Doughboys - Cosmic Wings with Jana Schmieding

Episode Date: May 6, 2021

Jana Schmieding (Rutherford Falls, Woman of Size) joins the 'boys to talk cats and school lunches before a review of virtual restaurant Cosmic Wings. Plus, another edition of Family Food.Sources for this week's intro:https://www.applebees.com/en/our-historyhttps://www.foodandwine.com/news/applebees-chicken-wings-delivery-ghost-kitchen-cosmic-wingshttps://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2021/02/17/cosmic-wings-flamin-hot-cheetos-wings-applebees-uber-eats/6707247002/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/business/restaurant-reopenings-coronavirus.htmlhttps://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/financing/virtual-brands-big-risk-dine-service-comes-backAdvertise on Doughboys via Gumball.fm.Want more Doughboys? Check out our Patreon!: https://patreon.com/doughboysSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

T.J. Applebee's Rx for Edibles and Elixirs. This chunky name, which sounds like an old-time pharmacy or maybe a modern marijuana dispensary, was chosen by restaurateurs Bill and T.J. Palmer when they opened their Atlanta area bar and grill in 1980. The concept was sold and turned into a franchise just three years later and, in a Sean Parker-esque bout of branding simplification, by 1986 the name was just Applebee's. It's cleaner. By 2007, the chain had 1,500 locations and went international in more ways than one,

opening locations overseas and merging with the International House of Pancakes, IHOP, to form Dine Brands, the world's largest full-service restaurant company. But Dine Brands' twin brands were hit hard by the COVID pandemic, breaking their dine-in-focused business models, as massive dining rooms and parking lots went vacant and staff were either furloughed or forced to reorient as takeout only on the fly. IHOP even had to take the unprecedented step of cancelling National Pancake Day. Then, in February of 2021, as outdoor dining and some indoor dining had returned in much of the country to scattered success, Dine Brands finally jumped aboard the Ghost Kitchen

bandwagon, partnering with Friolet and Uber Eats for a concept seemingly crafted by Edgelord Chefs. Chicken wings, coated with Cheeto dust. Prepared in 1,300 Applebee's kitchens, the ghost concept by all accounts seems to have faded, with many delivery orders from app-scrolling customers unaware of any connection to the parent brand. But just three months after launch, as much of the country is vaccinated and dining restrictions are loosened or abolished, can Applebee's to-go-only ghost gimmick sustain.

As restaurant business reporter Jonathan Mays writes, quote, Many of these restaurants have excess kitchen capacity. They need extra income that a virtual brand can provide. But what happens when life returns to normal? This week on Doe Boys, Cosmic Wings. Welcome to Doe Boys, the podcast about chain restaurants. I'm Nick Weiger, along with my co-host, Koalik's friend, Mr. Sice Mike Mitchell. I like that one.

Do you think that's a roast? I love it. Mitch, some context for this. That came from Mark Belko, who says much love from Sweden. And I worked on The Birthday Boys, and I saw Mitch being pretty buddy-buddy with Koalik, giving him small nibbles of cheese, et cetera, pretty cringey stuff, Smokling Malted, which is the closest thing to happy eating in Swedish, roastspoonman at gmail.com. What's he doing?

Did he move over there? I don't know. I figured you would know. You worked with a guy. What's he doing in Sweden? It's Mark, right? Mark Belko. Yes.

I don't know. Maybe he's... I don't know. Maybe he moved over there, but I think he... I think maybe he's originally from Sweden, but he... A great guy. I loved working with him on Birthday Boys, now forever ago, so long ago, that, you know, I haven't seen a ton of people from it.

And I haven't seen anyone, why, because in the last year, so I don't know. It's great. I'm happy he's listening to the show. You know, he could do something more productive with this time. Between working on the Birthday Boys and listening to this show, I've wasted a lot of this guy's time. Right, right. The slow decay of time is really something.

When you're just all of a sudden, like, you have those thoughts. And I think the big thing is when you hear, like, that movie came out 10 years ago. You're just like, Jesus Christ, how is that possible? Yeah, I'm also very distracted, because in a good way, because our guest has a cat, and I just got eyes on the cat, and I can't help it. Oh, man, it's a good, it's a... A spoiler alert. We'll talk about this cat in a bit, but it's a good cat.

Wigs, I go upstairs in the bathroom, right on the counter. I don't like where this is headed. It seemed to be placed purposefully, mm-hmm, a bottle of Gugon. Gugon? A bottle of Gugon on the bathroom counter. Gugon? It's called Gugon. Gugon.

It's called Gugon. Yes, it's called Gugon. What is it? It's... It removes goo, and to me, it seems like my mom's trying to drop some hints. She's putting Gugon on the fucking counter for me to see. That's too much goo, Mitchie. Michael, take care of the goo.

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Gugon!

Gugon. I'm looking it up. The tagline, your goo is as good as gone. Yes, Gugon! A goo and adhesive remover. It does as advertised. There's also a grout and tile cleaner and a grill and grate cleaner. What would happen if you sprayed your eye with Gugon?

Yeah, we'd melt into a puddle like the witch in Wizard of Oz. All right. Wags, here's a little drop. Here we go. Oh, shit. This is way more complicated. Hold on. I forgot, Wags.

I forgot that this is way more complicated. We're using StreamYard, which is a different streaming app than we normally do. This is so complicated. It has some advantages over Zoom, but it makes the screen share process a little complicated. Oh, this is insane. This is just insane. You're going to be fine. It's going to be fine.

Oh, my God. Don't stress out about it. I got it. Oh, we play the trombone. The brass section can get a little brassy. I'm over here playing the clarinet. Wow. I may have been stomped by a few euphonium players.

Yeah. Dear God. A little quiet in the cans, but I liked it. Could you, you could, oh, it was quiet? A little quiet. Oh, for God's sakes. I got the gist of it. Greetings from Norwood, Massachusetts.

Why did I make this? Jonathan. Jonathan Bronson. Jonathan, I can't tell you how long it took me to play this. It took, what was, what do you think, Nick? Three minutes? Yeah. I mean, I thought I was thinking like five minutes.

All right. Five minutes. It was a long, it was a good chunk of time that we ended up. It was much longer than your fucking, your, than your drop was. That was, thank you for sending it in. What a nightmare. Man, the doathon is, it's over at this point, but it's going to be so bad.

We're fucked. At this point, it's in our rear view mirror, but we're recording this in advance of it. It's going to be, we're going to be fine. We're figuring it out. We're going to be fine. Yes. Yeah, we'll be fine.

Well, look, let's just, let's introduce our guests, because first of all, I want to hear about this cat. Yes. This amazing cat. You've been fixated on nothing else since. Far too much of her time. Our guests is and writer and actor from the podcast, a woman of size and the show,

Rutherford Falls, which is now streaming on Peacock. Janish meeting is here. Hi, Jana. Hey, hey, thanks for having me. Thank you so much for being here. You are, as we have, as we have already said, you are a cat mom. I don't know if we've seen this on the podcast before,

cradling a cat as we record. Tell us about your kitties. It looks like he wants to introduce himself. I truly thought there was going to be like, he was going to say hello. Like he was going to come out with like a human voice. I have thought about, I have thought about when Wally is old. Ugh, this is, why am I telling this?

But like, when, like, I like, in my mind, I've like dreamed about Wally being older. And then when he's like on his last legs, like him saying a human word, like saying, I love you. Oh my God. I know. Can you imagine? Like he's getting old.

He's like kind of like on his last, last hours. And he just like peers up at you and is like, I love you, Mitch. That would, that, that, that would like, that would be, it would be the best moment of my life. If Wally and Armour were able to express that at some point. Also perhaps severely traumatic. Like what, it's like seeing a Sasquatch.

It's like one of those things that I'm just like, Oh fuck, my whole reality is destroyed. That's, this is my, this is my reasoning for, for never, you know, I don't want to see a ghost ever because I'm scared. Like I'm also scared of them, but then just your real, I mean, then you're like, well, now there's, there's some form of afterlife. There's a, there's some sort of heaven or hell possibly.

It shatters the paradigm. It, yeah, it's, it's, it's too much. So that's one of, that's one of the many reasons I don't want to see a ghost. You don't want to see a ghost ever. Yes. And I don't want my cats to talk, speak English. Um, yeah, that was Shazi. Shazi's my orange boy.

He is, um, he is the word Shazi is, uh, my native language Lakota for painted orange. And my other cat is up there in her bunk bed. That's Wilma. Wilma. Shazi is a great cat name. What a great name. I love that. And Wilma, I have not been able to, uh, to see yet, but I am excited to, to see Wilma.

Yeah. She's, uh, I, unfortunately she's just not of, not a friend of the pod. I think there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of animals out there, not, not fans of the pod. Yeah. Yeah. I like Hollywood handbook. Oh God. So you, you already, uh, you have a couple of cats.

