Bittersweet Infamy - #140 - F for Flamin' Hot

Episode Date: March 26, 2026

Josie tells Taylor about the spicy history of one of America's favourite snack foods, Flamin' Hot Cheetos—and how the brand's well-known rags-to-riches origin story may actually be a flamin' hot fraud.

Welcome to Bittersweet and Feud. I'm Taylor Basso. And I'm Josie Mitchell. On this podcast, we share the stories that live on and in me. The strange and the familiar. The tragic and the comic. The bitter. And the sweet.

Hey, Josie. How's it been? It's been good. I'm so glad you asked. You know, I was like, coming in, I was like, there's only one question. I hope Josie asks somebody. How have things been? How are you?

Nailed it. Yes. I'm good. As carries on, with the theme of our previous episode. It's a little bit concerned over the state of the world, but in terms of me, myself, and I, it's a beautiful, rainy Vancouver.

It's too fucking cold in Vancouver. You know what? Actually, I take it back. It's too fucking cold in Vancouver. That is getting under my skin a bit. Yeah. We're getting on spring. Tick-Tock. We need some cherry blossom action.

Some tulips. We do have cherry blossoms. And Vancouver's a good city for cherry blossoms. Gifted to us from the Japanese. Good gift. It's a good gift. How cold is it? Like close?

a freezing, it's going in and out of snowing. How was the weather in Baltimore? D.C. You recently visited this area of New England, eastern seaboard. What do we, now that you're a local, what do we properly call this neck of the woods? East Coast.

Okay. Little did I know until I googled it, thankfully a few weeks before. Baltimore's only an hour away from D.C. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I had a conference in Baltimore, and it was lovely. I got to see a lot of wonderful friends that I rarely get to see, as in Erica Joe Brown.

A friend of the podcast, I want to say it was something like 108 to 112 or something like that. Erica Joe does one called Satan's Last Stronghold about the attempts by American evangelical missionary John Allen Chow to bring the good word to the uncontacted by force people of North Sentinel in the Sentinel Islands. Spoiler, it don't work. Erica told that so well. Yeah, excellent episode, lots of fun. I really recommend that you go back and listen. She's a hoot and a half, and I really like spending time with her. The event that I went to, the conference that I went to, the keynote speaker, was the king of Baltimore.

John Waters. Yes. Yes. It was very good. It was a very good keynote. Talk us through it. Pretty much the impetus of his talk, this was a writing conference. So his thesis more or less was, you know, I'm a writer too.

And he presented a very convincing case. I totally agree. Okay. Maybe you had to be there. Maybe you had to be there. I mean, he gave examples and cheerful. And, you know, it ended with a poem that he wrote, his first ever poem. Mm-hmm.

His first ever poem. A first ever, like, published poem because it's... Oh, I thought you were saying that he, like, he finally wrote a poem for this. Like, he was just for the first time ever dabbling in poetry for the sake of this talk. No, no, no, no. Like how I wrote The Werewolf's Purse that one time. I thought that's what we were talking about. Oh, no, John Waters wrote poetry on his own and then.

Got it. Was it as good or better or worse than The Werewolf's Purse? On par. Equal, equal. That's a fair answer. Thank you. Yes. Good and different.

ways. Got it. Yeah. There was one, at one point in his talk where he was recounting his kind of like writerly schedule and one of them was like he wakes up and he reads every newspaper he has and they're all delivered to his door and then he gets the second round and he reads all of those on his computer. What a psycho. I know. And then he takes a bath and he kind of turns to the audience and he's like, I always take a bath because showers are too violent. He's hilarious. He's hilarious. Oh my God. That's very droll. Yeah.

And he's like, I would always tell my father that showers are too violent and he would hate me. And it was just like, oh, I love John Waters. Yeah. He's so sweet. John Waters is a, by the way, we should just be clear. Oh, yeah. With John Waters. With John Waters.

With John Waters. Who did that podcast with Shannon Doherty. Very well-known kind of campy, gay writer known for some of his early work with the performer divine, and then kind of latterly also for like the original hairspray and then also the musical hairspray. What are some other big, a serial mom, which is fucking great. I love, go watch Serial Mom. Serial Mom is a fucking riot and a half. Kathleen Turner calling people pussyface. It's fucking great. It's so good. He always does really like kind of crass, but funny, campy send-ups of like American suburban life. Yeah. And. And,

It's suburban life, but like the mom is a serial killer. It's that kind of thing. And she makes like a dirty phone calls and is obsessed with like John Wayne Gacy and shit. Yeah. And he's from and a very proud resident of and representative of Baltimore. Good morning Baltimore. Every day is an open door. Hairspray.

Yeah, so that was a really great. I've never been to Baltimore. What were your impressions of Baltimore as a locale? very undersung, a bit of an underdog city. Oh, a hidden gem. And maybe part of my admiration of the city is it kind of reminded me of Houston in that way, where it's like it's not a city you go to visit necessarily. Like, for example, I told a class of mine that I was going to Baltimore for part of my

spring break. And one kid was like, oh, I, like my grandpa lived there and we would go there as kids. And I was like, oh, what should I do? what can you recommend me to do? And he's like, you know, to be honest, I would go to D.C. I was like, oh, okay, which was funny because, one, getting a recommendation to go to a different city is the recommendation for a city. That's funny. But two, that was my actual plan.

After the conference, I went up to down. I went around to D.C. And I spent a few days with my old high school friend Izzy. Okay, tell me about this. It was great. She has lived in D.C. since 2017. Okay. So she saw Trump get in there and she said, this is for me.

Exactly. She said, I got to be, that is where the future is. Unfortunately, the poor thing, she works with the DOJ. She's a lawyer and antitrust. Oh, God. Yeah. My heart goes out to her. She is fighting the good fight.

DOJ is a tough one. Poor thing. Fuck, I can't even imagine. I know. But she's a, she's wicked smat. Wicked smat. And, yeah, that's not D.C. or Baltimore, but, you know. Oh, that's Boston.

Eastern seaboard. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Matt Damon. Fuck yeah. Yeah, exactly. What did you get up to in D.C.?

Like, what actual activities did you do? One day, Izzy and I spent eight hours at a Korean spa. Oh, wow. That was good. Did you fall asleep? A few times, yeah Yeah, good, good Yeah, it was

Very relaxing That's good You'll need all the relaxation You all can get these days In America Yeah Beginning to catch up with an old friend Is it's like I've known Izzy since middle school

So we've seen a lot of each other Like a lot of different versions of each other Oh yeah Different haircuts And then you came home and got sick Then I came home and just pooped the fuck out. Who knew that eight hours at a spa would really take it out of me? They were extracting the toxins.

I've just been sleeping and zoning out, taking cold and flu medication to sleep, and it feels like subfloor sleeping. Moomin hibernation. It's moomin hibernation. I know what you mean. It was like, foo, my body's just like sinking through the bed, down through the sheets and the mattress. gone. I'm gone. I like that. That's the, that's only the, the best part of being sick. Just bury me. I'm dead. Lights out for the next 28 hours. See ya.

How are you feeling? I'm okay. I'll be okay. Okay. What do you want to do about the war in Iran? Do you want to mention it? I want to stop it, Taylor. I want to stop it. Right here and right now. Okay, let's dive in. Fuck. One of the sad things about this stupid fucking season of bitter sweet infamy that I already, ready to bury. Six is over, guys. Six is trash. Let's take some cold and flu men. Let's go to some floor sleeping. Some floor sleeping. Just, just everything develops so fucking fast and so badly these days. So obviously since the last time we chatted, your country is newly at war with Iran. Not much of a strategy seemingly other than distract, distract, distract, and... Oil, oil, oil. Yeah. Oh, wait, gas prices are going up? What? Yeah, that happens.

Baseball apple pie and meddling in foreign governments in the Middle East and South America, predominantly, but other places too. Yeah. Ah, man. Yes. We've got South America already this year. Now we're in the Middle East. Who know? Who know?

I mean, I don't want to know. I don't want to know. I want to stop. In fact, this was the subject matter of our last episode to a degree, number 139 invasion of the ice room about American, among other things about American foreign policy and Greenland. Thank you. My heart was in it. I love Greenland. And you should love Greenland, too.

Go back and listen to our last episode, 139. And stay out of Greenland. And stay out of Greenland. Stay the fuck out of Greenland. Unless you are supporting their economy with your tourism dollars discreetly. And to all the listeners, thank you for bearing with us while we attempt to find the line between comedy-style podcast back to her and the fact that what's going on in most of the world really sucks these days. Sending love out to all of our listeners who are affected by kind of the situation and around and all of the kind of global shittiness that's going on. Let's make it through this together as best we can.

