Doughboys - Fatburger with Yamara Taylor

Episode Date: July 21, 2016

Comedy writer and LA native Yamara Taylor (Black-ish, The Boondocks, Party Over Here) hops in studio with the 'boys to review a childhood favorite: overloaded burger chain Fatburger. Plus, a special Twinkie edition of Snack or Wack.Want more Doughboys? Check out our Patreon!: https://patreon.com/doughboysSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I don't worry about McDonald's, Burger King, or Wendy's. They may be more popular, but a good hamburger sells itself, and I don't think anybody makes as good a hamburger as we do. Those are the confident words of Lovey Yancey, a true trailblazer in the chain restaurant sector. In 1947, at the age of 35, Yancey opened a three-seat burger stand in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Exposition Park, building the eatery with scrap metal provided by her construction worker then-boyfriend.

She gave the restaurant its unusual name, one which would briefly become a millstone around its neck during the low-fat diet craze of the 1990s, explaining, quote, I wanted to get across the idea of a big burger with everything on it, a meal in itself. As the chain grew in popularity over the decades, it attracted celebrity clientele like Red Fox and Ray Charles and a celebrity investor in Los Angeles' Laker legend Irvin Magic Johnson who traded his NBA championship rings for onion rings. With its fat and skinny fries, thick shakes, and loaded burgers, including the pioneering option of a fried egg as a topping, the restaurant became a staple hip-hop reference, receiving

shout-outs on tracks from the notorious B.I.G., Ice Cube, and Tupac. As hip-hop culture grew more establishment, its connection to the chain grew more direct. At various points, E40, Queen Latifah, Kanye West, and Pharrell became business partners and or franchise owners. Now with over 150 locations in 20 countries, Count the Place dubbed the last great hamburger stand as yet another local SoCal favorite that became an international sensation. This week on Doughboys, Fat Burger. Welcome to Doughboys, the podcast about chain restaurants.

We're part of Ferrellaudio.com. The best way to support ours and other shows in the network is to use the referral link on our website anytime you shop at Amazon. I'm Nick Weigar, alongside my co-host, Ruth's Chris Christie, Mike Mitchell, the Spoonman. How are you, Mitch? Hey, you're talking about our future vice president of the United States. You think Christie's gonna get the nominee? I don't know.

He's pathetic if he doesn't. I think it's gonna be... I think it'll probably be Gingrich. I mean, at this point, they'll probably be announced with the 10-dice episodes out. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, but as of now, I'm putting two weeks before release, I'm putting my money on Gingrich. In fact, I actually have money on Gingrich. Yes, that's right.

I'm betting on politics via Predictit, the website. You can read... Run up your alley, a boring man betting on politics. I actually made a hefty profit betting on Scalia to be the next Supreme Court justice to vacate his seat, and when he died, I got a cool $20 in my bank account. Oh, great. Yeah. You could celebrate a man's death for measly $20.

Well, he wasn't a good man. That's true. He was a bad man, so that's fine. That roast was courtesy of Kyle Jamison. If you have an insult you'd like me to use on Mitch at the top of the show, email roastspoonmanatgmail.com. Go ahead, Mitch. I like the last name. Don't like the roast, though.

Yeah. First of all, I was going to stop you. It was the first time I ever was going to stop one of your introductions for the magic Johnson trading in his rings for onion rings. That is the dumbest shit I've ever heard in my life. That's because you're a Celtics fan. You're a partisan. You have your biases built in.

And then also, I don't think I've... It was the most unnatural... I've never heard anyone say notorious B.I.G. More unnaturally than you. Oh, yeah. The notorious B.I.G. It was the dorkiest I ever heard. Anyways.

Howdy-ho! To Spoon Nation. All right. Come on. Howdy-ho! Ever see a guy say goodbye to a shoe? Yeah, it's one. Oh, my God.

I'm one of the most forward-thinking men there is. Yeah! Oh, my God. My mom just interrupted the fucking drop. This is canonically part of the drop now. Starting over. Okay. Ever see a guy say goodbye to a shoe?

Yeah, it's one. Oh, my God. I'm one of the most forward-thinking men there is. Yeah! For all who wish to learn. Whatever their color or their creed. There has been a buzz over the city of Quincy and it's coming from the sky. Scott Ackerman.

That's it. Great. That's the drop. My mom left a voicemail, too. Should we listen to it? Should we roll the dice and listen to what my mom had to say to the guy? Oh, Jesus Christ. What is going on with your phone?

Do you know how to use this device? Anyway. That drop was courtesy of... Oh, wait. This isn't the right drop. Oh, Jesus Christ. Oh, no. This is the right drop.

That drop was courtesy of Joseph Bastion. His Twitter handle is at zero disorder. Yep. And should we listen to my mom's voicemail that she left? Yeah, sure. Put it on. We might have to edit this out of the episode if it's something weird. And here we go.