Uh, I mean, I have to imagine that has been nice while we've been quarantined, having a couple of feline companions. Uh, and I got them right at the beginning of quarantine. So, uh, they were like cats that were kittens that were found in a friend's backyard, you know, and it was at the beginning of quarantine. So we had to like, you know, figure out how to get somebody out to, uh, like, you know, T and R, the mom cat, you know,

and, uh, also figure out how to coordinate like the fostering or adoption of these five kittens. And so I was like, I'll take two, please. Just pass them right along. Um, I've been thinking for a long time about getting pets. Like, and I'm a cat person, like through and through. And for years, I've been talking about getting cats. And I lived in New York city for, uh, 11 years and this, the

entire time living in New York, I was like, oh, like, I don't know, like, I just don't have this kind of schedule here where I feel like I can actually really take care of an animal, like give them a lot of attention. Um, there's always just been an excuse and I'm sure it, the, the source is like my own like insecurity about mothering something. Like I'm sure there's just like a deeper issue as to why I've

never gotten an animal. Um, but these little bitches have been just the ideal companions this entire time. We're ride or die, man. You're good. You're good friends with friend of the podcast, uh, Marci Gero and, and, and she, she has an, uh, also a cat mom. She's got a, she's got a, she's got a great cat and also a

believer of ghosts swags. That's right. A big believer of ghosts. Oh yeah. Uh, we, um, we pretty much, uh, text cat tiktoks to each other, uh, several times a day and then, you know, at night we share ghost tiktoks. So.

Wow. Ghost tiktoks. Yeah. There's some ghosty shit on tiktok. Oh my God. Dwight's jaw unhinged. Dear Lord. It sounds spooky.

Yeah. Sounds terrifying. Yeah. It's like people catch, you know, uh, strange movement and strange happenings on there. Like, um, uh, what do you, like their nest or whatever the camera system that people now set up that's attached to their phone and it records shit.

Like if something moves, it triggers the record on their nest or whatever. And like, I've seen some wild stuff on tiktok. I heard a old man's voice on my nest one time and then I figured out that it's like pretty powerful and like can hear people outside. So I think that's just what it was. Okay.

But there was like a stretch where I was like, my apartment is haunted. This is fucked up. Ooh, that was Wally talking. He was, he was saying it finally. Yeah. Get me out of this house. Floors are too sticky.

You need Gugan. So, so, uh, beyond, uh, beyond the cat aspect of quarantine, I'm curious, and I feel like I've said this in like six episodes in a row and perhaps too optimistic, but it feels like we're finally on the other side or at least emerging from the tunnel, uh, that was living under COVID. I can't wait, I can't wait for you to keep saying this for six more months.

Yeah. 2022. Still going to be saying it. But how did that impact your eating habits? Oh God, you know, it was interesting because I, throughout quarantine, I've been going through the process of shooting this show, Rutherford Falls. And like, and we, our writer's room started in January

of 2020 and we, so we did, um, uh, two and a half months in the actual room, which was like a snack heaven. If I may say so. Uh, it was my first time being staffed on a show, uh, as a writer. And so I was like, you live in the life. Like, you know, you get snacks writing on a show. There's like, uh, you know, no limit.

You can all, you also get like lunch ordered for you every single day. Um, although we were like a pretty like healthy room by the end of the two and a half months in the room, I was like, no more salads. I can't take any more tender greens. That's tender, tender greens gets a, it gets such a bad wrap specifically from writer's room.

It's just is ordered so much that you get sick of it. I know. I was like, I'm shitting too well. Never thought I'd say that. Yeah. Yeah. With tender greens, I think I'm just like, I'm shitting weirdly.

Like I never. Wow. What's happening? Is this what it feels like? Uh, yeah. So then, uh, so then COVID happened and all within the span of a week, I, uh, on Monday of the week that we got shut down for COVID, I, um, was on my way to the second

screen test for the show, being on the show, which was a total surprise being, you know, auditioning for the show. And I totaled my car. I totaled my 2004 Ford Escape that my parents handed down to me on the 134. I fucking like hit some wet road. It like was the first rain of the year in 2020 and like hit some wet road going like 15 miles an hour, like not even

going that fast. Like thank God I didn't hit anybody else, but I like fishtailed, slammed into the wall on the 134 and Jesus totaled my car. Uh, I was fine. Yeah. Thank God you're, you're, you're okay. That's terrifying.

I was fine. You know, I picked up myself. I like, I like hit impact hit and actually driving toward the wall, I like knew it was going to happen. Cause I've been in a head on collision before, uh, not a bad one, but like, um, again, going like 15 miles per hour. So I was like veering toward the wall.

I knew it was going to happen. And the thing that came out of my mouth was a fuck with that exact tone. It's like all of the emotions of like really today, really right. Yeah. So like impact, uh, airbags, uh, you know, driver and passenger airbags explode.

Never had that happen before. And I like, I'm shocked of course. I'm like, Oh fuck, I just did this. And then I like do like a pat, pat down body check. Like, I don't know what the fuck that's supposed to determine, but I was just like, is anything. Missing. Yeah.

And I was fine and I picked up my phone and instead of calling like 911 or highway patrol or whatever, I called my showrunner Sierra. And I was like, I got to get to this audition. I mean, that is just, I mean, there's so much pressure just testing for something for, for, for, for people, for listeners who don't know, there's just the most pressure filled situation.

Not only do you go in and do something, but they also give you a contract. They basically show you what you will make if you do this and, and, and then if, if, you know, it's just a possibility of making this, of making this money and being on a show or whatever. Yeah. But, but it's like there's so much pressure involved in it.

And to have something like that happen during it is just a fucking. That's a nightmare. It's like, it was a nightmare, but it, but like, see, like everything happened in a way that like worked magically. So like Sierra came and picked me up. We drove to the test. I slayed the test.

And, you know, and then that was the Monday of that week. And then the, the Wednesday of that week are, are EPs, Mike sure, and Ed Helms and Sierra or Nellis came into our room and said, we're shutting down for COVID. So don't come back tomorrow. And then the Friday of that week, I learned that I had gotten the role of Regan Wells on the show. That's, that's a great way to end the week at least.

Yeah. I mean, it was fine. And, you know, it just so happened that like, you know, we're on lockdown. So I didn't need a car for like a couple months. But what if, what if, what if they were like, you got the part, but you need a car. So unfortunately, I mean, NBC, I would have been like, thank

you, you'll be providing it. They were so, so fucking cool about it. Like the day of my test, one of the, you know, EPs that works closely on the production side, Morgan Sackett, who I really love, he like, I did the test, you know, I read with Ed Helms and I was like feeling good about it. And as I was walking off like the kind of the little stage that they have, Sierra goes, you guys, she just totaled her car.

Can you believe that to everybody in the room? It's like all these Peacock execs and NBC universal execs and they were all like, oh my God, are you okay? And Morgan was like, as I was leaving the room, he was like, hey, if you need any, like, do you need like a, you want me to call a car service? He's like, I also have like a mechanic or like whatever. And I was like, you know what?

I honestly, I don't even know where my car is right now. We basically abandoned it on the side of the highway. So thank you. But yeah, it's been wild. And so to answer your question, Nick, like I, then I went through this whole process of like, we're waiting for production to even happen. We don't even know, you know, it was two weeks where we were

just like, what's going to happen? We weren't writing. And then we came back to Zoom, have a Zoom writing room. And then, and then it was one of those things like on the last day at the end of May on the last day of our Zoom room, everybody was like, you know, well, you know, show is still up in the air and we don't know when we're going to go into production. And so I had like June, July and the beginning of August just

sitting around the house being like, are we even going to make this show? Like, is it even going to happen? Right. And during that time. Well, that's, that's, that is like a very real scary Hollywood thing where they're just like, well, this thing happened and it's over like the writer's strike.

Like that would happen where shows would just get canceled. So that's the thing that happens. It's terrifying. It is terrifying. And you know, there was also a threat of a writer's strike over the course of our writing room. And so, you know, I will say, you know, that that time off from doing nothing was like pretty stressful for me because I'm a

person who like, I love food. I love eating. I love all foods. I love healthy food. I love junkie food. I love it all. But I was kind of looking down the barrel of being the star of a TV show and having myself seen on TV a lot and have tons of time

to think about what that means and what that means to me. And so I was having some like real old school, like, like high school level disordered thoughts about food at that time. And I was clocking them because I've done a lot of work around my body and, you know, my body image and what's going on behind all of that. And I was having these kinds of shitty thoughts like, hey, maybe you should maybe like lay off on the pasta and like, maybe we

should do some kind of, you know, these things that like, they're not healthy because I'm not going to do them. Like quite honestly, I'm not going to follow through on any of these thoughts. They're just there to make me anxious and to like poison me. Yeah. Well, also, I mean, this is another factor in all this is that when you're in production, it is like, you know, superstars have

like trainers and people who like, you know, personal chefs. But most actors, it isn't, it's almost an impossible thing to one either get any sort of exercise in because you're, you're filming for 12 hours in a day and you can't leave set. It's just, it's almost, it's nearly impossible. Yes. And like you're basically going to set going home sleeping and then the next day you do it.