The news cycle is a, it's a rough one. You got to tap in every once in a while, but it's also, you can't sink into it. You got to breath, breathing exercises, that kind of thing. LaMaz, you know, you got a LaMaz this new cycle. May we all be delivered safely. If you want to deliver us safely to some great movies, Picks. You can join us over at the coffee account, K-O-F-I-com slash bittersweet infamy. Pay us like three bucks a month, I think. And it is? Is it three bucks? Something like this? I don't know. Everyone's a story of tariffs got it. Dude, I don't fucking know any. Life is a fucking mystery. Everyone must stand alone. Um, in the words of Madonna. But don't stand alone at coffee.

Yeah, coffee.com. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Be coming back on track. Pivot back to the Hard sell. Call to Action. You can become a member of the Bitter Sweet Film Club where we watch infamous films, films about infamy films that have infamous stories to their makings, things of this nature. Most recently, we watched Notes on a Scandal. Oh, wow. Sorry, I can't really do it. No, that's okay. I hope so. It's good. You were excited. Kate Blanchette, Dame Judy Dench. Dame Judy Dench making a second appearance in the film club. Katz, 2019 was not enough. She said one more spin. Round the compass.

Always happy to see Dame Judy, aren't you? I am. I can't speak for you. Ah, yes. I watched a movie the other night, and there she was on my screen. Yet again, I didn't even know if she was in the movie. It was so pleasantly surprised. Great.

You're like, damn, I didn't know you were one of the Ninja Turtles, Dame Judy dance. Yeah. I didn't know you were Donatello. That may have been the cold of flu meds. Yes. And then you sunk back down under the house. Apparently, you're not supposed to mix those with alcohol and edibles, but... Who knew? They're finding out new things about medicine every day.

Truly they are. Science. Wow. And for our next movie. What's our next movie again, Josie? Oh, yes. Bonnie and Clyde. We are watching the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde. It is starring Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty. Join us for, what's the story of Bonnie and Clyde to your recollection, Josie? Oh, bandits on the run. Married couple, are they married? They're involved.

They're enmeshed with one another in some way. They're enmeshed. Uh-huh. And they're robbed banks in the 1930s, I feel like. And they're a bit of like a Robin Hood kind of story because they like roll through towns and people are like, whoa, was that Bonnie and Clyde who stole our money? That's cool. That's sick. I love when they steal our money.

So they had a bit of cachet that way. I think there's a sense of like, glau. clamor about them. Yes, they have a song, a French song, you know? Bonny and Clyde. Yes. Which may not be in the film Bonnie and Clyde. I'm not sure. Find out with us over at coffee.com. One last thing, we heard your voices, and by heard your voices, I mean, no one said this to us, but this April coming back, it will be the April Fool's fact or fiction minfamous. April Fool. We're given it its own whole entire episode, so not only is the April Fool's Mimphemus back, but the Mimphemus.

We told you we're killing the Mimphemus forever. Next episode, I'm giving you two Mimphemuses. One of them is real. One of them is fake. You can play along from home, try to decide which one. Is that Taylor pulling the wool over our eyes, or do we see right through his bullshit? Oh, that's so fun. And later in April, I will be bringing a similar such episode of a truth and a lie.

Josie has a very good track record in Truth and Lie game. She's very, she's a metal. Yeah, because I just, like, he was wearing a blue, suit. Wrong. It's like a green suit. Stupid motherfucker. No, you know what?

Wins are wins. And like, and not for nothing. Like, we have taken you to task. You have put your, you've put in your time getting your licks for your micro lies. You know, I can't even remember the truth about Fran Drescher anymore. I'm so traumatized. In any case, results speak for themselves in whatever me and Lucia specifically want to say about this.

your record is relatively undefeated. Thank you. But before we get to April, we got a march forward with an excellent story from Josie Mitchell that I can't wait to hear after the break. Taylor, are you a spiceman? Are you a fan of spicy hot? Yes, but late in life. Okay. A lot of my eating habits were built around like food avoidance when I was younger and now I'm older.

I'm like, you know, trying, trying branching out, trying any things. And I think that like, especially when it comes to like Peppers, the feeling of just like in John Waters' terms, it's like a violent feeling. It's like a mouth chaos that numbs and burns. It's an intriguing feeling to me. I want more. So it's new enough. New enough. Yeah. But it's very much like I know I'm going to hit a limit someday where I'm like, okay, I've gone too far with this. But for right now I'm doing okay. With the tummy. Yeah. I come in, I will say, I come in with a healthy respect for the heat of it all. And so I'm not trying to be one of these people like, yeah, give me the hottest thing ever. I can take anything because I can't. And I won't. No.

Yeah. You know your limits. You play within it. I play within it. Are you specifically a flaming hot Cheeto or a taqui, taki guy? No, not a hot chip person. I don't need that from that. The chip can be other than hot and the cheeto the same.

Have we ever mentioned on the podcast for our dear American, listeners, the ketchup chip? The ketchup chip? Ketchup chips, they don't need to know about. Ketchup chips are fucking gross. No one needs to hear anything about it. They're fucking vile. It's like a sweet vinegar chip. Can I tell you something? You can.

Thank you for listening, all of you. When I tell you that my young life was built around food avoidance, I specifically mean like the idea of accidentally brushing your hand against a paper cup of ketchup and then having ketchup on the back of your hand. And then even after you watch it, the back of your hand, smelling like ketchup for the rest of the day, just occasionally getting hit with these fragrants, some fucking ketchup. Ketchup chips is that but like a bag of chips.

It's fucking gross. It's fucking disgusting. Okay, I see you come by it honestly. I have thought and thought and thought about this in my Canadian identity of like, oh, we love ketchup chips up here. Yes, some of us do, Dave. Some of us do. Yes.

Okay, okay. That's fair. But you like the ketchup. Please, by all means, provide the, rebuttal. You're a ketchup chip fan. I like the ketchup chip. I think it's a novelty. I think it's, I think it's sweet and vinegory. I think there's something like elbows up about it a little bit, you know, like go Canada. Yeah, Don Jerry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Give me a, you know, plaid suits and, yeah. Log drivers, waltz and bounty outfit and, you don't know the works. I got you. It is. It's one of

those. It's one of those for sure. I just, I just, it's not, I think of all of our ones of those, it's my least favorite of those. That's fair. That's very fair. Because it's fucking growing. Someone pops open a bag and you just get the, this is Josie's time. I seed the floor. No, no, no, no, my dog. Your owner, redirection? I'd like to ask some questions on redirection. No, no, no, this is, this is, this is proving my point today how powerful snack foods are. Yes, okay, this we agree on. And how much they not only activate a sense of taste and flavor, but. But a sense of identity. A sense of identity. Yes, you're 100%. And how, how you kind of function in the world. And I think there's, that's true for food in general. But I think snack foods,

especially like highly processed snack foods that you can get anywhere. You can be at the courthouse, you can be on the ferry. You can be at your high school, whatever it is. And you can access these foods that you can identify with or not. Maybe you don't like them. But that is such a powerful connection. Well, I think today's episode is also going to scratch that snacky delight when it comes to how passionate we can be about our snacks. Because today, Taylor, I am telling you the story. I love that you take a hit of a joint right before I talk about this iconic snack food. Crack open the bag. Flaming hot Cheetos. Okay. So I have some small background knowledge here. Okay, okay.

I know that this is a story that has like an iconic discovery slash creation of story that is very tied in with like the American dream and all this kind of shit. Yeah. I heard recently that there's some in some type of way that story is maybe not as it seems or not as, it's sort of in a monopoly way, not as it has been marketed or something like this. Yeah. I didn't know too much about this story. I guess my background knowledge, was like de spicy, they real spicy. They're flaming hot. They're flaming hot. Pugh! Bright red. They're doing great things with food dye on these flaming hot Cheetos, eh? It's true. Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of test stuff. Whatever beetle they had to mash up the carapace of that gets them that shade of red, they need to repopulate because it liberally applied red food

coloring here. Oh yeah. Yeah. I like them. I think I'm more partial to a plain Cheeto. Me too. Which I don't know what that says about me as a white person, but I'm okay with it because... White guilt is everywhere you look. It's in every bag. You open every bag of Cheetos. And there's a reminder. And there's always a reminder.

You can't take Flaming Hot Cheetos. Yeah. Your people were Welsh. But I also, I know and love the summer hit from 2012, Hot Cheetos and Taki. Are you familiar? 2012 mhm romney

yeah yo dame jones i'm with my crew and we gonna show y'all when we be snacking on you dig I'm gang

hot cheetos and tachis hot chitos and tachis I can't get enough of these hot chitos and tachies gum off yeah yeah did that make him like

one billion two billion, how much money did that make them? It wasn't enough. So this was actually made in like an after school program for kids called Beats and Rhymes. And it was in Minneapolis. It's a like after school and summer program. Dude, give children access to the arts. Give children access to the arts, right? They will do wonderful things. And hot Cheetos and talkie. You got to have a good snack budget in there too, mind. Yeah, obviously. Yeah. I know. Had you not heard that song before? No, that's good. I like it. I'm not opposed to having heard it, but I'd never heard it. I can't believe that I popped your hot Cheetos and Taki cherry. That's amazing. Wow, that's vivid.

