desserts ready to go whenever you need them. If you've never tried them, their burger perfection flight is the ultimate way to start. You get 20, yes, 20 premium steak burgers crafted from five distinct cuts of steak, filet mignon, New York strip, ribby, brisket,

and sirloin for just $7,99. Try their burger perfection flight at Omahasteaks.com today. That's 20 premium steak burgers for just $799, plus get $35 off with promo code hot. dog. That's Omaha steaks.com promo code hot dog for $35 off at checkout. Terms apply, see site for details. I love traveling, but I always feel self-conscious when I can't speak the local language fluently. If you want to stop hesitating and start speaking with real confidence, you need to check out the brand new Rosetta Stone Sapphire app. This is their biggest launch in over a decade, combining their classic research-backed immersion method with incredible new features. Forget boring grammar drills.

you learn naturally through immersive visuals and audio, picking up the language intuitively. They just introduce chat missions, which completely changes the game by tuning conversation practice into an interactive experience. You get dropped into everyday scenarios, like checking into a hotel or making dinner reservations, and complete specific goals while receiving instant supportive feedback. It gives you the real-world practice you need without any of the anxiety, and let me tell you, you don't need any extra anxiety. At least I don't. If you want to take your language skills to the next level, don't wait to try Rosetta Stone Sapphire.

A Hot Dog as a sandwich listeners can get 20% off their Rosetta Stone Sapphire subscription when they sign up today. This gets you access to Rosetta Stone Sapphire in 25 languages. Visit rosettastone.com slash hot dog to redeem your 20% off. That's Rosettastone.com slash hot dog. Great things are not built alone. It requires the right pieces coming together with purpose. Right now, as families face rising food coffee, The most important thing we need to put together is us.

Farmers, advocates, donors, volunteers. When we connect our actions, we aren't just separate parts. We are a movement, building a system that feeds millions. This Hunger Action Month, assembly is required. Give now, volunteer, or speak up at feedingamerica.org slash hunger action month. Well, all right, Nicole. All right, Nicole. All right, Nicole. I've heard what you and I have to say.

Now, sound out what other wick. It is rattling out there in the universe. It's time for the second what we call. Opinions are like casserole. Okay, my first opinion, the movie Rockstar with Mark Wahlberg 2002 should have won an Oscar. Okay. All right, let's get at that first opinion. Wait, I have, maybe, maybe I want to say a hot take.

You think this is just all about you, Mr. Josh? I don't have any hot takes right now. My brain is totally blank. Well, have you seen Rockstar with Mark Wahlberg? I'll give you hint. Stand up and shout! You know, you know. Stand up.

I'm not even trying to be funny. I'm not trying to be funny. You do have a good voice. Thank you. But like, like not right now. No, I've had laryngitis for two weeks. You have a really good, like, base of a voice. Okay.

And if you wanted to, you could improve on it. I feel like I could, yeah, give me a couple of singing lessons. Yeah. That might be really fun. Like me, like, I have a naturally really beautiful singing voice. Tremendously talented. Yeah, I've said that for a long time. But you, you're like, almost.

You're the nice judge on American Idol, and then J.B. It shakes your head and goes, that ain't it, dog. All right, let's get to that first opinion now. Hi, my name is Aaron, and I, first of all, want to congratulate Josh for giving up smoking. That's, like, huge. And I hope you're so proud of yourself and know of an accomplishment. Okay, back. the business. My opinion

casserole is that brusketa, bruchetta, should not cost upwards of $17,18 in an Italian restaurant. You're right. It is literally your cheapest ingredients. It is tomatoes, basil, garlic,

stale bread. Pasha! What is this? Pasha! That's my opinion. Have a great day. Bye. Bruchetta should not cost more than $18, discuss. I love that I love that she translated brusquetta to brusetta. What's the real pronunciation?

What's the real pronunciation? Like brusketta. Brusketa. Brousquetta. And then like literally the double T is different. Like it's, it's brisketa. I mean, it's brisketa. Brisketa.

But like you can say like I would pronounce it just like, can I get the brisketa? No, I'd say brisketta. Anyways. I say bruchetta, which is wrong. No, I mean, listen. They know what I'm saying. There's no right. There's no wrong.

I order it. They know what I'm saying. And then I eat it. Give them the money. It's just really weird that we honor the pronunciation of pizza and don't say pisa. It's really weird. We don't do that with... Pisa.