So you have like the weekends and also to eat well because you are just basically eating whatever they put in front of you or whatever you can get. Or, you know, like when you are finally home and you're exhausted, you're just ordering or doing whatever is easiest because you're just spent. So it is, it is a very hard time to control any of that stuff. And also like the, like what is, what are, what's going to happen?

Like what am I going to somehow like lose 50 pounds in like a two month period of time? Like that's definitely not going to happen. There's absolutely, there's no way that that can like logistically happen in my life, but also like the fact that I even, like I was cast on the show as is like, like in this body and in this way. So like how fucked up would it be to show up on day one and be like, Hey everybody, like I got my lips dotted.

Like I suddenly look like a fucking real housewife of O.C. Like that's just not who they hired to play the role. If we ever get a Doughboy show, I'm going to show up to the first first day of shooting a fucking buff as hell. Yeah. I think we should both just get absolutely jacked. We just fucking jacked, just jacked. So welcome to fucking Doughboys.

Mainlining HGH for a year straight. I've been, I've been living miserably. That's almost, that's almost the tagline to Doughboys anyways. Right. I've been, I've been living miserably. Oh God. Jenna, I did have something I want to ask you about, which is that you used to be a teacher.

Is that correct? Sure was. Yes. Okay. I have to ask what are your school lunch preferences? Wow. Oh man. Well, I never touched the school lunches at the schools I worked in

because I worked in the South Bronx and I worked in the Bronx for 10 years. Wow. And these are like extraordinarily underfunded schools. Right. Like it's a real fucking equity issue and social justice issue. The state in which our public school students in urban centers are expected to learn and expected to like eat. Their food was just absolutely atrocious.

Like of the same companies that are contracted to feed inmates in prisons are the same companies that are like contracted to serve food in schools, public schools in New York City. So it was prison food and I just hated that my students did not really have choice in that. Right. But as a, as a public school student myself, I grew up in Oregon and I had like, I mean, I would say like standard school lunch food and here's some of the things that I really freaking loved. I loved those like chicken sandwiches that was just a bun and kind of like a breaded chicken

patty. Oh baby. I would just like put some ketchup on that shit. Mmm. Gobble it up. Chicken patty day. That was always the chicken patty sandwich day was always the best. I come from a family of teachers.

My mom was an English teacher at my high school. Also, I'm a proud public school boy. I got sent to private school one year of my life because my mom didn't want me to come to the same high school as her. That is the truth. Oh, lucky. And then I, and then I, and then I left. I went right back to public school.

I did not want to, I hated, I hated my private school experience, but my sister is now, she was a teacher at a public school. Now she's a principal at a public school and elementary school. And we were, and my dad was a teacher as well, Wags. Bill Mitchell was a history teacher and then he went to law school in his 30s. But he, so a whole family of teachers, I'm the only one who, I've taught UCB classes, which is probably the most important of all. That's pretty, there you go.

The most important of all. Really carrying on to the legacy in that way. Actually, I only subbed. I didn't even, I didn't really teach classes, but, but my sister was. I'm going to take some of those. I'll learn how to. Yes, and I'll do a one on one with you. All right.

Great. Yeah. We'll figure it out later. Um, my sister had a lunch schedule printed out at her, at her house. And I actually, I printed it out because I was testing her, her printer. And I was looking at it in one of the days she was like, the lunches are bad. She was saying that the lunches are bad. And then she's like saying every, every couple, like the popcorn chicken, the kids really

love it. And she's had it and it's not bad. I know that I was, I was shocked at that. Popcorn chicken. I know. I was shocked by popcorn chicken. It's probably not that great. And then there's like every Monday is pizza day, but that's the way it was.

I think when I was a kid, but they switch up what type of pizzas. But one of the days is fucking Lunchables. They had just fucking lunch. And I was like Lunchables and she's like, she's like, yeah, it's fucking awful that there's Lunchables. It sucks. And I was like, how can they give Lunchables when I, when I went to school, I remember my elementary and in middle school lunches were not great.

They were probably prison system lunches. Like you were saying, say the same sort of thing, just not good lunches. And then high school, they were also not good, but like they just also gave, there was a place where you could, where subs were made. So you could get some sort of sub every day, but then there was also, they served everything with fries. And I feel like it must have changed because they just like would throw out, it would be like, it would be like French toast sticks and fries.

And it was just like, this is fucking hard, but no one seems to care at all. And this is also back when, you know, like there were Snapple machines. I mean, not too far from when there were Snapple machines. And they, they kind of took all those out of school cafeterias, I feel like, but. That was a Clinton initiative. Yeah. Like did your, did your high schools have like contracts with like a fast food? Like my high school did had like a Taco Bell section where the actual like women who were

working in the cafeteria were actually like folding our bean burritos. If you go. Yeah, it was kind of tight. We never had any of that. North Quincy, North Quincy high school lunches were hard. And I, and it came, I came from there, which was the, the private school I got sent to for one year. And those lunches were like so fantastic.

It was insane. Like the, the private, and there isn't even like a great private school, but just comparatively they were so much nicer. You get just a fucking plate of spaghetti and meatballs if you wanted to for lunch. I didn't like it. It was good. It was, it was crazy. I went to Long Beach Pauly, which is a huge school.

It was like 4,000 students. And there, there wasn't anything like that where there was like an on-campus. Yes. Please tell me you didn't eat any of Snoop's brownies. Well, we were different generations. He is a little bit older than me. You were three years older than him. Okay.

Snoop Dog, famous alumni, alumni Snoop Dog, Cameron Diaz, Billy Jean King, Tony Gwynne, it's a, it's a, the whole bunch of celebs. And Nick Weiger. Wikipedia page flagged for deletion. I, yeah. So, but they didn't have anything like that, but they did have weirdly like they had some stands set up where they would just like have like a whole bunch of McDonald's cheeseburgers. They'd just be selling loose cheeseburgers and then like loose pizza slices.

I'm not sure exactly how all that worked. Yeah. I don't love the loose as the description for those. Loose pizza slices. We didn't, we didn't, we had no fast food crossover. That bums me. I would have loved, I would have loved that. North, North just said, yeah, like I said, those fucking horrible fries, they just threw

on with everything. And I can't even, I can't believe that they would, it can't be allowed. I think that is, this is like an early, you know, late 90s, early 2000 thing that just cannot happen anymore. But still, still bad it sounds like, still pretty awful. Still pretty awful. Yeah. Also in my high school, we had open campus lunches.

So you could go to like the fast, the fast food spots in like, like across the street, we had a Taco Bell, a Dairy Queen and a Pacific Northwest staple. I'm not sure if you've ever heard of this chain. It's called Burgerville and it fucking rules. We've heard of it. It was one of the options to do, I think, on one of our tours and we did not do it yet. At the time, You blew it.

You blew it. Well, there was a reason for this. At the time, they were having an issue with their, there was a labor dispute. Oh, that's right. We didn't want to support it. Oh, yes. Yes. Which is, I hopefully resolved at this point, but I honestly haven't checked in with it for

a while, but it is like, it does have great burgers, yes? Oh my God. I'll tell you what's great about their burgers. They're spread. They got this spread. I go to Burgerville and I buy just two plain cheeseburgers, which is like a bun of skinny patty. I love a skinny patty burger.

Me too. And like slice of cheese and some ketchup and some of their, their like signature spread. It's called spread. And then I borrow by a jar of spread because now they sell it like in packets or like a jar or something. I buy the jar and I take it home and I put it on like fries. I put it on, like I dip my like cucumbers in it. It's so good.

Damn. So this is, is it kind of like a Big Mac type sauce? Is it a Thousand Islands-y sort of deal? It's less Thousand Island and more, it is like, it is that, but it's like, it's like a mixture of mayonnaise mustard and like basically like tiny chunks of pickles and maybe some like pickle juice. Oh man. Wow.

We got to go there. I'm just going to fucking, I hope they cleaned up this. We should send in the Goodfellas. Have a- We'll be back with more Doe Boys. Welcome back to Doe Boys. We are with Janice Schmeeding reviewing this week's chain, Cosmic Wings. Cosmic Wings.