So much red. Was there blood? Yeah. What the fuck? Is that why it's popped your cherry because there's blood? Yeah. Did I pop your... You popped my popping my cherry cherry. Yes. I never stopped to actually grasp the implications of that metaphor before. Yeah. Shit. I was just like, I don't know the clit? Like, I didn't think that hard about it, honestly. I didn't think hard. I should have thought harder. So I was best to think hard in the situation. You never know when there's going to be a pop quiz. You never know when there's going to be a game show, right? You never know. Pop quiz. Oh, stop. Ew. We already changed the sheets. Enough. Oh, man. I'm so sorry that that followed up the very wholesome hot Cheetos and Taki kid summer school

Whatever. We tried. Like I said, the trouble isn't keeping it G-rated. That is the difficulty. So even before the summer of 2012, when the viral song, Hockitos and Tockeys, took over the airwaves. Flaming Hot Cheetos were still a really big thing in the early 90s. That is when they came on the market.

Taylor Dane is on the airwaves. Melrose Place is the hot new show. Yeah, exactly. according to the chief marketing officer at Frito Lay, Flaming Hot is not just a snack, Taylor, but it is a lifestyle. How come every brand is a fucking lifestyle, man? You know, because that's the stage of late capitalism we live in. Mountain Dew can't just be like a C-tier soft drink.

It's got to be a fucking lifestyle. Exactly, yes. When you do the do, you're Baja blasting your, like, what the fuck, shut up, Fucking shut up. Fucking shut up. The world is melting. Anyway. I want you to know, too, that there is a flaming hot mountain dew flavor.

I'll never say that America has contributed nothing to the culture. I never will. I never will. Thank you. No one. Thank you. No worries. Our chief marketing officer says that Flaming Hot has a cult-like following.

It might be an over-exaggeration just to generate more press. Okay. But, I mean, you heard the song. You heard the song. You heard the song. You heard the song. Yeah. People like hot Cheetos and tockys.

There is also a makeup line. There is a collaboration with Forever 21. There's so much money to be made. It's so true. Yes, pop-ups where everything is flaming hot, like a flaming hot margarita. Clothing, anything, everything. Christmas stockings, you know, all the thing. As of 1992, when it first got on the market, Flaming Hot.

now has 15 flaming hot snacks that range from popcorn to Doritos, corn nuts, you know, any snack food that you find at the local corner store, it's going to have a flaming hot version of it. Flaming Hot Cheetos between 2000 and 18 and 2019, the increase in sales of Flaming Hot Cheetos was a 105%. Between when and when? 2018 to 2019? Jesus.

Yeah, 105% increase in sales. Like off the fucking charts. And as we were talking about earlier, part of its success, yes, it's a lifestyle. It's a cult following. But it is tied to identity in a relatively clear way. Yep. Immigration in the U.S. has been increasing, specifically Asian American population and Hispanic populations have increased the most in the last about 10 years. And those flavor profiles from those particular cultures, they do tend to run a

little bit spicier. Welsh palettes no longer dictating the national snack conversation. Exactly. Put away your Quaker oats. Those riva crackers just don't cut it anymore. You can use them as drywall. It's okay. Of course, it's not just the growing population from immigration that is demanding spicier food, but it's also exposure to spicier foods. So it's not just growing population, but whole generations. Like the millennial generation, we're eager and willing to spend money on spicier stuff. Funko pops.

And we're eager and to spend money on shit like funco pops, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got it. We're great little consumers. We love our brands. And then also the other thing is, too, is like, if you look back at the rate at which, like, let's call them, like, quote unquote, ethnic foods are introduced to the North American palate generally.

There was a time, like, if you go back to, like, the 50s, pizza is a very exotic option. Yes, yeah. If you go back to the 90s, sushi was seen as a very... You eat sushi, isn't that raw fish? And now it's just, like, what are we doing tonight? Oh, we're getting sushi. Fah, uh, pokey, all of these, like, things that are, like,

existing in many places all over the world, but kind of get, quote, unquote, discovered by Western cuisine. as broadly we realize that there are more food options than just McDonald's, I guess. Yeah. And how do we discover these food options? Immigration. The same immigrants that we accuse of exploiting our systems are enriching our lives and our palettes.

And you can even see it in stuff like McDonald's. Like there's more like, oh, spicy, you know, spicy chicken sandwich. Sri Racha, there's another one. Yeah. If you want to talk about another one that's like a brand and a lifestyle and an identity and I carry my Sri Racha around. I live downwind from the Sviracha plant and my eyes hurt. Whatever it is.

Yeah, it's important. It's part of it, right? And sort of like a Flaming Hot Cheetos way that's sort of also similarly, I think, tied to to like diasporic populations and things like this in its own way. One interesting thing about Flaming Hot Cheetos is that it was specifically developed and produced and marketed in the U.S. It wasn't an import from somewhere else. It was a snack food that was developed for a growing desire for it within the U.S. population.

And developed by Frito Lay, who is the mega brand of the snack food world, right? And the parent company of Frito Lay is PepsiCo. Okay, so there you fucking go. So it just goes big up the chain. Just everyone's eating the fucking snake above them's ass. It's like a human centipede. But is he really? wrong.

Is he mistaken? We shouldn't ask, are the things that he is saying crass and unballible to us? We must ask ourselves, but is he incorrect? That's what we must ask. This is true. This is very true. So, of course, sometimes hot flamen can be a little spicy, a little too spicy.

No doubt you'll remember in about 2018 or so, little Zan odied on flaming hot Cheetos and had to go to the hospital after vomiting blood. I can't believe you're breaking this news to me. Is Little Zan okay? He was okay. He's a very white boy. He must have very soft stomach lining.

It's all that Xanax, you know. It sits bad on the tongue. Weakened the cilia in there a little bit. Yeah. And today we're in our hellish whirl of 2026. You know RFK Jr. is coming after that Cheeto dust. Really? Actually, in response, Frito Lay is releasing their first significant visual update to the Flaming Hot Cheeto since it was originally launched.

Right. Are they going to try to make it look less like a gas station product or what? It's in like a white bag, so it's like clean. And then they're marketing it as Cheetos simply naked. NKD. Naked of dyes, but with the same flaming hot flavor you love. No, no, no, no, no. You don't understand. It's going to save the U.S. health care system, Taylor. Red things are hotter. Not to interrupt your very good point, but I also have a very good point.

Red dye number two makes things hotter. Yes, yes. It's like how drawing speed lines on it makes it go faster, you know? These are similar thoughts. Well, the one TikTok review I watched of a kid at Walmart eating them said they taste the same. I'm sure they fucking do. There's nothing about the red that is, again, this is just some beetles in a mortar and pestle that we're crushing up at the end of the day. What is the, what's the, is it just food dyes, food additives? Or is it something specific about this red Cheeto dust or what? I think it's, well, RFK Jr. is coming after like dies, unnecessary dies in American foods and stuff like that.

So there's a cultural push towards that. And realistically has been for a while. Like, this isn't even just an RFK thing. I think that, like, dyes and preservatives out of food has been a drum that people have been beaten for a long ass time. It's not good for you. It doesn't change the flavor either, according to this kid of Walmart. But it changes the branding. I think that the simply NKD is so, I think it's maybe meant to provoke this reaction.

I think it's maybe meant to make people feel territorial about OG Flamin Hot Cheetos or something like that about that brand. But it's, I find the new one a little chachi, I will say. Yeah, hard to say. It's hard to say. Where these ideas all come from. Who can say? No one knows. No one knows.

In fact, no one really does know who invented the Flaming Hot Cheeto. Is that so? Because I was given to understand that we knew exactly who and how and where and when, and it's quite a noble and interesting and amazing story. Well. In a corporate Parker Brothers Monopoly speak kind of way. Oh, it's, you hear that, you hear the fucking cops coming as I start talking about this shit. That's the bullshit detector.

What do you got? If you have read the best-selling memoir, Flamen Hot, The Incredible True Story of One Man's Rise, from janitor to Top Executive. Great. Yep, great title, great subtitle. Who wrote this? Who wrote this masterwork? Oh, wait. He has another book, A Boy, a Burrito, and a Cookie, colon, from Janitor to Executive. Damn. Look what AI is taking from us. Look what AI is taking from us. We were talking about none other than Richard P. Montagnets.

This is the hero that you seem to know so well. I know of him. I know of him. You know of him. Okay. Okay. What may I share of what I know of him? Share everything.

The story as I know it is that in true, like, benevolent, this is a story where in many ways the corporation is the hero, which is really true to my understanding and experience of the American corporation. Got the little guy, little guy on the radar. Always. And always, always looking for talent and fresh ideas and underdogs. And the story as I've heard it is that like some higher up decides that we're going to take, you know, the, everybody has a voice at the table here. Gosh darn it.