We don't do that with any... Because Pisa doesn't sound right. What do you mean? Everything doesn't sound right until it sounds right. This is all relative. Okay. You know, what I'm saying... Pop off, Queen.

I don't know if those are the cheapest ingredients. Bazel's expensive. Tomatoes, basil. Like, especially if there's a balsamic in there, it is probably some of the restaurants more expensive ingredients that aren't meat-based, right? Even something like using a fresh tomato versus something like a canned tomato, spaghetti,

people would, depending on the type of restaurant, right, I'll go to like my local, old school style red sauce, Italian restaurant. They're, God, everything's expensive now, but like spaghetti used to be nine bucks. You know, Little Tonys used to be nine bucks. Now it's probably 1399. Do you know they shot

obsession at Little Tonys? Oh, I heard about that. Oh, man, I haven't been back since. Gen Zee can probably bring back little tonies But uh Probably But anyways like spaghetti

Fancy restaurants People people pay 25 bucks For the spaghetti For the most basic Caccioi Pepe You know and that's cheap as hell I mean Parmesan is gonna be a little bit expensive But like pasta is cheap as hell

Can't Tomato is cheap as hell Yeah Olive oil you're buying in bulk You know what I mean I think brisketta I kind of don't agree with you on this one It makes sense intuitively That like brisketa should be one of those

You know there's like some restaurants They'll have the little menu of like appetizers for the appetizer. Like they'll be like little bites. It'll be like fried olives for six bucks. Oh yeah. Like you mean like bar snacks? Yeah, a little bar snack menu. I went somewhere recently and they had a little bar snack menu area.

Oh, I fired the menu on all of them. And I and I was so like pissed because I'm like this should just be in the appetizer section. Why are you here? But are they significantly less expensive? They're like seven bucks? Yeah. You get like little pinchos, like a little hinda? Yeah, but like they should explain.

I'm just pissed off all the time. I'm just pissed off all the time. I'm mad. I'm mad. I'm mad. I'm pissed off. I would not, I would not, I would like to not spend more than $15 when I'm getting a brisketa. And that's, that's where I stand.

Going out to dinner's hard. Yeah, oh my God. Much of dinner is hard. Yeah. I was thinking so it had a lovely, lovely meal that you couldn't be there for because you were traveling. I'm really sad about that. We got to bring you back out. It's okay.

Broken Spanish Comed d'O. chef Ray Garcia. Absolutely wonderful. Tremendous meal. Was it not the old A-frame? Old A-frame space. I saw the restaurant space in L.A. I saw it.

I saw it. I literally saw him like, this is A-frame. He's maybe like my favorite chef in the last 10 years in L.A. Awesome. How is the food? It was unbelievable. And a lot of them are based off of dishes that he had as O.G. Broken Spanish.

And then also a place called Broken Spanish or B.S. Takaria that I used to love. And this was a very like formative restaurants for me. Really, Lily at some point, she was like looking at one of the dishes. And she looks at me and goes, It looks like something you'd cook. And I'm like, the reason I would cook something like that is because 10 years ago I would have eaten Ray Garcia's food and the chef's in his, you know, ilk. And like, yeah, I was copycatting them. They were copycating each other.

Right. Actually, a shout out to Kelly ran into her. She's, I think, the manager at Brogan Spanish Commodore. She was like, I think an assistant manager at Tarene, the restaurant that I briefly worked at back the day. You worked at Tareen? Yeah, I did like a couple services. And I worked for Chris as he was doing like cake. catering stuff.

I did not know you were like... But Chris was like kind of like a mentor of mine, you know, for at least like a summer plus in college. I always wanted to eat at Terrain. Dude, it was awesome. But, you know, it's like a lot of good restaurants go under. But the point is it got named a Bon Appetit, Best New Restaurant in America. And I was like, it was the only L.A. restaurant in the list. It's a 10-year-old restaurant that they revived.

That's pretty cool. It's cool, but it's like there's not a lot of sort of... Stories like that? No, there's not a lot of like innovation. It's like, that's like, that's not a new restaurant. That's a 10-year-old restaurant, and that's Ray Garcia doing what he does best in a really awesome space with a really talented group of people. But that Tamal, I had that Tamal 10 years ago, and it's awesome. Right?