A new, a new kid on the block. Go ahead, Mitch. I just wanted to say that you Westcoasters have a, you got the lunch system right because we did not have open campus. It was very much like a prison. You couldn't go anywhere. But that was school by school because my school was very much like, my school had high fences and cops.

I had metal detectors. I didn't realize any of this was unusual until I got older and was like, oh wait, people had, people could just leave for lunch. Like I think it just depends on what. You couldn't leave for lunchwags? I thought you had another one. No. You couldn't leave for lunch at Long Beach Poly until, I think you had to be 18 and you

had to get a lunch pass. That was the only way you could leave campus. Otherwise you were kind of, you were locked in there all day. Yeah. I will say also, I was, you know, I grew up in a West Coast like small town. So there wasn't a lot of danger happening around our school, although it was a very big school, like, it, it wasn't like, we did have metal detectors eventually, but like, we were late on that.

Yeah. Yeah. We had, we had security guards and stuff like that, but just even out of the idea of, in Y's, I know that some of your campuses outdoors, right? Yes. See, that actually is a huge difference. That's, that's, that's great. Yeah.

Once we were, once we were in like the fucking building, it would be great to walk outside during the day. I just was, you know, my first 18 years, you're just in the fucking, you're in the fucking little building. It sucks. Yeah. Yeah. Your schools are very like, they're kind of like the high schools that you see on TV.

It's very, they're very like, like open campuses and like, there's like a big courtyard that is where people pass from class to class. It's kind of cool. Yeah. Yeah. Nick, you're like those high school kids I see on TV. Like Riverdale? Like Save by the Bell.

Cosmic Wings opened in February of this year. It's a ghost kitchen, speaking of ghosts, owned by Dine Equity, which also owns iHop and Applebee's. It operates out of 1,300 Applebee's restaurants and delivers via Uber Eats. And its big gimmick is most of the menu is covered, most of the wings and other items are covered with Cheetos Dust, Amply Applied Cheetos Dust. And I learned this, Cheetos Dust is officially known as Cheetle. What?

What? They call it Cheetle. The substance that you spray on Cheetos is Cheetle. Like Don Cheetle? Like Don? Yeah. Like Don Cheetle, but spelled like C-H-E-E-T-L-E. Oh.

I don't love that. Yeah. I like Dust. I don't either. Now, quick question. Is that how Don Cheetle spells his name too? I can't remember now. It's one of those details you learned.

The other one I've talked about in this podcast that's unsettling is that, because I worked on a Cheetle's ad and the name of an individual Cheetle's piece is a Cheetle's Lentil, because they don't use the singular Cheetle ever. So you don't have one Cheetle, you have one Cheetle's Lentil. Yeah. He's obsessed with this whole thing about the Cheetle's Lentil. I have notes. That sucks.

That sucks. Jenna, are you a Cheetos fan? Oh yeah. Big Cheetos fan. I like Cheetos, but I'm more, I like Cheetos, but I'm more Doritos. That is my, that's my stance. I'm the Dorito kid, Wigs, as I told you, my grandma used to, my Nana used to call me the Doritos kid.

It's not what I think of it. Also she didn't like me that much. I was like, one of the, I was like one of the last grandchildren and she was like, I'm sick of. She's like, ah, the Doritos kids here. Yeah. The Doritos kids here. It's fucking annoying.

My Nana who ran the Mitchell Mini Mart, Wigs, I told you this Mitchell Mini Mart, we used to have a store in How's Neck. That was what my Nana and my dad's brother, my uncle, they would run the Mitchell Mini Mart. Wow. That's cool. And my Nana would just like let kids would be like, can I take this? And she'd just be like, yeah, and she wouldn't charge people.

So it closed. Um, but, um, I'm more, I'm more, I'm more, I'm more Doritos than Cheetos. Yes. But, um, but I like Cheetos. I like Fritos too, but I'm more, I'm more Doritos like Fritos, a little too plain for me, right? Unless you get the flavored Fritos. And I think that's fun.

Like chili cheese, for example. Like chili cheese, which are, which are great. And Cheetos, Cheetos are good, but it just wasn't like my go-to. And if there was like a bowl of Cheetos, sure, I'm going to, I'm going to snack on some Cheetos and the Flamin' Hot, they're fun. They're hot. They're nice and spicy, but, but, but never like my go-to. I'm never going to grab a bag at, at, at 7-Eleven or whatever it's not, it's not the one I'm

going for. Now, if you guys were to choose between Cheetos original crunchies and cheese puffs, Cheetos brand cheese puffs, where are you going with that? This is a great question. Great question. I encountered this very dilemma recently when I went to my local liquor store and they had what I'd never seen this before, Flamin' Hot puffs. And I was like, do I get the Flamin' Hot puffs or do I get the Flamin' Hot original?

And I went with the puffs and you know what? I think I made the right choice. I might be a puffs guy. Yeah. What time was this, Wags, when you were at the liquor store? Yeah. I was buying cheese, hot Flamin' Hot cheese puffs at the liquor store. It's my kind of guy, I like it.

He was waiting out. I didn't get my groceries at the L store. He was waiting outside the liquor store like a fucking, like it was a PS5 launch waiting to get inside. You know what? I kind of like puffs too, Wags. Maybe we're two puffy boys. We like the puffs.

The puffs are, the puffs are fun. I like, now if you get too puffy, if you get into the Pirates Poo-D territory, I'm not having as much fun. That's too much puff. Sure. No. You've over puffed, the flavor is gone. But if you've still got, you know, if you're plumped up and you've still got a nice bite

to you, then I'm on board. I love the texture of a puffed rice snack. Like right now in my snack cabinet, I got cheese puffs and funyons, which are like another puffed snack that is so salty, it makes my ankles swell up like I'm pregnant. But like just hits the hits. They hit. Funyons are, if you're in the mood for funyons, funyons are fantastic. They're, Nick, they're like their name.

They're fun. They're fun. They're a lot of fun. It is. And you know what? Not a lot of onion ring shaped snacks like that. It's fun to have a little onion ring shaped snack. And speaking of which, at this place, I got some onion rings to go along with it.

It was like a, don't you think there should have been, I mean, all right, here's the deal to get it, to get into what this place is, which what is it really? Why is it cosmic wings? What's the deal that's going on here? But the brand doesn't make sense. So maybe they should be some fucking funny and funny encoded onion rings. Why not? Why is it interesting?

Why is it just Cheetos? Why are we, why is this place just Cheetos? Is there any reason for that, Wigs? I mean, I couldn't find the exact origin of this concept. All I could find is that this was like some brand part. I have to just think that like Frito Lay, they just came to Frito Lay and were like, what do you got? Yeah.

I, yeah, I don't know if the, but yeah, I don't know exactly what the genesis of this was. I do love this idea that like, okay, so in my mind cosmic means like, ooh, it's trippy. And then like, then you take that one step further and it's like, oh, it's a, it's a podhead snack. Like, and then yes, if you were to create, you know, not just Cheeto, but Dorito, fun, young, all the eagles and coat your like, whatever your cheese balls and your fucking wings with that, that would be an excellent move for this company.

That to me feels more like a sort of concept where this was like, are the wings just like, that's what I did. That's what I was questioning when I, when I looked at the menu, I'm like, are the wings supposed to be the main thing? And these are like, these Cheetos are kind of like a fun version of the wings that you can get. Like, like, or are these Cheetos like the main thing you're supposed to get? Like what is, what is the deal?

I didn't really understand that. Well, I'll say the way the menu is structured. They lead with their exclusive Cheetos flavors. That's like, that's like the top of the menu. I think that's what they're trying to drive you towards. That's their gimmick. That's their hook. They do have boneless wings and traditional wings, alternately, but I think they're trying

to drive you towards the Cheetos. Well, also, you got a parrot cat, huh? Wally and Irma will, they'll jump up on my shoulder occasionally. Yeah, both of them are pretty parody, but this one, what he really likes is that I scratch his butt. Oh, yeah. So he, he'll have to, you know, he perches and tries to stick his asshole like right in my face and I don't know what to do.

Men. Does he do the butt raise where if you scratch the butt, his butt goes, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's cute. Man, do you know, I was doing, I was doing a stream. I was doing the, the, the stream in preparation for the doathon. I showed Wally's butthole to the stream, which I don't know if it's legal or not. And you know what these freaks started saying? They started telling me to sniff the whole.

Oh, no, God, that's the, these are our listeners, Nick. These are the people that we're counting on to raise money for the doathon. Are people telling me that they'll, they'll donate if I sniff the whole. It's my little boy, Wally is whole. They want me to sniff the whole. But what if that did make a difference for the restaurant workers community foundation, like what if you could raise some extra money by doing that? Then guess what?