It doesn't matter who you are. Oh, yeah. Feel a stake of ownership and in this, you know. Act like an owner. Yeah. This Pepsi co-branded other very large corporation and act like an owner. And someday the janitor or in, in my head, it's. it's the janitor comes in and is like, you know, actually I have this idea that I, like,

that I somehow put together from my experience as a janitor that we should have fucking flame and hot Cheetos and it goes through like the quality assurance and becomes a huge hit. And this janitor presumably, you know, I haven't actually looked into this gentleman, but if I know the way that this story is being told to me, he comes into a great, a great success and rises up to the C-suite and maybe now he even owns Frito Lay or Pepsi itself who can say. Yeah. This type of story.

Am I, how, am I warm? You're flaming hot. Flaming hot? Awesome, awesome. Woo! And then as I say, I only recently became aware that this story may not be entirely on the level in some way. I will say that I came to this story through a film directed by none other than Eva Longoria

called Flaming Hot. And it's the story of Richard Montemez. Ava Longoria has a thumb in every pie. She should always donate into the Democrats, you know? Yeah. Creating this 2023 Hulu feature film. And why not? It was pretty good, too.

Was this a feature film was like a doc, or was this like a fictionalization? A biopic. A biopic. Based on the true events. Based on the true events. Okay, so you're making ironing faces. Yeah, yeah, I got you. Yeah.

Okay. This is a column. classic better sweet situation where we have multiple narratives that... Right. A story of a story of a story, yes. Missed around the truth. Will the truth ever be known? You know what?

It's all Cheeto dust in the wind, yeah. Yeah. Yep, lick your fingers because it's all Cheeto dust in the wind. It's our boy Richard. Let's hear a little bit about his story, according to him. By all means. He grew up in East L.A. and a small community called Guausti.

This was in the 1960s. And at the time, Guelstey was a big wine-producing area. So all of his family were farm workers. They picked grapes. His mom, his dad, his aunts, his uncles. They all live together on this farm. They live in kind of these dormitory style housing with like bunk beds and like a big kitchen outside

and shared bathrooms that were like down the lane. Even though he's very close to L.A., It's still a very rural upbringing. And he grew up in the 60s, so this was an era of desegregation in California. When Richard is about seven years old, he and another group of kids from his community are zoned to a previously what had been a white school. So they get busted, Kamala style, busing across California. Let her live. This is this poor woman

Let it go be a coffin piece So his first day at his new school Richard is sitting at the lunch table He's eating with the other kids from his neighborhood And he busts out a burrito And all the white kids are like Ew, what's that? It looks like a toilet thing

And he is so upset Nobody likes him He goes home He's like, mom, make me a bologna sandwich That's all I want All I want is a bologna sandwich She's like That is disgusting.

That's foul. Don't let these colonizers do that to you. Exactly. Disgusting. I want you to take this beating cheese burrito for yourself, and then I want you to take this other one for whoever calls it disgusting, and they can taste it and know how delicious it is. Okay. And he does just that. The next day, he brings a few more of his mom's burritos and starts selling them for 25 cents a pop.

Damn. He learns how to sell them. things quickly. He knows how to how to market things, we'll say. Now, he wasn't really fitting in at school, wasn't a good situation. So according to him at around grade six, he stops going. He doesn't continue on into high school. He doesn't continue on to college. But when he's about 12 or 13, his family moves from Guelosti closer into L.A. And he lives in a largely Hispanic neighborhood in East L.A. And this is where he meets Judy. Okay.

Judy, they're about 12. They had a cute little dating situation. They date all through their teenage years. And at some point, into adulthood, they get married, have babies, is real cute. They're middle school sweetheart. Sure. When Richard turns 18, Judy is like, okay, you got to stop this, like, hustling thing that you're trying to do and that you're not very good at. You can't be selling burritos for 25 cents anymore.

those rates aren't going to stay. We need to raise a child. Yes. Well, and he was getting into some other, like, hustling side situations that weren't totally epically legal. And according to him, he was very bad at them. He got caught at every bad thing he tried to do. Right.

Yeah. It's probably for a blessing to suck at being a criminal to a certain point, because it just limits your options in that world. It's true. It keeps some people from chasing it, but, you know. So Judy says to, Richard, you need a real job. Let's get going on that. Let's get cracking. And so he applies to the Frito-Lay plant in Rancho-Cookamonga. He doesn't feel super comfortable even filling out the application,

like trying to read and write it. And so Judy helps him. She's like, whatever. I got this. We'll just make it up. You went to Rangchukumanga High School. We're done. You went to Yale. You went to Yale. Yeah. Nothing on there was true, according to him. But they hired him anyway. And they hired him on as a janitor. He starts as a janitor, and according to him, he's so stoked to have a full-time job, health care, and he's part of a union. It really is a good deal. I love Frito Lay. What a great employer. All hail to our overlords at Frito Lay and PepsiCo. Yes, exactly. Yeah. He's making $3.10 an hour. This is the early 70s. He's having a great time. He, according to him, is cleaning everything till it is sparkle.

There is not Cheeto dust anywhere, not a speck of it. Imagine being the person responsible for cleaning the Cheeto dust up at the Cheeto factory. That's thankless work. Yeah. Orange lung. Go watch out for that. Oof. Yes, don't you end red later on down the line.

Spicy red more, too. We're coming into red, yeah, the spicy stuff. This is where I feel like Richard's accounts get fun. We'll say that. it fun. I love when the story gets fun, don't you? Wee! He cleans everything until it's sparkling, ting, ting, everywhere, and then he cleans it again, because his shift isn't over. But 30 days after his hiring date, his boss pulls him in, he's like, you know, I don't think this is working out. I think maybe you need to be it. It's too clean. We like some dust. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So which one is it,

Richard? You cleaned everything or you did? But there's other reasons. to be like this isn't going to work out. Maybe he had a terrible attitude or was hostile to his coworkers. This is perhaps. This is true. Yeah. And so Richard says, no, no, no, please just give me two more weeks. I'll show you.

I'll show you. And apparently he just gives her. He claims that he breaks the record for the most pounds of product bagged, like by several thousand pounds. He claims that he's in sales meetings, that he's in the bag. like with his little notebook, taking all these notes. He's working girl. He's working girl.

Yes. Thank you. Got it. Got it. Thank you. I'm so glad you. Yes. That's what Mitchell pointed out.

He's working girl. Oh, really? Mitchell also clocked that he's working girl. He's definitely working girl. Then he's definitely. If we have two independent verifications of working girlness, then it is true. So within a year, Richard, he's on it. He's good.

He gets promoted to be a machine. operator. He says he's still on the sanitation crew, but he gets to also operate some machines. So he seems to kind of like flint and fly and do his thing and he has lots of energy at work. He's also eager to share his new ideas. Friedo Le has a program. They'll give an employee with an idea on how to improve the whole company. They'll give them a silver dollar, which he's making three, 10 an hour, an extra dollar. Sure. So he's just like, what? He's just like, what? about this? What if we did this? What if we put balloons on the backs? What if we, you know, like, what, what if, carrier pigeons, you know, whatever. Bag of flan. Yeah.

Someday I'm going to find a problem I can solve a flan, Josie. It's going to come. Hunger, perhaps? I don't know. You know what? But I like to think outside the bun. Think outside the bun. Yes. Isn't that a Taco Bell phrase? It all comes back to Mountain Dew, Bahab. It's all comes. It's brands. It's all just brands. It's all just, we all like traffic in brands now. We only talk about brands. I love Fanta. You know, it's great. And this is where we'll insert an ad. How about it? Sure. Yeah. That's true to a commercial. So Richard is being in and bopping and doing his thing at Frito Lay, Rangchokukumanga plant. Where dreams come to play, yeah.

Rangshokukumongas, where dreams come true. According to Richard, at this time, there's a new young CEO by the name of Roger and Rico. Roger is interested in setting a new tone at PepsiCo. He can be credited with bringing Michael Jackson into the advertising mix. Madonna. Michael Jackson caught, wait, no, Michael Jackson caught fire, and Madonna's ad got fucking taken down because of controversy because of the like a prayer video.

These are all infamous stories, Josie. Again, Rachel Kukamonga, a later dreams. It's too true. Too true. This Roger Enrico CEO guy, he has a spark. He's kind of interested and shaking things up, even if it doesn't always work out well. It's still, you know, no bad publicity kind of vibes. He's Flaming Hot.

He's the right guy for the Flaming Hot movement. It's his lifestyle. I like the way you think. Yes, yes. Trademark that shit. At this time, Roger Enrico films a short kind of PSA for all the workers across Frito-Lay programs, all of their factories and production. lines, and he is interested in having even the smallest player at Frito Le, come up with the best ideas.

Shoot your shot, Brokies. Mm-hmm. Act like an owner. That's what he wants from everybody at Frito Le. You're not an owner, to be clear, you're not. And this is not an employee owner. But fucking act like it. But act like it.

Richard Montignyaz, our guy, he's like, I'm on it. I've got the energy. I'm binging, I'm bopping. I'm going to do this. So he offers to help stock on different sale routes. He's willing to work overtime. He's willing to work even off the clock to learn things about other machines. How does this machine work?