But right now, like, everything's expensive as hell, and there's nothing that I deem very exciting that I want to spend my money on outside of the handful of spots that I'm already going to. It's really dining out right now is really difficult. I want to support restaurants, but like paying $20 for brisketta. It's brutal. God, dude, it's really, and frankly, like, I'm privileged as hell. I can afford it. Yes, we can't. If this is your one date night a year, or not a year, hopefully, if this is your one date night a month with your partner and you're going out to try a nice new place and you go, brisketta's $21, but we really like it.

We got to get it. That's $30 with tax and tip. And then if those tomatoes are not in season and if it's skimping on the balsam, if it sucks, dude, that's like devastating. When I was a kid, every payday, not every. payday once a month, every other payday, my dad would take me to a restaurant and I don't want to try. And we wouldn't, you know, wouldn't be anything crazy, fancy, but just a new spot. And I remember, like, if that meal was good, that was the last good, really good meal that I was getting in a month. Yeah. And it was incredible. It was a lot of formative memories. If the meal

was bad, it was devastating, you know? Yeah. So I don't know. So much writing on it. Yeah. There's just so, whenever, like, things are just so expensive, there's so much writing on Yeah. There's a lot riding with the chefs, too. It's tough for the diners. It's tough for the people working at the restaurant. It's tough for the people supplying the food. It's just very, very difficult right now.

My big question about, and I'm so sorry, we've, like, answered your question poorly. It's a new podcast. Sorry, babes. We've never podcasted before. Yes, me. I think asking the question, it's like, well, who is actually making the money here when you talk about rent? The farmer, yeah, literally the farmers aren't making money. The people who pick the vegetables aren't making money.

The people who cook the food aren't making money. Restaurant owners aren't even making money because we know how many fail. The servers aren't making, well, servers are probably making, servers probably doing better than a lot of people for being honest. I mean, in California. In California, yeah, yeah. But in tip sharing, you know, economies, it's very different. Yeah, it's tech ghouls and landlords. Yep.

Absolutely. I don't know. Start smashing windows. What do you want me to say? Eventually the landlords are going to be out too because everything's becoming like in a digital space. So it's probably only going to be tech goals. I hate the tech goals. Oh, and especially when the tech goals are like forming the culture when restaurants can only open up for what the tech goals want.

I know. And then what do they want? Slop. Iowasca. Oh. Oh. Next opinion, please. Hi, guys. This is Austin from Eastern North Carolina. I'm calling today to challenge Josh.

He, I'm going through the backlog, and he has stated that he thinks sushi is more of a generational food for newer generations because boomers are unlikely to eat it due to preferences and stuff over the years. I think either my father is an anomaly or it's a regional. thing based on where you grow up because he grew up eating raw seafood all the time working on fishermen's boats. Oh. And also raw oysters are a very common food on the eastern coast. So I feel like if you're willing to eat a raw oyster shooter, you're okay to eat a piece of sushi.

But that's just my opinion, my little casserole. I think it's a regional thing. If you like to eat sushi, it might be because of what you were raised around eating, of course. But I think older generations are okay with eating those things because of stuff like this. All right. Thanks, guys. Bye. It's a really good point. Really good point. And I'm glad you challenged me on that.

Because, yeah, something like a raw oyster. I would be curious. I would be curious if any boomers, when I say boomer, I mean, I've just met a fair amount of slightly older people who will just, you know, thumb their noses at the idea of raw. fish because it's weird, but also, yeah, raw oysters are raw oysters are like one of the older foods in the world. Like everybody. Oysters in general. Oysters, yeah, but like every class of person in general.

And if they were eating them, they were probably eating them raw, right? Straight out of the sea. They've also always been like, like, tremendously dangerous. Like, there's like crazy outbreaks. Vibrio. There's Vibrio outbreaks that'll just like take out like a hundred people. You can read about this in like New York in the early 1900s. But anyways, like, God, I love their oysters.

They'll never stop meeting them unless something terrible happens. But yeah, I'd be curious if there are people that are skeved out by raw fish, but do eat raw oysters. Because, yeah, people... Or, like, raw, like, clams. Do people eat raw clams? I love a raw clam. Raw cherry stone clam is maybe my favorite bite of seafood. I love clams.

But, like, yeah, people eating, you know, steamers, raw clams, raw oysters. I don't know. But even, like, on East Coast fishing boats, were they eating a lot of raw fish? Probably not. I know that's like the origin of pokey, they say. It's like, you know, you'd catch a fish and you'd preserve it by mixing the salt, Ogo, seaweed, cuckooly nut. I had so much pokey on my trip.