Why would you have to think about it? Then I'm sniffing a hole this Friday. Again, this is in the past. Well, we'll, we'll know if this actually transpired. So let's, let's get into our meals. So I will say that, that as a, as a vegetarian for this calendar year, this is not a great no meat. Shall I eat?

Oh boy. Uh, they're not great veggie options at cosmic wings. As you, as you might expect, it's a wings place. It's like trying to go to wingstop. You got, what are you going to get? Celery sticks and carrots. There, there aren't a lot of options, but they do have one that is their Cheetos gimmick.

And I'm curious if either you got this as well, the fried Cheetos cheese bites, which are basically cheese curds that are coated in Cheetos and Cheetos flamin hot. Uh, and you choose what you choose, whichever one you want. Apparently there's a sauce in addition to the Cheeto. So they, they, they're used, there's a Cheetos based sauce and then some sort of, then the Cheetos crumbles on top of it and they come with blue cheese or ranch. I will say from a dip in sauce compatibility standpoint, the blue

cheese is Ungepochka with the Cheetos cheese bites. And probably I would assume with the Cheetos wings too. It was, it's just too much cheese, but the ranch actually worked pretty well. I got, I got the cheese bites with a knife. And not the, not the flamin hot Cheeto, but the regular original Cheeto. We're sorry. Yes. Nick, Nick should have never introduced Cheeto.

It's fucking awful. It's like burned in though now. Yeah. And I, I will say that although I love a Cheeto and I love a fried cheese ball or a mozzarella stick or a cheese curd or whatever. The two together was still a lot of cheese. Yes. Mm hmm.

Mm hmm. Yep. It was a lot. It's a lot. Did, did, wait, did you get these Mitch? I, I, yes, I, I too got, I got the, look, I got almost everything on the menu, but I got the, I did, I did the cheese bites, the fried Cheetos cheese bites, not the flamin hot.

Just the, the, and it is, it is a lot of cheese and my, I gave my mom one. I didn't tell her what it was. And she's like, she's like, oh, this is chicken. And I was like, it's not chicken. And it is just kind of hard to tell what it is. I mean, like, uh, right, but, but it's just very cheesy. So that, that texture is so cheesy on the outside that she thought that it just could have been chicken on the inside when in fact, just more cheese.

So. Yeah. So, so the, an issue with me is that the cheeses are, you know, they're not all uniform, which is fine. Um, it suggests that they're, they're more, you know, like handmade, but some of them, like the cheese was out of proportion with the crumbles. And I think if it's, if there's too much surface area on one of these, yeah, to Janice's point, it's just, it's just too much cheese.

Yeah. And also some of the larger ones, they weren't like fully melty all the way through. It was like, Oh, I could tell this just like came out of the freezer and was put in the fryer and, and you know, that it's still kind of a little cold and, and not, you know, kind of hard in the middle. It's not, it's not ideal. But overall, still, even though they're kind of abominations, as I was eating them, I kept vacillating between, are these repulsive or are, or is this just

a bite of pure deliciousness? Is this just like so delicious? I can't comprehend it. Same. I mean, now I was kind of like bitching at them as I was like shoveling them in my face and did I leave some in the fridge to heat up for later in the oven? Yes, I did. Yeah, same.

I was like, I was like, I'm gonna, I might finish these. They're, they were pretty, I don't know. I, it's a gimmick and it doesn't quite work, but it also like does work. It's, it was a very strange experience and I'm, my thoughts on them are still unsettled. But Mitch, what did you think and, and let's get into the rest of your order. Oh my God. All right.

So my order is gigantic. But I'll say this, that my mom did not like these and she didn't like them for the reason that I actually thought that they, that they actually did a decent job with, which is she thought that they were kind of too soggy when they, when they were transported where I thought that they actually had a nice crisp comparatively to other places that where you get wings delivered or like Domino's Buffalo wings. You know, Nick, we've talked about this before.

They're not, they're not crispy. You're not getting crispy wings when you get Domino's wings. It just isn't happening. Um, so I got almost everything on the menu here. I'm going to hear, I'll break it down into, uh, to the apps. You know, the one thing I didn't get in that I forgot to add is that they just give you a free bag of Cheetos, which I forgot to mark. Yes.

Uh, and I didn't get the free bag of Cheetos. I didn't either. I know. Fucked up. I, maybe they stopped doing it or I don't know what the deal was, but I didn't, when I looked before it was one of the things on there and then I don't see it marked on here, but you know, I kind of want them now. I'm kind of mad.

In fact, it might, it might affect the score. I, uh, I got the fried Cheetos cheese bites and, uh, I got that with housemaid ranch and then I went all over the place with the wings. I'll just, I'll save my sides first. I went waffle fries and I got the honey barbecue with the waffle fries just to try some different dips and I got the onion rings. And with the onion rings, I got housemaid ranch dressing and honey mustard. Then I got myself a flavored lemonade, strawberry flavored lemonade.

And now let's go, go onto the wings here. Well, let's, let's, let's start with the, uh, let's start with the fries and the rings because I also got some, I will say that the, the waffle fries are seasoned. They're not aggressively seasoned. No. They're okay. It's just, they're okay.

It's, it's so hard to travel. It's just exactly 100%. I mean, that was the whole issue is they were just mushy and they didn't have a great texture to them. The onion rings travel a little better. The onion rings surprisingly were, were decent. And I think the honey barbecue sauce they come with is a good dip in sauce. I'll say of all the dip in sauces, I got five of them and, and four of

the five were hidden. Uh, the sweet Asian chili was the only one that, that to me was just taste. It was a little too like, like a spicy maple syrup. It was just a little too sweet. Um, but Jana, did you get, did you get any fries or wings or rings rather? I feel like hearing you guys, I blew it on, on not getting onion rings cause I love onion rings, but, um, I, I, I, my brother who is two years younger than me is staying with me right now.

And, uh, so, and he's a huge snack freak as well. And so we got waffle fries and a side of all of our, everything we just got with a side of ranch, I'm not into like honey mustard. I don't like like strange dipping sauces or whatever. Um, so yeah, we got waffle fries. And also I'm, um, you know, I, I refuse to eat a soggy cold, uh, side. So I just put the broiler on and heated those bitches up, uh, crispy as hell. Like the waffle fries were great reheated.

Wow. We, we, we, we should have done the same thing. Why not? Why not? Especially I do feel like protecting. I feel like when you get something straight from the restaurant, this is the same with pizza or anything. If you do a quick heat, just really quick, little, you know, like sometimes

lower temperature, it will, it will taste like it will just taste like it was straight from the restaurant. It won't, it won't affect it. Not in the microwave. The oven, you got to crisp it. And same with the, the, the cheese balls, uh, in the oven, you get almost like a, a, a recrust of the, of the side that's like on the pan. It was money.

The, the onion, I'll say this. The onion rings stayed crispy, but wags almost for not a great reason. They were, they were battered out. It was, it was battered up. They were, they were too battered. It was, it was crazy. There was just two, they were just, these things were, were so thick. Um, to the point where it's like, it felt like you were eating

something, uh, like almost like, uh, like a dessert. Like it was just very, the coating was so thick. It was right. Did you agree with that wags or no? My mom, my mom thought it was too much batter, too much batter going on. I wonder if this was a difference between locations. You know, I think probably instantly putting this operation, getting it up and running in, in 1300 different kitchens in a matter of months

is not an easy logistical feat. And cause mine did not seem overly battered, but then again, maybe that was the source of the crunchiness. And I just didn't, uh, I just didn't divine it. When, when you're, when you're like, when the batter and casing of the onion ring is like, you know, three times the, the size of the onion. It's just, it's too much. Right.

Too much going on. It's gotta, it's gotta be closer. It's gotta not, you know, you don't want it falling off, but you want it to be at least a little bit flaky or, you know, it can be, it can have a crunch to it, but that this was just too much to me. They were entombed. You also want to taste the onion. You got to taste the onion.

Was there even a strip of onion in the thing? That's why I didn't get him. Cause I was like, I know what fast food onion rings are and there's no onion present. Mine had onions in them. I maybe got Funions. There's a chance I just got Funions. No, mine, mine, mine were there, there were onion in mine, but it was,

I was not in, I was not in, I wanted the onion rings to be better. Um, but I think that those, the, the, the wedges, or whatever the, the criss-cut fries, the waffle fries. I feel like, uh, if those were, if those were heated up a little bit, I think I would have liked them even more. So, um, the wings. All right. Should we get into these fucking insane wings?

Please. My mom wanted to get some more traditional wings. So we got nine pieces of the sweet Asian chili and we got blue cheese dressing with that. Why is I agree with you? That's the, the, the sweet Asian chili sauce is just was a little too much. There was, it was a little syrupy. It was just a little too much going on.