How does that machine work? He's really given it. He's like, I'm 110. I'm a team player through and through Frito Lay. According to Richard, he is helping to stock a little bodega in a Mexican neighborhood. And he sees he's doing the ruffles, the lays, the ruffles the lays. And he stacks them right next to the Mexican spice rack. And then he's like, wait, we got to add some spice to this.

All these flavors, all of these chips, these are just kind of for a bland palate. But what about the people who like spice? What about the Mexican people? What about mehente? The Welsh people come in and they're like, oh dear, I don't know about that. Ooh, ooh, too hot. Too hot. Yeah.

So he goes to his wife, Judy, who at that time, You know, they're trying to make ends meet. They have two young boys. A third will be on his way. And she's doing a side hustle of making spicy salsas and selling them out of the garage, out of her kitchen. And so he thinks, you know what? We're going to get some of her salsa because it's so good. We're going to find a way to put it on the Frito Lay products. But he's not sure which product will be the best until he's at the park with his kids. It's a special day, Saturday. He's going to take him for a little treat. There comes. the alote man. As the alote man will do. Yes. As he does. Mionessa, maize, the whole works, right? Limon, nemo, ma'amon.

Yeah. Richard's like, I'll take two. And he's holding these two elotes. And for those who are uninitiated of an alote, it's a cob of corn with a stick in it. And to make it delicious, you add a slathering of mayonnaise, mayonnaise, mayonnaise, and then a sprinkling of cheese, and then a lot of. and then a lot of spicy powdered chili. And then you secure all of that powdered chili with squeezed lime on top.

And it's really good and delicious. And you can also have it in vaso, where it's like cut off the cob and put in a little cup. And then you just like eat mayonnaise out of cup and it's wonderful. And he's holding these two alotes. And he's thinking, what can I do for Frito Le? What does my benevolent employer need for me? How can I bring spiciness to their product? He's holding the tuolotes and he says,

Oh my gosh, these look like Cheetos. The inspiration for flaming hot Cheetos. It's not what I was expecting. As much as I got to admit, at first I was a little distracted by the image of you, just kind of like air jerking off these two aloes just one in each fist. But I wasn't expecting Cheetos. That one threw me for a loop and took me by surprise. I can see how you might be thinking of something else.

Oh, yeah, I know. Someday you're going to get like some horrible old creep across the bar being like, hey, he, ha, ha, ha, and you're going to be like, I love Elotes. Sir, me too. I also love Alopez. I say with my Welsh accent, I lentes. I love elotes me. That's what I got.

There was a chick on UK traders who faked Welsh for the entire. show. It was remarkable. Good honor. Wow. And like convincingly so, even as she was having like legitimate breakdowns, kept the fake, and for what? What's that about? You know? So it's interesting. The Welsh. Interesting. Or those faking to be Welsh. Even more interesting. It feeds into a long-term thought of mine, which is that all of the Welsh people are faking it. Faking the accent, faking the whole thing. I do think this. dragon on the flag. Come on. It's right there in front of us. Starting shit with the Welsh.

Someone has to, has to prove you wrong, I think. Come on, Welsh. Let's talk. Come on. So back to the Alates. Yes. Okay, so Richard now has a plan. Judy is making these wonderful little hot salsas. They are drying them and he is spraying the unseasoned Cheetos, which at the factory get tossed. So he gets to take home a trash bag without questions because they're just going to throw them away anyway. Got it. Got it.

Because it's a stealing company property now. But Frito Le, benevolent employer. Uh-uh. They're great. Anything in the name of innovation. Yeah, exactly. Awesome. He's putting the naked first round, first edition, naked Cheetos. Yes, yes. With the spicy slurry that they've created. And add a little oil so it can all stick. He puts them in little clear plastic baggies. He uses a clothing iron to seal the top. On there, it says, flaming hot. He draws a little devil guy with a sombrero.

And he's passing them out to his friends, his coworkers, everyone's in love with them. They're so spicy. He has a product. He's tested it out. He knows it's good. He has the confidence to look up Roger and Rico's number in. the employee here. One owner to another.

Exactly. Let's have an owner to owner conversation about my great new idea. Yeah. So he calls up central office and he gets not exactly, you know, Roger and Rico, but he does get his secretary, a woman named Patty Roof. She's like, oh, okay, you're calling from California, so you're the president of California, Frieda. And he's like, no. She's like, oh, so you're like... VP of sales or some shit, yeah.

Yeah, Southern California. No. And she goes down and finally, he's like, I'm the janitor at the Rachel Cucamonga plant. Say it. It's fun. She's, I guess, into it enough that she's like, you know what? Go ahead. You're crazy. You're crazy. You're nuts. You're flaming hot. Roger's going to have fun with that. But he gives her the whole pitch and she's like, okay. So she forwards it on to Roger and Rico, who says, Richard, this sounds interesting. I have a planned plant tour in Rancho Kukumanga in two weeks. I want to hear your pitch in its entirety. And we'll go from there. Richard is stoked, obviously.

Yeah. He does not know how to do a sales pitch. No, that's tough. You got to watch Shark Tank, bro. Didn't have it yet. Ah. So where do you go? Judy tells him,

We'll go. Bermos on the bibliotheca, bitches. Ah, where is ta the bibliotheca? Exactly. This is before Sharkana. tank, so we go to the library. We have to go to the library. Get into the microfiche. So he puts together a presentation.

He buys a tie from Goodwill. He gets a whole bunch of his little red devil sombrero wearing little bags together. He brings them to his presentation. And according to Richard, the presentation is great. And according to Richard, Roger Enrico, CEO, Top Dog, Michael Jackson, Madonna, dude. He says, I like it. This guy's right. And he's behind the idea.

So in the movie version, Eva Longoria, thank you for your service. At this point, to hop, skip, and a jump, he's in a shiny CEO corner office. And, you know, he's head of multicultural advertising. It's great. Everyone under him is now also at their own wonderful spots and his mentors. Now, the real life, Richard, has another story to share. Okay. According to him, quote, it was a lot of congratulations, but no promotion.

It was more opportunity, more assignments, but no physical promotion. He was allowed to kind of poke his head in on some of the ideas surrounding the hotter, spicier product lines. And being a very initiative kind of guy, he was popping his head in and saying things and asking questions and writing notes and doing his thing. More Beatles. Crush up more Beatles. Yes. That's what he said. Yes. Yes. That red could be redder. We don't want to see these things naked. They'll be embarrassed. Let's paint that white album, red. Let's get it done. Yes. And during that time, when he was poking his head in, offering to smash up more beetles, he had to. He had to, to be off the clock. He was not getting paid to do this. Go clean the machine, Richard. Yeah.

It was a little bit of that. And he does remember when he saw the first bags coming off the conveyor belt of Flaming Hack Shito. And he was so proud. He may not have been at every single meeting and his name might not be on it. But damn, that's fucking cool. That's very cool. Like I was a janitor. And now the thing that I talked about and like, you know, when balls to the wall for is happening. Someday this too can be a Mountain Dew flavor. If we just believe. Exactly. And this takes a long time, obviously, to get a new product launched and off the conveyor belt. So it's about 1990. This is when Flaming Hot is first getting onto shelves, and they're really trying to see what it can do. Now, according to Richard, they weren't pushing it hard enough in Southern California. And he's so excited. He does his own

guerrilla marketing. He tells his wife, he tells his kids, he tells his friends, he tells his family, go into any shop, go into any corner store, buy them up, open them up, eat them right there, talk about how good they were. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's happy to kind of like buy up a few and give a few out, you know, go parks, go to car shows, go to churches, you know, the whole, the whole thing. He wants to drum up the excitement. And whether it's his guerrilla marketing or the larger mechanism of a huge corporation like PepsiCo. By 92, 93, hot Cheetos are everywhere across the country. They're extremely popular.

It's flaming hot fritos, flaming hot Doritos, flaming hot popcorn, flaming hot funions, like everything. They're kind of diversifying. Blue raspberry of the chip world. Yes, if you will. Yes. If you will. It's super duper popular.

Now, according to, Richard, he didn't get a promotion that was reflective of his effort and time and input and expertise until about 20 years after the Flaming Hot process. What a motherfucker. What a motherfucker. Imagine maybe this guy has more than one good idea. Give him a chance. Well, the final promotion that he did have was vice president at PepsiCo.

Oh. So he does climb the corporate. fucking ladder. Working girl. Damn. You know, there's some perhaps inconsistencies and we'll get into a few more of those later. But we do know it's verifiable truth that he started and was hired in the late 70s as a janitor. By the time he left, which was in 2019, he left as a vice president of PepsiCo.

So not Frito Le, the parent company. So he definitely made some motherfucking big league. moves. There's no way. He went from janitor to vice president of PepsiCo in one go. So I'm interested to hear what his career trajectory has actually been. Well, 42 years at PepsiCo, a lot of room for movement and growth. You know, one of his roles that he gets bumped into is multicultural marketing. And he's seen as kind of the godfather in PepsiCo and kind of in the larger world of snack food corporation as the godfather of Hispanic marketing. That's a fun title.