It was incredible. But, yeah, that is a good point, though. Regionally, if you grew up in a seafaring place, rosca... Are people eating ross callups? Mm-hmm. I love a raw scallop. I'm not supposed to eat ross shrimp, but I'd do it.

You're not? What about ebby? I don't know. You're also not supposed to eat raw oysters, so it's whatever. I eat raw stuff all the time. I eat raw stuff all the time. I eat raw salad. I don't eat bag salad. I don't eat bag salad, but I will eat raw seafood all the time.

I used to be so scared of eating raw, marinated crab. Oh. You know, the little like, ha-jong kejang. I was, because I saw a video of someone who ate it and they got sick and they were in the hospital for a month. Yo! And I was like, that's a long time. I'm never touching that stuff ever. And I realized why? Like, why? Like, yes, there's a little, there's risks involved with some foods. But sometimes you just got to bite the. bullet and

like I'm an adventurous person you know like why wouldn't I try something new and cool because one person got sick on the internet like that was that was weird of me raw marinated crab has never been my favorite

like I dig on it I enjoy it when I have it but there's something like the the jelly texture has never oh I love well also I love you like on rice do you or do you

yeah yeah well I like to slurp one like I do like an inaugural you do the spicy the yeah I do an inaugural slurp and then the rest I just on some rice but I love I love

the action of eating raw seafood so much. I feel like it doesn't get enough respect. I love like a seafood boil, crawfish, crofish boil, like to me sit around for hours, just peeling crawfish, drinking abeta, Andy Gator ale with your boys, you know, you stumble upon a hard-boiled egg sitting in the pile of crawfish. You go, ooh, oh, oh, oh, oh, egg. Oh, I do that with the corn because I guess in all the crevasses and you're just like, Yeah. So good. That's a fun time. Hi. I'm from Illinois, and I need you guys to answer a friendship, well, not friendship ending, but we use this to start fights within my friend group really.

I need to know, would you rather eat a chicken tender than for soup from a flask? the soup in the flask is not like a miso brothy soup. It is like a chunky broccoli cheddar soup or a chicken noodle soup. What are we eating the chicken dinner? And it is in fact a surprise. When you go to drink from the flask, it's surprise soup. And then the caveat with the tendee, it is room temperature and possibly straight up from your pocket. Have a great day.

all, you're a friend. So Josh is my friend. Yeah. I don't think we're best friends. I don't think we're best friends. But we're friends. My best friend is Deep Nike. My best friend's my daughter.

Or my husband. Sometimes my mom. Sorry. Would I rather eat a chicken tender out of someone's pocket room temperature or flask soup? Chunky flask soup. What do you think?

Can I have both? No, you can only have one. I want both. That's not the game. Neither of these just disgust me at all. Chicken tender pocket. Chicken tender, pocket tender for sure. I've surely had pocket tenders before.

I've done a lot of drinking around a lot of chicken tenders, and I tend to wear clothes with pockets intentionally. You think you've pocketed a tender? I can assure you I pocketed it's tender. I've pocketed French fries when we go to the club. It's a tenders. You get a much bigger bang for your buck if you pocketed a tender than a French fry. Give me your tots, Napoleon. That's, I have, I have, like, washed hoodies and stuff that have just had, like, whole Oreos in them.

Like, I just, I squirre. I just, like, squirrel away food and pocket. You've laundered food in your hoodie? Yeah, it's disgusting, dude. Julie, just like, why are you having? And I was like, I don't know. Oh, this is recent. This isn't college age.

This is. You're putting food in your pocket for later? Or do you forget about it? What's going on? Are you ready for a little bit of Josh is now out of touch? because as his star continues to rise, he ends up in fancier places. You?

You? You talk about this job? Yeah, go ahead. I have to go to a lot of events. Yeah. It's so good. YouTube is throwing a creator, clash of collective marketing.

You have to show up. Yeah, you do. As their new darling. You don't like eat, you know, there's never a good place to. They'll have past apps. But then you're like, you're talking to someone. Dr. Mike, you're hanging out with Dr. Mike, and you just need calories at some point,

but like you have to go do a thing. Maybe you're doing a panel, and then somebody has the thing of chicken tenders, and you just go, screw it, and you just put the chicken tenders in your pocket, so then you can find somewhere to eat them at some point. Josh, you have nice pants on. What if they get greasy, and there's a grease stay when you're walking on stage. You need to be thoughtful. Yeah, back pocket. Greasy backpocket? Honey, they're going to think you poo-pooed yourself. Red carpet, photographers, they ain't shooting from the back, baby, unless I show it to them. Oh, what if you're walking away?