Um, the wings themselves though, still crunchy enough, like still well fried. Just that sauce was probably my least favorite. Um, and then I also got, we also got just, uh, traditional wings with Cheetos flaming hot sauce, wing sauce, and we got that with ranch. And so what did you guys think as far as Cheetos versus the flaming hot? Did, did everyone try the flaming hot on their wings or no? I got both with my Cheetos cheese bites. I, you know, I'm something of a heat seeker.

I like things spicy, but I do kind of think that it worked at least in that, at least in the cheese bites. I do kind of think that the non flamin hot, uh, the flamin regular, I think worked a little better. Mm hmm. I didn't get, uh, any, my wings. I didn't, I went pure. Only wing sauce and no, no, no cheeto.

Yeah. Sans cheeto. And I, maybe I fucked up on that too, because maybe it would've tasted different, but I have completely opposing, uh, positions and Mitch on, on the wing stuff. Interesting. Really? Yeah.

I gotta say, I mean, maybe it was just the franchise, you know, maybe my, it was just a little, you know, weirder and, uh, the travel time. There's a lot of things that could be attributed. Again, I put everything in the oven just as to, you know, crunch it up. But, uh, I personally liked the sweet, the, the chili, the sweet chili sauce. Interesting. I thought I had a spice to it that I appreciated and I don't usually like a sweeter sauce, uh, and I got, uh, the, I got, uh, regular buffalo,

like hot wings and I got, uh, boneless sweet chili bites. Like those, and those were dope, but I found the wings, the bone-in wings to be fatty and not fried enough. Yeah. Okay. That's fair. You know, of all the, the, the, the, of the traditional wings, the thing I liked the most was the boneless, just regular buffalo wings.

That was my favorite. That was my bite of the night wigs. And it was just because I was like, Oh, these must be like apple bees, boneless buffalo wings. And, and I'm like, these are good. These are a good app. I enjoy these. Everything else.

I wasn't too sold on that. So the traditional wings with the flaming hot sauce, I did like, I did like the flaming hot sauce, maybe just a little bit more in that. Like it was less cheesy and had a little bit of a bite to it and it made sense on wings, but I don't know. It was, none of it was really doing it for me. I was, I wasn't blown away by any of the, of the, of the cheetah. The cheetah, the cheetah doesn't do it for me.

The cheetah doesn't, the cheetah doesn't work. The gimmick. Wow. The gimmick doesn't really work, but I'm wags. I'm with you in that. I was like eating them and being like, I'm having fun too. Like this is. Yes.

This is fun trash, but it's, it's, it's not worth the whole concept. It's not, it's not worth it. That's exactly. Yes. 100% it's like this would be, if these were on the Applebee's menu and you could get this like with a few different other apps and, and mains and you know, like, but this sustaining an entire franchise makes no sense. I just don't think it's enough.

Yeah. And also give me a cool ranch fucking swing. If you're going to go cosmic, go cool ranch too. Get a, give me a funion wing. Damn it. We want the Dorito. We want Dorito. We want, we want Dorito.

Dorito. We want Dorito. Dorito just, it's, it's very weirdly close to diarrhea. Dorito. It sounds, it sounds. Oh God. It sounds like something that like leaks out of you. Dorito.

After you eat a shit ton of Doritos, you got diorito. Speaking of that, I feel like I still have fucking gas 24 hours after I ate cosmic wings. Like I was just, it was like the wings like hit my stomach and my ass was like, sound the alarms, babe. We got some fucking Cheeto dusted fucking cheese curds. Shootin fucking cheat a lot of my ass all over the house. It's fucking awful.

It was, this was rough. Digestively. This was pretty good. And I gotta say, and this is, and so I got, I got a few different boneless wings. I got the original Cheetos. I got the original Cheetos boneless wings with blue cheese dressing. And I also got the Cheetos flaming hot with ranch.

And then like I said, I got the boneless, just regular buffalo wings. So I got three different types. I wanted to try each one side by side. And the thing I noticed with the Cheetos and the flaming hot is that they did just seem a little bit more oily. And that could be the part of the reason that everyone's stomachs was getting fucked up is just that, you know, whatever that sauce was or whatever the way it fried, maybe it retained more grease, but they were

oily, they were definitely oily. And like looking back on it, I'm like, did I like the regular Cheetos or the flaming hot? And I'm like, I've had fun with both of them while eating them. But then when I had a boneless buffalo finger, that was my favorite. So yeah. So like they lose out to regular buffalo fingers. Yeah.

Yeah. 100%. By the way, I think we got a cat tail in front of Jenna's camera. No, that was great. She likes to like make a very like unattached appearance. She's like, I'm here. I don't want to participate in your fuckery. But like just I'm present in the moment.

It was a cat tail. Then, then just, uh, we saw a cloud of Cheeto shootout. Yeah. Whoops. I left my cheese bites on the counter last night. Well, we should get to our final thoughts on cosmic wings. So, Jenna, here's how this will work. We'll each go around, give a closing argument, if you will, on this

week's chain and end that by giving it a rating from zero to five forks. You are a guest. We'll begin with you. All right. Um, you know, I'm, I'm wary of a fast food wing chain. Uh, I'm a person who, uh, you know, I did at one point, I did a buffalo wing tour of New York City. Like I put my, I created my own like cultivated my own like top 10 list

and overwhelmingly the best wings, uh, in the state of Buffalo itself, a good, the original, you know, wing, uh, place. What was anchor bar? Is that one of that's like one of the originals anchor bar? Anchor bar is one of the originals. But, uh, you know, I, I, uh, I can't believe I, I forgot the sport, the name of the sports bar in, uh, in Manhattan, uh, that has like the best wings notoriously.

I'll think of it. But, um, Well, hey, once, once, once the world is open back up again, that sounds like my favorite double of all time. Wags a New York, a New York wing tour. Oh my God. It's you'll, and, and this is my, this is my, uh, my defense is that, uh, the best Buffalo wings are of course found in New York City sports bars.

Um, they are like the fryers are hotter. They, they know their own, they usually create their, their own take on the Buffalo, you know, sauce and, uh, they do the wing right. And the drumstick, you know, is nice and like crispy on the edges, but then you also, you don't get too much of the fatty in the, in the wing part. Um, and, and that's something about cosmic wings that I didn't love. It was just too fatty, like the texture of that chewy like skin. I'm like, Oh God, one of the chewy skin wings is enough to put me off

cause it feels like the wing isn't cooked through enough. Yep. Um, the sauces were good. I, I appreciated the attempt, but, um, like I said, the, the, the cheetah aspect, uh, or cheese dust, if you're OG is, is a fun, uh, but short-sighted um, like selling point too much cheese. If you ask me, um, I will give it, uh, like an extra half of a fork for the waffle fries.

I thought that they were a bomb. Um, they like delivered on all fronts that I want a waffle fry to deliver on. Um, so for that reason, I'll give it, uh, I'll give it two forks out of five. Two forks. Wow. All right, smooth man. What do you think? Well, look, I like Applebee's and you know this, these are usually out of

Applebee's kitchen. So I think you're real, Nick, I think you really just hit a great point of if I was in Applebee's and I, and I, and there was a, uh, uh, buff, a boneless wing platter with, uh, flamin hot cheeto dust, regular cheeto dust and then regular buffalo wings. So that was like a trio platter of boneless wings. How much fun would that be? I would love to have it.

That's, that would be great time. It's, that's, that's, that's fucking fantastic. Watching the game, watching some games, having a few drinks, eating those boneless wings. That's fun. Cosmic wings as it exists is not fun. And it's not even that kosmicky. You're, you're, you're right.

There is, there's no, we, you need to, you need to add the Daredal or fun. You needle. You should, you need to, you need to do, there has to be something else. It's just cheetos added to a couple of different wings in the wings. Aren't that fantastic? The boneless buffalo wings were just Applebee wings and those are good, but that does not make a, that's not a restaurant concept that and then a couple different cheeto flavored wings.

And then I got to say this. Well, the strawberry lemonade, not, not great, like just was like kind of whatever, uh, like a very sugary, didn't taste real, like, so what is this place? I don't know. Let's see what the cookie is. I've got a chocolate chunk cookie. God, you got the cookie.

And it's a fucking, and guess what? It's a fucking Otis sponkmeyer. They just give you a fucking Otis sponkmeyer. It's a sponkmeyer cookie. You get a, you get a sponkmeyer cookie. So what the fuck are you doing here? They sold sponkmeyer at my high school. It was another little stand.

We had a sponkmeyer stand. What the fuck? This is ridiculous. What is this restaurant? What are these ghost kitchens? I, hey, Nick, you know, I'm afraid of ghosts and I'm, and I'm a, I'm a, I'm especially afraid of fucking ghost kitchens. Get it.