He really does seem to understand it and can communicate what he knows as well. And remember too, verifiable, he doesn't have a high school education, he doesn't have a college education. So he's going off vibes. I think you can be a very good reader of people and a very good reader of trends and a very good reader of, you know, advertising and things like this. Yeah, exactly. Without necessarily having a diploma per se. As of the 2020s, he's on record as saying in his 42 years at PepsiCo, I was tolerated, never celebrated. That's a quote.

I was tolerated, never celebrated. Okay. He does kind of advise young entrepreneurs, young business folk, you're going to love your company more than it will ever love you. No company is worth more than you and the people you love. None, none, none, none, none. Don't take the fall for anybody, dude. don't take the fall for anybody. Yeah.

I know they're telling you to embezzle. Don't do it. When it comes to this question, who invented Flaming Hot Cheeto? The Flaming Hot Cheeto. The original. The first one. The first one that came out of the little Ziploc bag with the devil drawn on it in Sharpie. Yeah.

Of course we have Richard's account. Yes. He very clearly has a long and charismatic story to tell. But just because a story is long and charismatic doesn't always mean that it's true entirely. And according to Friedel Le, when they are asked this very same question, their response is, you know, a lot was not really documented in the 80s and 90s. Is you know part of their statement, you know. Quote, you know. It's one of those things.

No, don't. I mean, ah, a little bit of a little bit. We're not even the same people who are there. Exactly. We weren't keeping such a close eye on the individual specs of Cheeto dust back in the day. Yeah. You know, it's just the origin story of one of our most, like, influential brands. Who's keeping track? They did have a record at the same time that Richard is telling his story of creating the salsa, the dried salsa, the slurry for the naked Cheetos. The slurry for that? This is just, why is this so foul? You're just describing coding a corn snack, but when you're talking about, when you're talking about it. You're talking about applying the slurry to the naked, to the husk of this naked thing.

I'm like, oh, God. It's a little bit mortuary, these like terms of art, you know? I know. It's because it's not real food. That's part of it, you know? You know, everything's real food if you're hungry. This is true. Frito Lay does have on record that at the same time that Richard is creating his Flaming Hot,

they had a market in the Midwest that was creating. Flaming Hot samples and was marketing them. Ohio was early to the prom on this one, huh? Yeah, surprisingly, right? I think it is important to say in 2019, Richard retired from PepsiCo as vice president. And he started joining the speaker circuit. So he's going to graduations. He's going to conferences.

He is making his living, telling the story. Being Flaming Hot Cheeto guy. Yeah. Yeah. The inventor of. the Flaming Hot Cheeto. Right. You know, some of it, it's based in that because that's such a good story. It's a really, like, crunchy thing to lock into. But he's also giving, like, young business people advice about

don't be scared. Like, just call the CEO, see what happens. Walk in there with your resume. Let them know. You know, all the advice you get from boomers. Yeah. That, yeah, that doesn't really work. Not all boomers are like this. Everyone's, no one is whatever the think pieces about their generation say that You are so nice. That's really sweet. It's because I'm a millennial. I'm sensitive. You guarantee you that boomers aren't saying that about you.

That's a millennial. People can say whatever they want about me. There's always going to be, let my haters be my waiters at the generational think piece of success. That's what I say. At the Flamen Hot pop up. Yeah, exactly. I'm success. By Flamen Hot Margaritas.

Ooh, my colon. Richard's making good money, 2019, probably a little slow in 2020. We're all a little slow in 2020. Hey, forgive us. These speaker circuits, he can make like 50K at a pop. And he's a good speaker. Probably got the story down to a fucking by now. And it's going pretty good for him, until.

Uh-oh. Thought there might have been an until there. May 16th, 2021. The LA Times. Oh, no. You never want to be in the LA Times. Yeah, he's like an LA guy. Homegrown, homegrown paper.

Publishes an art. entitled The Man Who Didn't Invent Flaming Hot Cheetos. Motherfucker. Motherfucker. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Damn. We're burning our socks.

We're burning our leggings. Yeah. We're burning our gas station tukes. Yeah. It's all synthetic. It's going to create a terrible smoke. Yeah. All my nail polish, that'll really get in the lungs.

Talk about orange lung. Exactly. Ugh. When asked by the L.A. Times, Frito Le wrote in a In response to questions about an internal investigation, quote, none of our records show that Richard was involved in any capacity in the flaming hot test market. Fuck. We have interviewed multiple personnel who were involved in that test market and all of them indicate that Richard was not involved in any capacity. Fuck.

That doesn't mean we don't celebrate Richard. Fuck. Hopeful fuck. But the facts do not support the urban legend. End of quote. Oh, fuck. Yeah. So I go.

Good run. Good run. Good run. Had us all believing for a long time there. Had us all, we all had we're licking the dust off our fingers and being like C-Sipuella, but no. It turns out, no.

What happened? Okay. At the time that Richard was starting to get into this, It's kind of early, late 80s, early 90s, right, according to his story. Now, according to Frito Lay Records, which you know, they don't keep back on the records in the 80s and 90s, you'd be surprised, you know. It was all a carbon paper. Yeah, we lost it.

We lost it when the film archives burned down. Yeah, okay. Yes. In 1989, there was records of development of a flaming hot flavor in Plano, Texas. at one of their plants in Texas. Okay. So they had been doing a lot of test marketing and product investigation, product testing, in specifically Chicago, Detroit, and H-town, Houston.

Okay. Pipe-down. Not Pipe-down, yeah. Go-pods, okay? Go-pads. Fair, fair, fair, fair. Fair, fair, fair. They decided that, you know what, this is a big market.

Spicy snack foods is like, that's kind of where it's at. People are really into it. Which has been born out to be true. Yes, totally. And so they get a new employee, a freshly minted, according to this LA Times article, freshly minted MBA by the name of Lynn Greenfeld. And she is tasked with researching, doing some R&D. D and bringing a spicy hot flavor to Frito Lay product line. We should note, too, that for Richard's story, he doesn't start taking public credit for

inventing the flaming hot spice situation, the flaming hot Cheeto until the late 2000s. What a minks. What a rhapscalion. What a spicy hot devil. Yeah. What a flaming hot disgrace. I love it. So Greenfield.

According to her, she was given this task to do all this research and bring it into existence, really. And so she was doing field marketing. Again, it was looking mainly in the Midwest, Chicago, Detroit, and Houston to see exactly what people wanted. What spice level was really tolerable, what was really getting people going. Do you want the ring to burn afterwards or no? These are the questions you think about. Thank you. I have a gift for cutting to the facts.

Do not question if it's crass. Question if it's true. But is he incorrect? Thank you. Thank you. You understand me. You get it. Yeah.

Yes. She, according to her accounts, came up with the name Flaming Hot. She decided that a little chubby devil dude would be a great insignia, a great little symbol for Flaming Hot. A little devil dude holding a pitchfork with like a Frito or a little. Cheeto on it. And she's like classically trained MBA, right? Like this is kind of her thing. Okay. Okay. Yes. And this is also, it should be noted, not something that she's coming to Friedo Le with. She's tasked with doing the research. With breaking open the market that we've already observed, it isn't just something that like you, like an enterprising Mexican American janitor to bring to

our attention kind of thing. And according to the LA Times, her memory of designing this and everything is independently cooperated by newspaper archives. Of course I believe it, because it's so boring, it has to be true. It was an MBA who was given it as an assignment and did well. It's the Welsh version of the story. No offense, Welsh, I bet there's exciting stories. They're not spicy. Josie, you're terrible for the things.

You're terrible for the things you say about the Welsh, Josie. That's what they say about me. Yes, I agree that. She's disgusting. Getting there. We're getting better every time. Every day, every day. There were already other spicy snacks on the market, and not just by Mexican corporations bringing

their product across the borders. It was also by American companies. So the competition was fierce. Things were happening. R&D was getting done. And by the summer of 1990, the product had entered its test market. So there were flaming hot products with the Frito-Lay stamp on shelves. making their debut.

This was around the time when Richard was making his underdog, goodwill tie speech to the higher-ups. Yeah. What a, what a mentoroso. And when we're thinking of that pitch that he made, specifically to Roger Enrico, the like, you know, remember him? He's like Michael Jackson and Madonna Whisperer PepsiCo guy. Everyone's an owner, yeah.

At the time of Richard's supposed meeting, Enrico did not work. at Frito Lay. In fact, Enrico did not work at Frito Le when flaming hot products were even developed. Now, he was in charge of PepsiCo. He was associated with Frito Le and then, you know, but he was kind of, he was in another building. He was another city. He wasn't looking over, he was never at the Frito Le plant in Rikshu Kukumanga. Wow. It was until 1991 that he took over control of Frito Le and would have been anywhere in need. information about test markets. But you might remember Patty Roof, the secretary who took Richard's call.