I don't know. What you walk like is. But like, you know, there are multiple times in my life recently where I've needed to eat a pocket tender. Okay. And it really helps. I think pocket tender is the answer to the question. I'm out of touch. I'm very famous.

Yes, I'm hanging out with Dr. Mike Varshowski. Josh, you are famous. Thank you so much. Do you like being famous? Nope. Do you want to stop? Being famous? Yeah.

Eventually. Got business to tent, Nicole. We got business to tend to ten. You want a nice quiet life. We got things to accomplish. On the outskirts of... We talked about... Me and Maddie Matheson, dude.

Oh, yeah? Are you guys friends like that? Well, no, but he... Like, we haven't shown his numbers. We could text. You can text. No, something during his last meal, he was like... He was like, trying to get my pile, dog. Trying to get my pile.

I got a little bit of a pile. I don't got a big enough pile. Not a big enough pile to disappear with my family. That's what I want to do. You know? Yeah. And he just, you know, he wants to get his amount of retirement money and then focus on the things that are actually important in life. I don't think I'm ever going to leave Los Angeles, unless something happens.

Earthquake, the big one. Maybe. The Dwayne the Rock Johnson's San Andreas one. I think I'll stay if there's an earthquake. Yeah. I like L.A., but I've been entertaining the idea of not settling here. Okay. You know?

Just make sure you're. let me know where you're living so I can come visit you. Santa Clarita. Santa Clarita. No, I'm just kidding. Jamie just shaking her head. What about Northridge? It's still L.A.

That's where the biggest earthquake was. Northridge earthquake? Yeah, so lightning won't start twice. Yeah, huh? There's a fault line. It's on the fault line. Oh, you're so right, queen. That is how everything's are.

I mean, a lot of the houses in Northridge are those, like, there's so many rooms and they go forever. I kind of like. Yeah, I was in, I shot something in North. Shot something in Northridge recently. Just like gorgeous suburban neighborhoods, much more affordable than even farther east in the valley. Guys, Northridge is where it's at. There's a place where you can get a $60 omicasse and a bean burrito in the same restaurant. Wow.

Do you know about Kings? I love Kings. Yeah, man. I've never been to Northridge before. Really? I've never been to Centro Bay before. I've never been in Northridge. I've never been anywhere.

I don't go anywhere. There's like a big ass. Northridge is like the closest place that'll have like an Applebee's and a BJ's brew house and like a TDR Friday's in the same. You know, it's like... I feel that's Torrance for me. Oh, Torrance is, yeah, the other way.

That's torrents for me because my sister's that way. Sure, sure, yeah. But you got to get out of the city center to find those big ass strip malls with like... I got my torrents. You guys got your Northridge. We'll hit each other up in like 10 years. Shout out, C-Sons, baby, go Matt Adores. And on that note, thank you for listening to Hot Dog is a sandwich

please subscribe to our YouTube channel so we can keep doing fun stuff over here. We got new audio-only episodes every Wednesday and guess what? Also, the same for our video. You know, if people say Go dogs, you're like, go dogs. I was about to do that with Matadors

and then realized, what sound of the Madadors? Go Matador! That's racist. That's what racist. I don't want to say anything. David went to C-Sysun and you graduated from C-Sun. I went to C-Sun.

Yeah? He went to USC for a year, And then he was like, it was way too expensive. I'm not wasting my money on this. I competed a lot at C-Sysome. I remember I told you I broke the windshield of my car in high school? No, you never told me that story. With a shopput?

Just kidding. You've told me it like four times. Well, check this out. What's up? That was in Northridge. All right, see you guys next time. Call us 833 Dog Pod 1, Ring a ding-a-Ding. This has been brought to you by the official Tours Board of Northage. This is in Burbank.

Josh is lying again. There was recently, like, a news story about how DTLA is so over, downtown Burbank is in. And I was like, what are we talking about? What are we talking about? What are we talking about? Come on. Like, yeah, are people going to go to the Goldstone in downtown Burbank? F*** yeah, there.

How fucking I am.