See you in the next half hour or so. Thanks. Love you. Bye-bye. Hmm. Seemed innocuous. Yeah, seemed drunk. Do you want to give out your mom's Twitter handle?

My mom is not on Twitter. Oh, okay. So... What's going on? Not too much. You know... What a clunk he starts to... This is a mess.

What a disaster. These devices we have, you know? Sometimes they work in your favor. Sometimes they don't. My mom was calling. She's coming to LA in August. Right. So she's planning stuff.

And she's hitting me up. And she's here for like seven days. She's coming with a friend and my sister and my sister's bringing a friend. Great. Yeah. Let's get the Mitchell family in here. No. Get them in studio.

Get them in studio. Fucking way. We have a little bit of business to take care of real quick, Mitch, before we introduce our guests. First things first. We want to announce the winner of the Mitch Gump Contest from a couple episodes ago when we had Paul Sheeran for Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. We had a contest to see who could come up with the best meme-mashing-up Forest Gump and the Spoon Man, Mike Mitchell.

The winner was Senior Beamer at Me Shock Figs. So congratulations, Senior Beamer. You'll be receiving a souvenir glass from Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. What was his meme? His meme was, it was your face with a Patriots hat put on top of Forest Gump sitting on a park bench and the meme text was, my life is like this box of chocolates. I'm going to end both of them tonight. Insulting but also like very dark, but I think very accurate and a nice combination of these

two properties, these two intellectual properties. Yeah, you earned it. Yeah, you earned it. And guess what? We'll sign that glass. Yeah, we'll sign that glass. That'll work, right? Yeah.

You can sign a piece of glassware. Something you didn't ask for. Well, I mean, we'll do it with Sharpie. Let's see if it stays on. Maybe we'll just sign the box and the box can be of a mention. Oh, okay. All right, sure. Yeah, we'll sign the box.

We'll figure some shit out. So we're expecting that Senior Beamer, but you go ahead. They brought up, well, they brought, I was just going to say they brought up the big Simpsons debate in that drop. Yeah, we don't have, I mean, that's a full hour discussion to talk about the Hank Scorpio shoe incident. That's true. But yeah, we can get into that in a bit.

But before we go any further, we have a, I want to briefly bring in a friend of the podcast, and a Tournament of Chompians Commissioner, Evan Susser. Wait, what? God damn it. We have an important bit of business to go over. He has an announcement he wants to make on the podcast that is relevant to what's going to be happening with the show this coming August. So I'm conferencing him in now.

He's waiting to board a flight. I'm hoping we can grab him before he gets in the sky. I want to treat. We get to hear from Evan Susser. Hello? This is a commissioner. Hey, Evan. You're on with me and Mitch.

How are you? I'm good. Guys, I'm going to read a brief statement, and then I'll take a few questions. Is that okay? Yes. Where is he in the airport bathroom? Which airport chain restaurant are you at, Evan? I said I'll take the questions at the end.

Okay. All right. Go ahead with your statement. Commissioner Susser, are you buying a seatbelt extender in the airport lobby? Or are you waiting until you get on the flight? Yes. As all of you know, I served as a commissioner during the much-beloved and awesome praise Stowboys Tournaments of Chompions.

It was my intention to retire from that position after the championship, as I believed continuing to insert myself into the podcast would appear to be self-serving and potentially pathetic. However, with an athletic concentration of even greater magnitude than the NCAA tournament that takes place imminently, I have no choice but to intervene and declare a Doe Boys counterpart to those games. That's why, starting the first week in August, I'm officially declaring it the 2016 Doe Olympics. Wow.

The 2016 Doe Olympics. Three weeks of competition bringing together competitors from around the world of chain restaurants. Also, for clarity and to not be confused with the actual Summer Olympics, the full title will be the Doe Olympic Susser Games. Fuck off. Okay, is that the completion of your statement? That is the completion of the statement.

Yeah, we wouldn't want to get confused with the real Olympics. You know, they're very litigious. Yeah. I think it's a real concern. The Improv Olympic had to change its name to IO because they got sued by the Olympics. I think it's good to avoid that potential legal hassle. Susser, I have a question for you. Why?

Sure. Why? Yeah. Well, I think I was pretty clear that the Olympics are taking place. Gotcha. Yeah. You know. Oh.

Okay, cool. Great. That's enough of a flimsy peg for us to hang an entire month of shows on. Have you decided what the fuck the idea is going to be yet or no? You know, I think it's pretty obvious. You hear Doe boys. You hear Olympics. I think you just, you know, there's going to be competition.

The answer is no. It has not been fully figured out yet, but we're going to get there. It's going to be wild. It's going to be a desperate attempt to recapture what we had with the tournament of Shabian. Right. It's probably going to be worse. Sure. But we're going to do it for a long time, whether it works or not.