Get them out of here. I was trying to, I was trying to say I ain't afraid of no ghosts, but it didn't work. I didn't know how to move it. I didn't know how to work it into what I was trying to say. How about, I'll just, how about you call yourself, you designate yourself a ghost kitchen buster? Yes, I am a ghost.

I ain't afraid of no ghost kitchens. I want to break them up and get them out of here. They're not worth it, Nick. Every place we've done has not, has not been worth it. And this is just another example. If they're going to have a concept like that, go all out. Don't, and don't, the fatty wings. How can you have fatty wings?

That's like Domino's. Like you're giving out fatty wings. Mine had some good crisp to them, but, but still it's delivery wings and there's places that do it right now. Like you can get Buffalo Wild Wings or you can get Wingstop and sometimes you'll, you get those wings. Crispy and good with delivery. So just fucking close it up.

Cosmic wings. This is, this is worthless. I'd rather be ordering from Applebee's. It just, it just, it, it makes me sad, Nick. And just what are these places? I don't understand it. I'm going fucking. I'm going one and a half forks.

One and a half forks. Wow. Not a great score. I mean, I, I think part of it is where the, where are these ghost kitchens coming from? It's, I mean, it's all COVID, right? Like so much of it is just like we're trying to get away to get, we're trying to wait to sustain our business that is reliant on a big, a big

empty dining room. So let's try to come up with a new brand. And maybe it worked and maybe it, it, it kept some Applebee's workers employed for a little longer than they would be otherwise. Which is great. But, but also like Applebee's, why, why does Applebee's just do the Cheetos, the Cheetos trio or whatever? Well, I, I kind of, I guess where I'm going with this is I think in a,

I think a year from now we're not going to be, like cosmic wings won't be a thing. I feel like once things are back to, to some relative sense of normalcy, a lot of these ghost kitchens are going to close up shop for good. And, but that said, evaluating this meal, I can't speak to the wings, but I can speak to the cosmic. And I just think it was a failure to launch. It just, they, they, there just wasn't quite enough going on here to

justify spending the money for this meal. A failure to launch. It was a failure to lunch. Thank you, Mitch. Ooh, yes. Attempt, attempting to reach the cosmos, but can't get their ship off the earth. Oh boy.

Oh boy. I love it. I'm trying to be a dough boy. I think sadly you nailed it, you nailed it your way. That was a hundred percent dough boyish. Did you, you just, you heard me ramble on. Yeah. It was too, too long.

I can work on it. I'll, I'll, I'll work on it. I'll tighten it up. No, it was, it was great. You heard me ramble on for 30 minutes and not make any sense. It was perfect. I will say that the, I don't know, I'm still undetermined on the cheese bites, but I think I land on, I would not get these again.

They were, they were a fascinating one time purchase to consume once in my life. And there's no reason for me to ever have these again. And that to me is one fork territory, but I will also give it an extra half fork because there was some stuff that I liked. So 1.5 forks, clearly not a good outing for cosmic wings. Ballpark buds, for sure. We're ballpark buds. Well, hey, on that note, Mitch.

On the somber note, we'll go to break. Wow. We'll be back with more dough boys. Press some peace, cosmic wins. Welcome back to dough boys. We were here with Janice meeting. Sorry, sorry, Jana. Such a funny, great guest.

And we just gave you a fucking shit restaurant. Yeah, we gave you a really shitty restaurant. Oh, listen, as shitty as it may have been, I ate a lot of the food that I ordered from there. I'm no stranger to ordering bullshit. My mom, it was one of those things where I was trying it and my mom has done this. I've said this a lot on the pod, but she was like, why don't you get a plastic trash bag and just throw all of this stuff in there now?

Cause we've had enough and you should put it away. And then I threw it all away. And then at one point she looked over and I was just taking the, I was, I was taking the sheet, the flaming hot boneless wings out of the trash. And she was like, don't, don't take it out of the trash. And I was like, you're right. So I just, I tossed them back in. But that still, I mean, it was there, there were fun bites to be had.

And there is a novelty to it. I love, I love the Doritos Locos taco. It's so much fun to have a, to have super fun. You get the Dorito dust on the taco. It's, it's, it's amazing. So you want to love it and it's a fun gimmick, but it just, that restaurant did not, did not work. It didn't work.

Yeah, it's a bummer. Uh, but hey, it's time for a segment. Wow. I've got a food related survey and Mitch and Jana will compete to guess the results. Let's play the family food. Wow. Our theme song, the Richard Carn era family feud theme, Chesil stank on it

will twang. We're snapping along. So standard rules, whoever gets the most correct without collecting three strikes will win. And the theme compiled by the drop King Robert Persinger for this week is favorite vegetables in America. Favorite vegetables in America. This is according to a poll conducted for veggie tracker.com.

My homepage and the top six answers are on the board. Do you know my mom and I, my mom and I have been watching family. If we watch jeopardy with dinner and then when, when we're, we're pretty much closing out dinner. Oh yeah, I'm going in for that second or third course. Fishing something on the trash. We, we, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm grabbing an old tuna can out of the trash. Pardon some cheetah on there.

Well, we'll turn, and then we'll turn on feud. We'll, we'll, we'll watch a Steve Harvey and feud. We have a blast. Does your mom like it when, uh, when, uh, like someone says something raunchy and Steve Harvey reacts. She doesn't, she doesn't, she, she, she else, she also, she was like, she didn't like Steve Harvey at first and now she loves him. She, she, she thought, I don't know.

I don't, he's a natural fit. Yeah. She, he's, oh, he's so good on the show. I don't know why she didn't like him at first. I think, I think she thought he was being too mean one time or something. I don't know, but she loves Harvey now and she doesn't like when it gets too raunchy, she thinks that sometimes it gets too raunchy, but, uh, she loves when, when Harvey will like Steve Harvey will like, when a guest will say a

dumb answer and Harvey will be like, what do you do? You know, when he's like, what do you do? She loves, she loves that very much. So we big thumbs up to Steve Harvey's family. If you, Nick, it's a great, it's, he's, he's got a great iteration of the game going. We watch it too. It's fun.

It's great. I was streaming on, uh, on twitch.tv slash do boys podcast. I was, I was streaming family feud for PlayStation four and they don't have Steve Harvey's voice or likeness rights in the game. They have a generic host named Lucky and he sucks. He's so bad involved. What the fuck? No, they've got, they've got just this animated guy who looks like Mitt Romney.

And he has like the worst wisecracks. It's, it's a real bummer. Um, man, he's, he's, he's so, I can't, I can't believe that the show still works like it does after 40 years. It's great. Why is it be watching a Jeopardy? Do you got a Jeopardy host front runner? I like, I'm, I'm optimistic about Burton's run.

Yeah. I don't watch it and, uh, I am a bad at trivia. So I'm a dumb dumb. Oh, trust me. I'm just sitting there getting every answer wrong. But I, but answering confidently. Yeah. I like the music.

So family feud a great game, which is why that we've stolen their format for family food, favorite vegetables in America. This is according again to veggie tracker.com. Top six answers on the board. Jana, you are a guest. Would you like to go first or second? Uh, I want to go first. Okay.

Go ahead. I'm confident if nothing else. All right. Great, great choice. Six vegetables. All right. Here we go. Cucumbers.

Wow. Good answer. I'm going to call it good answer. Wow. Cucumbers not in the top six. Mitch, you have one strike. I'm shocked. Mitch, what do you think?

I'm going to go with a big one. I feel like it's going to be up there. Mm hmm. Lettuce. Show me lettuce. What? No, lettuce. Lettuce not on this list.

All right, Jana. This is trash. This is fucked up. What are people eating? I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, are you going? I was going to guess cheeto. Yeah. America.

America is showing their true colors right now in this quiz. Oh man. That's what I was going to say. I think you're both giving America too much credit. Uh huh. It's a. All right. Let me, let me go with, uh, uh, one of the grosser vegetables.

Um, uh, let's say broccoli. Wow. That's a good answer. Show me broccoli. That's got to be up there. I'm going to be shocked. What the fuck? Broccoli not in the top six.

It is in the top 10, but it comes in at number eight. Wow. All right, I got one. No broccoli. I got one. I got one. I got one. Yes.

Go ahead, Mitch. Carrots. Show me. Carrots. Survey says. Okay. I had the wrong clip there. Yeah.

What the fuck? Wow. Sorry. I pulled the wrong, uh, the wrong clip from the super Nintendo version of family feud. Uh, you got, yes, you got that one, Mitch. Coming in at number three, carrots. Wow. All right, Janet, you have, you have two strikes.

Shit. Oh boy. All right. I'm going to put. This is a real wild card here, but I'm going to give it a whirl. Green peppers. That's, I like it. I like it.