She worked for Enrico. So she does remember Richard calling and she remembers the timing of it and she remembers forwarding it. But the timing of what she remembers works with the summer of 1990 and test markets rolling out. So they had already had stuff and she was willing to hear what he was saying because he's so charismatic. You know, well, this is fun.

Let's get the janitor involved. And by the time that all of this was kind of getting unearthed, Roger and Rico had passed away. He died snorkeling. Doing what he loved. So according to this guy, former president and CEO of Friedel A North America, a guy by the name of Al Carey, he says of these allegations and maybe why Richard is saying what he's saying, quote, of course stories grow. And they grow the longer we get away from the date, the stories evolve. I'll bet Richard's, his story added a little flavor to it. A little dot, dot, dot, dot, flaming hot, hot, flavor.

Yes, exactly. Still, though, Kerry, who, you know, he's a credible guy, was the president's CEO of Friedelay North America and charged that whole caboodle. He still, to this day, insists that Richard Montagnets is the creator of Flaming Hot Cheetos. K-Fabe is alive and well. Yes. We've spent too long saying that you invented the Cheetos to back down now. Quote, they may not have invented the ingredient, but they invented the energy that goes behind this thing and the positioning.

And then it becomes successful. Without Richard, this thing would not be out there. So let's talk about what isn't true and what is true. Please, I'm yearning. Okay. So he does rise up the ranks of the corporate life. He is hired by Frito Le in the late 70s as a janitor. And he does become a machine operator within a year. He does create this spicy slurry. He does call Roger Enrico. We know that from Paddy Roof.

He does give a pitch to some higher ups. According to records, Roger Enrico was not in that room. He does do the guerrilla marketing. He is interested in the product. He has a personal stake in the But he, and this is already in his own story, he's never really allowed and fully into the development of the product. He claims that his wife Judy's recipe is what they still use now. It's not what they use now. I didn't think it would be. It would be like a fucking starch Georgia for eight number three one, two.

It wouldn't be like a delicious homemade mom cuisine. Yeah. No. And you know McCormick, the seasoning maker? Mm-hmm. They make like spices and your food. spice rack and stuff, they have had a longstanding relationship with Frito Lay. And that is who created the spicy condiment that is added to make Flaming Hot Cheetos. Got it. It's good

marketing, but it doesn't sound like it's based in too much. Well, one thing that is true is that Roger and Rigo was really interested in focusing the business and the entire PepsiCo situation and with specific into Frito-Lay on empowering their employees. So there was, you know, a lot of initiatives that Enrico began that was like, it doesn't matter where you are in the Frito-Lay family. We are family. And frontline workers all the way up to the C-suite, our ideas, your ideas, they all matter. So there was this push.

We know living in the corporate America world that we live now, that a lot of that can be very empty, and especially when your employer is telling you that you're like family, you should run far away, as best you can. You'll be able to run farther because you're not actually family. It'll be easier, I swear. Yes, yes. And we do know that this woman Greenfeld, the MBA, who was tasked with doing this, she was responsible with this task. That is true. What seems to be kind of like a little switch of the truth from Richard's story is that while he wasn't fully involved with Flaming Hot, he was with a specific subsidiary of Frito Lea called Sabrositas. And you might recognize it. It's a very well-known brand. It's specifically marketed towards a Latino market and in the Los Angeles area is where it got its start. And so there are records upon records of Richard being involved with that line of spicy snack foods,

Sabracitas, which isn't as shiny and happy as the flaming hot nail polish. It's not as crossover. Yes, yes. Don't get me wrong, big, big success, but like success in a Latin market as opposed to crossover success. Yes, yeah, that's well put. And it is confirmed by a few different folks. within Frito-Lay Corporation that what Richard recounts in his memoir is what aligns with

the records and story of Sabrositas. But it doesn't with the Flaming Hot products. From what we can tell the investigation into this, into the LA Times investigation, he's like adding a little spice to the story, as Mr. Carey says. He has repackaged the story of Sabrositas as the Flaming Hot story. Yes. Oh. Hmm.

Yes. Hmm. I didn't see that coming. So he's not entirely dishonest, but he's, he just wants, he wants credit for the bigger shot version. He wants credit for the, I was like early to market on this thing. So why is this other thing that is identical to the thing that I have been doing? I did that. If you look at it that way, I did that.

Yeah. And to me, that's kind of convincing. I think I'd rather side with Richard than Frito Le, to be honest, like huge soulless corporation. But like also, how long did you say Richard worked at Frito Le? Like 42 years or something like this? So he is Frito Leigh. Yeah, he's a bit of a company man. Yeah. A bit. A bit.

A bit? Another statement released to the Times, Frito Leigh Legal Counsel wrote in an email, quote, Frito Leigh will continue to take the position that Flaming Hot Cheetos was created by a team of people. And as with all of our products, we do not credit one person with a product invention or flavor extinction. End quote.

So they start to get a little bit more cautious around the inventor of the Flaming Hot Cheetos story. Flaming Hot is a lifestyle. It's not one person. It's something that lives within all of us who step out every day and make the choice to be bold

and to tackle whatever life throws at us with a can-do spirit. That's the Flaming Hot Lifestyle. Next question. Taylor, you should do this for a living. Spin, baby, spin, and the world keeps spinning and the world keeps spinning, right? Exactly. Is that making sense, like, what is the truth and what is the, like, investigated truth? Yes, yes, it's more nuanced than I expected.

It is. And so how does this come, remind me, again, who is it who narcs on him for the LA Times and what was it that tipped them off? Do we know this? So it was, well, Narc might be strong, but yeah, Narc. It was, uh, it was, uh, it was Greenfeld. She said, wait a minute. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, wait a second. There's an impot. I was wondering if it, because it would have to be her. Or someone who, someone who is sympathetic to her cause. Yeah. And I think there were a few people who were working on the Flaming Hot program. And so they also, you know, when she spoke up, they also said, well, yeah, no, we were working on that in Plano, Texas, and we had that stuff out in Detroit by August 1990.

Remembers all the very dry details about the rollout. Like, oh yeah, we expanded into Chicago, probably like spring. Yeah. And here's a quote from Lynn Greenfield. That's her name, Lynn Greenfield. It is disappointing that 20 years later, someone who played no role in this project would begin to claim our experience as his own, and then personally profit from it. Yep. So I guess NARC is still kind of a strong word because she's saying, like, wait a second, like, this isn't just a spicy story. This is like spicy money story.

And is that- This is spicy intellectual property. Yes, yes, exactly. No, she's right. And she's right. She's right. Yeah, that Frito Lay is not correcting anybody about either. Makes a good story.

It's a great marketing story I believe their statements started with you know You know The statements are a little unsure It's a great marketing story And it's almost like

On the one hand And this is such an asshole thing to say Because it feels like it slights What Len Greenfeld Achieved but also it sort of plays Into what she's saying here About this being having like Currency as an idea

But like to me as like a listener in This guy's fabricated version of how he did the Flamin Hot Cheetos thing is as valuable as the actual truth. Because it was a pretty well-known, like, product-y story. He marketed it well. He told it well. I don't even fucking eat Flaming Hot Cheetos really, and I knew this story. Yeah.

I didn't know the particulars about that it was, that it wasn't real, but like I had heard the story for sure. Yeah. So it's interesting. It really is, much like the question of like, what does it mean to know the true story behind the game Monopoly, which you talked about a couple episodes. right? Does it matter that it had this kind of fake shiny version attached to it? You know? And I mean, what he was doing with Sabracitos was still pretty extraordinary. He wasn't C-suite then.

He was still on the floor, like doing his guerrilla marketing, kind of interested in its, in its production and and all facets of it, and really taking initiative. And that alone is like, that's an incredible story. And I can understand how he's like, no, I did. all the work. It's, I did all the work. The work is what counts. I'm just changing the name. Doesn't wash with the, no, doesn't wash. Does not wash because if it's all, yeah, but I did all the work. I just changed the name a little bit. Okay, why did you change the name? What personal void does it fill for you if it is flame and hot as opposed to Sabrositos? What's the point? Because there's a reason. Yeah. And this is where it gets kind of interesting because

Richard benefits from that story, as does Frito-Lay PepsiCo. Yep. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And so the publication of this LA Times article where you can imagine Frito Lay isn't going to like stand strong and be like, no, he invented it because there are other recorded stories and investigated evidence that says something different. So they're not going to come down firm like Richard invented it. No, everybody else shut up. And also it's so much easier to cut one guy loose than it is, you know, cut them, fucking fucking fucking

fucking fire him out of a cannon who gives a shit. It's corporate America, not to be cool. He's crass, but is he incorrect? The LA Times article, of course, PepsiCo can't say that he invented it. The blowback from that is that Richard Montanieres is not getting on the speaker circuit as much. No shit, because now it has a scandal. Well, and, you know, it also came out in 2021. He may have been like, okay, we're getting to the tail end of COVID.

like I got to get it back out there and then a scandal. So it's like extra hard for him and his livelihood. And if you think about it too, it's not only his livelihood if he's kind of built his whole identity around Flaming Hot Cheetos, which at this point he has. He has. Then everything has been kind of taken from him if they can't firmly stand and say he invented it.