Jesus. Where are you flying to? I'm flying to Toronto, Canada. Wow. Why? For a study up on the Olympics? Yeah. To study, you know, to prepare.

I've been traveling all over the world to get people's ideas for the still Olympics, which you may or may not have an international angle or not. We're still kind of figuring it out. Jesus Christ. All right. Well, speaking of things we might have to edit out of an episode. I think this entire phone call might be on the chopping block. Sure.

Fair enough. Yeah. Evan, thank you so much for joining us. Safe travels to our neighbors in the north. And I did a chain restaurant there. Bring us back some opinions. I'll stop at a Tim Horton's just for you guys. All right.

Oh, that's nice. Take care, Susser. Fuck you, Susser. All right. 2016 Olympics Susser Games coming in August. I'll look for more details on that soon. And I'm just going to say, if you're excited for that, you are a complete fool. All right.

Let's introduce our guest who has been waiting very, very patiently. Uh-huh. The writer for the Boondocks. Party over here in Black-ish. The great Yamara Taylor. Hi, Yamara. Hi, guys. Thanks so much for coming.

Thanks for having me. So you were sitting through... First of all, me messing up with my phone, then having to hear an echoey Evan Susser. Sorry about that. That was delightful. I'm so happy to have heard all that. And your mom sounds so cute. And you call her mom.

I know. I can't fix it. I'm trying to fix it. It just doesn't work. You don't have to fix it. It just doesn't work. Yeah. She was like, well, I told Nick this.

I paid $450 for my driver's side mirror to be fixed. Yeah. And I called her and they... This is at the dealership and they didn't seal it. They didn't seal the damn driver's side mirror. So she might be calling me about that or she's calling about her visit. Wait, you get your mom involved in this? Yeah, because I mean, like, what are you supposed to do?

Well, I don't know what to do. Call mom. I mean, yeah, sure. I'm a grown man calling my mom. That's embarrassing. But I don't know who else to talk to. I can't talk to the fucking kittens about it at my house. I gotta talk to somebody, you know?

You have kittens at your house. I have kittens. I have two kittens at my house and they're hanging around and they're doing great. Around, like, in your house or just around your house? In my house. Oh, okay. So you own kittens? I own two kittens.

Yeah. I took them to the vet today. They were great. They're doing well. Yeah. Healthy as ever. While you're at the vet, did you ask if they can put you down? I asked the vets if they would put me down.

Yeah, yeah. I wish. I wish it was that easy. No, I should. I'll ask next time. We're gonna have to order some extra tranquilizer. Here's what I'll do. I'll go in.

I'll strip my clothes off and I'll start barking around the floor of the veterinary's office and see if they'll put me down. I think you can easily pass for a man-sized dog. You're from LA. I'm from LA. Where exactly in LA did you grow up? Yeah. Pico Fairfax area.

Gotcha. Bowen Hills area. So growing up in LA, it's a big food city and you're something of a foodie now. You and your husband, Ryan Meharry, are big foodies, I'd say. We talk about food at work a lot. What were your food tastes as an Angelino? Oh, tacos. Right.

That was a big one in burgers, I think were the two. It is a big burger city. It's a big burger city. There's what we know in Los Angeles as the burger boom, which happened in 2007 or 2008. That was when Umami came onto the scene and then there was a bunch of different places that had these kind of artisan burgers. Oh, yeah. I didn't think of that.

You've never, you've been to Umami and stuff, right? Yeah, but I didn't get into that gourmet burger until I was in my 30s or something. Growing up in LA, it was just like your burger stand for you could get a full meal for $2. Is there a Hawkins burger? There's these older, old school burger spots that I've never been to but I've heard good things about. Yeah, there's Hawkins and there's more better meat burgers. Oh, we just went there a couple months ago. It was really good.

It used to be around the corner of my house when I lived off Pico. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So burgers have always been, they've always kind of been one of the big things about LA. Yeah. I think there's a lot of the local chains that have, like Fat Burger, which we'll talk about in a bit, but there are these local chains that have gotten big and gone nationwide, but there are also these local institutions, these sort of shack places.

The Long Beach equivalent to Twets in LA is there's Dave's burgers and it's just this little shack. The original location is this little shack that's on the same lot as a gas station and it would just be like a 30-person line every lunch hour because it's just a place where you can go and get a super good loaded char-grilled burger or flamborille burger. And yeah, it is like a thing, I think there's a big LA thing of loading up a burger, just putting a bunch of shit on it. You like a lot of stuff on your burger. I get that.

And at Fat Burger, which we'll talk about later, Nick, relax. You have that option to load up that burger with whatever the hell you want. And I like that. I say if it works in the equation, put as much stuff as you can on there. Yeah, yeah. Do you like pink sat-dog? I know, I feel like pinks is like one of the things that LA is known for. Yeah.