Show me green peppers. Wow. I'm so sorry. Damn. What the hell? You have accumulated three strikes, uh, great and bowling, not, not so good in family food. Uh, this is a, Mitch, do you want to try to guess any more on the board? Yes.

I mean, you guys can keep going here. I'm going to, I'm going to, I got, I got one potatoes. Show me potatoes. Oh, of course. Potatoes. Number two answer. Now you're kind of thinking like an American. All right.

Potatoes. All right. What qualifies as a vegetable in the loosest, loosest terms. Throw out all the starchy as fuck. And then I got, I got, I got, I got two more than I think could be up there, but I think I'm going to get buzzed. I want them because this is hard. Okay.

Onion. Show me onion. Anything you can fry. Onion number five. One. Jenna, do you want to take another guess just for funsies? No, cause I'm going to, I'm going to blow it. I'm going to choose an actual vegetable.

How about, how about mushrooms? Oh wait, that's not, does that doesn't, that doesn't count, does it? Let's see if it does. No mushrooms. Not on the board. Piece of shit. You knew it didn't count. So here are the, here the, here the remainder.

All right. Do you want to take one more guess to try to get number one, Mitch? Number off. We didn't have number one. No. Number one is not on there. I mean, look, last time tomato, tomato is a fruit, right? It doesn't count as a vegetable.

Yes. Okay. Well, I mean, it's on here. Tomatoes is on here. It's a fruit, but what people, how people answer the surveys. That's the thing in the family. Yeah, but wasn't it under the fruits when we did this stupid thing before? Look, this is how people choose to answer these things.

That's when you have an open-ended question and you ask Americans, sometimes they're going to say dumb shit. It's, the one I always remember is when it's like, what, name a tourist attraction in France, and the, like the number five answer was the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Jesus Christ. People just don't know geography. Jesus Christ for dumb. All right.

I have another one. Here's another guess. Yes. Pisa. I would love it if that was the number one answer. It is not. The number one vegetable. Hold on.

The number one vegetable. I mean, we should, we should get this, shouldn't we? We, we, we should be able to figure this out. The number one vegetable is fucking. Potatoes, we eat, we eat a ton of potatoes, not eggplant, not. We're in the same territory. Do people think beans are vegetables? Green beans is actually number six.

So green beans is on there. No mushrooms. So far you've gotten, you've gotten everything except for number one. I'm going to give it to you. Corn. Americans' favorite vegetable is corn. Corn. The top two are ones you could make into chips.

I mean, I think of nutrition in this country. I completely just even forgot corn. I forgot. I forgot about corn. I can't believe I forgot about corn. Corn is like, it's the fucking, corn is the best. Corn, corn, corn is, corn on the cob is great. Yeah.

Popcorn, Nick is a popcorn skeptic, which is insane, but. What? Yeah. I don't love, I don't love popcorn. Okay. Please don't leave. She's left. Rightfully so.

As an indigenous person, not liking corn and living on this land is actually the most white you could possibly be. Same with potatoes. Potatoes are indigenous to the, to the States. So like, you know. Wow. I love corn in the popcorn context. Popcorn has never quite worked for me as a snack.

Let's prefer something else crunchy. I go to the movies for the popcorn. I don't give a fuck about the movie. I just care about the popcorn. Arclight popcorn, the best popcorn in the game. And I'm so, oh, you don't like it or you do like it? No, I love it. That was my delighted face, my disgusted face.

I'm very sad that it may never have it again. I like truly, they need to keep that, they need to keep the popcorn recipe. I don't know what they need to save that. I'll be, I'll be devastated if the popcorn recipe is gone. It's my favorite thing, Nick. I love going to that theater needing that popcorn and watching movies. That's all I like to do. Also, are you saying popcorn?

The way you're saying popcorn is so weird. This is an issue we should have given you, we should have given you, we should have given you like a small chat before we taught that I can't like talk like a normal human being. I say things incorrectly. I do like the term popcorn. It is, I say popcorn and hot dog. They say, say, and soda and pizza.

I'm just, I'm a downright fool. That's the issue. It's a, it's a regional affectation. I love it. Though a lot of other people don't say it around here. I think it is just truly me. It's just you. Hey, corn adjacent.

How do you feel about corn with a K and a backwards R? Jesus Christ. Thumbs down from Jenna. Were you a fan, Mitch? All I can say to that wag is boom, baka, boom, bakria. Thank you. That's all I wanted. Just like a restaurant.

We value your feedback. Let's open the feedback. Today we have an email from Max in Montana and Max writes, my wife and I recently got five chickens to give us fresh eggs straight from our backyard here in Montana. We're raising them from chicks and they have persevered in a rubber made box under a heat lamp long enough to be named. We've assigned naming rights for three of the chickens and given them one

the distinguished name queso that leaves one chicken left. We'd like to honor the birds and the dough boys by asking you to name the final chicken. Anything you want. Drumstick, nugget. Wow. Gabris. Give us a bird name and we'll slap it on a chicken.

Here's a photo of the five chicks. I'll share this with you. Wow. We'll post this on our social media. Let's see these chicks. There we go. Aww. Look at those chicks.

We zoom in a little bit. And the one in the middle, this yellow one here is the one that still needs a name. Wow. This is a big guy. Yeah. He's a big boy. Hmm.

Jenna, were you ever growing up in rural Oregon, ever around farm animals? Oh, we're talking. Oh, very much so. I grew up around a sheep farm. A lot of sheep material coursing through our house at all times. There's actually like an ostrich farm down the street from us. Wow. That was cool.

And there was one donkey in the ostrich pen. Wow. The ostrich slash donkey farm. But yeah, also a lot of chickens all over the hood and, you know, herd roosters in the morning. It was great. When we were in Italy, a donkey bit Chankton's wife, Angelica. Wow.

I don't know who these people are. Angelica, the donkey bitter. Not Angelica. Yeah. Wow. You've met Angelica, Wigs. Of course. Hmm.

This is, this is, I mean, now. What about Cheetle? Cheetle? I mean, Cheetle is a great answer. Cheetle. Cheetle. I think you got it in one. I can spell it like Don or you can spell it like the dust, but Cheetle, perfect for this

episode. Cheetle. And it's a wing theme anyway. So there you go. Cheetle. Cheetle. I was going to say, you know, Chankton, I was going to say Chickton, like a, like a chick, Wigs.

Oh, like, okay. Yes. Oh, yeah. Thanks. 30 minutes of giving me a fucking look like you didn't understand what the fuck I was saying. I was baffled. Honestly, I still don't quite get it, but I'm humoring you.

I think Cheetle is the winner. It's a good pitch. I think Cheetle is the winner. Yes. Cheetle is a great name. Cheetle. Cheetle the chicken. Cheetle the chicken.

You got yourself a chicken to fit in with your fivesome. And, uh, hey, uh, uh, you can send Cheetle my name and I'll, uh, I'll name it for you. Oh, no, Mitch is licking his lips. I hope they're gone. They're not going to, they're not going to, they're not going to eat these chicks. Right. They're going to, they're egg laying. Yes.

Therefore they're designated for egg. God, we like that. If you have a question or comment about the world of chain restaurants, you can email us at doughboyspodcasts at gmail.com or leave us a voicemail at 830 go dough. That's 830-463-6844. And to get the dough boys double our weekly bonus episode. Join the golden or platinum play club at patreon.com slash dough boys. Janish meeting.

What a delight to have you on the show. Delight. Thank you so much. Please come back. Yes. The show is Rutherford Falls. She's shaking her head. No.

Anything else you'd like to plug? Oh yeah. I would love to come back. Anything but wings, delivery wings. Hell yeah. Uh, yeah, check out Rutherford Falls. It's a great show. There's a native sitcom, not the last on, um, uh, you know, Network-ish TV.

It's streaming on Peacock. All the episodes. You can get the seven day free trial and do a little binge. Hell yeah. There you go. I'm a member of Peacock right now. I'm going to check it out for sure. And, uh, we got to, yeah, you got to have you back.

You're so funny. We got to do that wings tour at some point. And we, we didn't even, we should have, we should have talked about some indigenous foods, which we didn't do. We're bad, we are bad hosts. No, no, no, we, we did talk about indigenous foods. We talked about waffle fries, potatoes. We talked about, we talked about corn, both the corn and the one with the K.

Both indigenous. That will do it for this episode of Doe Boys. And on next time, for Mr. Slice Mike Mitchell, I'm Nick Weiger. Happy eating. See ya. On the next Doe Boys Double, it's the long awaited return of the king, Matt Koalik. Doe Boys Foyle Koalik joins as we review hunk filled, swords and sandals movie 300 for the week of our 300th mainline Doe Boys episode.

We just can't help celebrating ourselves. Get the Doe Boys Double every Tuesday only at patreon.com slash Doe Boys.