The human drama in a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos, you know? Amen, brother. There's so much. To bring it back, we really do. tie up our identities in these snacks, hey, but no one more than the guy who invented it, I'm sure, or didn't, who can say? There's enough of some ruffled feathers with this that five days after the article is published, Frito-Lay legal issues a statement, clarifying that Richard's contributions were far from an

urban legend. Remember that quote, urban legend? They're far from an urban legend. Quote, the information we shared with the media has been misconstrued by some, which resulted in confusion around where we stand. Let's be clear with Shannon Doherty. Yeah. A range of emotions among our employees and consumers

and a strain on our valued friendship with Richard Montanierz and the Latino community. So they're kind of like, we didn't read it. Sorry. No one wanted to hear that Santa wasn't real. Sometimes I don't think we want to hear the truth. Inconvenient truths that Al Gore was talking about, right? Yeah, he was talking about flaming hot.

He was talking of Flamed and Hot Cheetos. It was Santa's Not Real moment, right? Like, fuck. Yeah. No one wants that. Tell me the nice story about the janitor again. I liked that one. Yeah.

Well, as you've said, this is corporate America. So what does Richard do? In 2021, he files a defamation lawsuit against PepsiCo. Wow. That's Flaming Hot. That's some Flaming Hot lifestyle ambassador behavior. That is... Yes.

He's living life on the edge. He's doing the do. He's Baja blasting it. And he's Flaming fucking hot. Yeah. Lines of that Cheetos. Yeah. Flamen Hat. The suit is defamation. Defamation is when you say somebody said something bad about me and it's affected my

livelihood, my ability to function, blah, blah, blah. It seems that it might all fall into that type of lawsuit until May of 2025. This is four years. This is a long time. Four years later, a judge decreed that these claims, of defamation, unjust enrichment, and other violations of state law that Richard put forward against PepsiCo were largely deficit or lacking, quote, factual support. They were naked. Those hot cheetahs were naked. They weren't flaming hot. They were naked. What he's pretty much saying is,

like, they have all the records. You don't have any records. You have vibes. You have a really good story that everyone wants to believe is true. And even the judge was like, you know what? You have a month to amend your suit, Mr. Montaignez. If you can come back and kind of prove to me that you have the facts behind you with this, then we can move forward. Instead, in July of 2025, so still kind of within that month timeframe, PepsiCo and Richard Montaignez settle out of court. Love that.

We love a good nice out-of-court settlement. Both parties settled confidentially on undisclosed terms. Of course. Let the legend live on! Of course that's undisclosed. Not for the kind of fucking players that we're talking about the Flamin Hot Cheetos fortune. Oh, that will be an undisclosed settlement, absolutely. Chester Cheeto himself?

He had to come down. He had to come down from his mountain cabin in Vail. Helicopter in. Come out and personally write the check. The helicopter blades are. Architos. Yeah, you know, you got it. You got it. Exactly. Everyone's seen it. Everybody knows. Oh, yeah. No, it's only natural. What is Richard getting out of changing the story? You know, if he did do the work, why not just say you did the work? And you're still, you went from janitor to fucking vice president of PepsiCo. That's still an impressive story.

But everyone wants more. Everyone wants more, especially a guy like Richard wants more. And I think part of it too is that the way that he got from janitor to vice president, he had this charisma. He had this quick thinking. He had street smarts about him. This embellishment, this spice that he added is exactly what got him to the top. Oh, yeah. So he's like, why would I change my tried and true tactic when I've gotten all the way up here? This is how you make money in America. This is how you advertise. You add a little spice.

You embellish. You give it a little kick, little lemon on top, you know? On the Olote. What's the difference between being the Sabrositos guy and the Flamen Hot guy? I don't know, probably a couple zeros on the speaking circuit. Yeah. And let's keep making money, you know? It sounds like he did the same idea at around the same time that was

maybe like a pace behind or slightly less successful, then effectively the exact same idea but made it big. Probably one day he was telling the story to someone at a bar, and he was like, you know, Sabrositos, that's me. He's like, no, no, no, what Sabrosito's like, oh, you know, like Flaming Hot Cheetos? Oh, that, that, that, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like that. And it comes a little bit more easily the next time, and it comes a little bit more easily the next time.

Next time you tell this story, just say Flaming Hot. Yeah, just cut out the, but they don't know, these white people don't know what Sabrocitos is. They'll know Flaming Hot, though. I think that's very true. I do have to say, Eva Longoria makes a great movie about it. Is she Richard? Yes.

Yes, she is. No. And Richard is just like a fabulous five-foot one woman in like her Vlajean bandage dresses and the whole time. I want to see that movie now. I'll tell you this. The movie poster is the actor who plays Richard laid out on a bed of hot Cheetos and he's holding a single hot Cheetos up. And then there's like a jit-o. giant finger, like the finger of God coming down and he's holding the Cheeto to the finger of God.

It has a really wonderful, like a reverent tone. And in my research, I found that who knows if like the faith and prayer storyline is really true because one of the executive producers is also like a big Christian producer. So another question mark there. But you know what? It made for great story. It's a really good story. And isn't that what we do here?

Like, try to find the difference between, like, the story and the story. The story of the story of the story of the story that gets repeated in perpetuity. It makes for a great marketing opportunity. And the actual story, the actual real story is, like, you know who did Flamin Hot Cheetos? One, a woman. Two, she was like an MBA. Number three, she was assigned this by her boss who already had an idea of, you know, the efficacy of the spicy food snack market. But who gives a shit? That's not interesting. We don't want to be told Santa isn't real.

She was probably Welsh, to be honest. We're making enemies with the Welsh now. Welsh snack foods in particular, I think. That's who are really like... I'm open to Welsh snack foods. It's all in good fun, Welshmen. Please send us your snacks. Don't poison them. I do have to say UK potato chips, crisps. beautiful. The few that I've had, whew!

I'm very open to another culture snack foods. Except the ketchup chip. That is my personal quest to rip all of those abortions off of the shelves. I said it. I fucking said it. Is he not wrong? Is he not wrong?

Thank you. It's grass, but is it incorrect. Thank you. I'm craving hat cheetah. now. No, me too. It's the advertisements work. Yeah, yeah.

I might grab some from the store after this. I hope we get sponsored by. That'd be read. In which case, we'll just delete this episode and we'll replace it with whatever you tell us. Whatever the corporate lore that we get told is about the Cheeto, that's what we'll tell the people, okay? Like a bag of Flamin Hot Cheetos, we are for sale. Ah, key the commercial, yeah. Thanks for listening.

If you want more infamy, we've got plenty. 20 more episodes at bittersweetinfamy.com or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you want to support the podcast, shoot us a few bucks via our coffee account. At k-o-h-fifi.com forward slash bittersweet infamy. But no pressure. Bittersweet infamy is free, baby. You can always support us by liking, rating, subscribing. Leaving a review, following us on Instagram at Bittersweet Infamy.

Or just pass the podcast along to a friend who you think would dig it. Stay sweet. The sources that I used for this episode include the LA Times article, The Man Who Didn't Invent Flaming Hot Cheetos. That was written by Sam Dean, published May 16th, 2021 in the LA Times. I read the article in Fast Company. Eva Longoria is going to direct the Cheetos movie called Flaming and Hot, written by Jeff Beer, published August 27th, 2019.

I also watched that movie that was released in 2023. It's called Flaming Hot, directed by Eva Longoria. And you can watch it too on Hulu. I read an article from C&BC.com, How Flaming and Hot Cheetos became America's Favorite Snack. This is their suddenly obsessed series. I listened to and downloaded the song Hot Cheetos and Takis. By the way, you can download it for free off band cam.

Look for why. in Rich Kids. I read an article on ABC News, the story behind The Flaming and Hot Rise from Janitor to Marketing Executive, published June 17th, 2021. I listened to an episode of NPR's podcast Planet Money. The episode title is Hot Cheetos, and it was posted May 12th, 2021. Sarah Gonzalez is the host of that particular episode. I looked at an article from courthouse news.com. Judge drops fraud suit from man who says he invented Flaming Hot Cheetos, written by Matt Simons and published May 28th, 2025. If you're looking for a way to support the podcast, head over to our coffee account. That's K-O-F-I.com slash Bittersweet Infamy.

You can become a monthly subscriber with as little as three bucks, something like that. When you become a monthly subscriber, you get to enjoy the finery of the Bittersweet Film Club, where we watch and talk about the movies you select. You can also join the highly coveted ranks of our other monthly subscribers, and that includes Terry, Jonathan, Lizzie D, Erica Joe, Sof, Dylan, and Satcher the Cat. Bitter Sweet Infamy is a member of the 604 Podcast Network. This episode was edited by Taylor Basso and me, Josie Mitchell. The interstitial music you heard earlier is by Mitchell Collins,

and the song you are listening to now is T Street by Brian Steele. I said no ma'am.