I don't love it that much and I don't even feel like locals like it. I had a pink sat-dog story. Me and my girlfriend went because, you know, they always have these lines. Yeah. So we were, had to be maybe like 19 or 20. And so we're like, we're going to go to pinks and we're going to get this hot dog and it's going to be the best. And so we both got chili dogs and then we didn't have anything to do that night.

So we drove up to the Hollywood sign with our chili dogs. We hiked up. We like hopped up fence with the chili dogs and hiked up to the Hollywood sign, got up there and had to shit so bad. We ate them in the dark. It was like a mountain and it immediately had to shit. And they weren't good. They were like, not delicious and kind of cold and awful.

We were like, what are we doing? Neither of us had boyfriends. It was like a Saturday night. What is a nightmare being stranded when you without access to a, ready access to a restroom? Oh yeah. We talked about it on here with Jack, the story with me and Jack Allison, where I pulled over to the side of the road. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. And he, yes. And he laughed and like, like one of the weasels from Roger Rabbit. Almost laughed himself to death at me. Yeah. That is, that's an awful experience. And I guess maybe that speaks to, to pinks quality maybe.

Pinks whole thing is there because they're like, it's such a triumph of marketing. Like they've got like this huge sign and they've got like this, they've set up their line so it will basically always be visible from the street, from Fairfax, right? It's a very, very busy, heavily trafficked street. But yeah, everything, I've never actually been there because everyone I know who's been there has been like, yeah, it's not that good. You've never been to pinks? I've never been to pinks because every, every impression I've got from anyone I know,

especially anyone who likes food is just like, yeah, don't bother. It's not, it's not very good. Yeah, they're right. For you, what, when you just had the 4th of July, this podcast is going to come a couple of weeks after that. I drank for a couple of days in a row, which I haven't been doing much and I got myself sick, but I still indulged in plenty of barbecue food and, and I want to ask, what's your favorite like, cookout food?

Are you, are you like, are you, are you like a hamburger or I need to have a cheeseburger? Are you going to do a hot dog? Are you going to do a sausage on the grill? And Nick, that goes for you too. What's, what's happened? What's popping at your 4th? Hashtag, what's popping at my 4th? What, what, what, what do you like to try?

I feel like if I'm swimming, I always want a hot dog for summer and then like water. I like, I think when I was a kid, we go to the beach all the time and that's what we would have hot dogs. Right. There's always like a little hot dog stand. That is funny. You know what? I kind of, I feel like a hot dog is like a hot dog is like a beach food.

I guess, yeah. Probably because like there's like clam shacks and hot dog shacks or something like that. It's, it's very much a beach food. Yeah. I feel like it, I understand the connection. I feel like if we're talking about my grill preferences, I feel like I want, I want to burger off the grill. Like I actually usually like, actually really like a, you know, just a burger with a nice

sear on it. I'm not necessarily always like, oh, I want that barbecue burger, but I feel like if I'm in the cookout scenario, that's what I tend to be craving. Yeah. If I'm in someone's backyard, I want a burger. Yeah. If someone's working the, if someone's working the grill, I want, I want to eat a grilled cheeseburger at some point during the day.

But that's it, huh? No, like, no shish kabob or something weird for you? No. I don't have any exotic choices. I mean, my steak or anything like, I mean, like steak is a grill food. Yeah. There's not many grill foods. I feel like, well, like if I'm going to prepare a steak, I will have, and if I'll go to a steak

house, I'll usually go to a place that'll do like a pan sear, like a pan roasting. Oh, okay. But I think like, but growing up, my dad would always make steaks on the grill outside. Yeah. And so that's how I came accustomed to it. But I really do just like a nice, a nice sear on them. And you usually get that from that cast iron skillet. Oh, all right.

I didn't know that. If you're grilling, here's another question. Yeah. You're a gas grill or you do the charcoal or what? Or is it even some other weird answer you have? Everything I've heard is that the charcoal is superior in terms of flavor, but the gas grill was always what we had growing up just for the convenience factor. And I always like going with my dad to fill up the propane tank.

That was a lot of fun. I just went on that errand in Kansas with Ryan. It was the first time I've ever seen that exchange happen. We need a propane. And Yamar, if you were, imagine yourself being a little boy. Do you think you'd be excited by this? They just swapped out the tank. They didn't like fill in the tank.

It's not fun. It's even, even in the olden days, I guess, when they refilled the tanks, it still was not fun. Here's what I liked about it. It was like a big, heavy tank that I get to help my dad lift. Oh my fucking god. And then we got to go on an errand together and retrieve the new tank. Again, then I knew when we went home and hooked it up, we're probably going to get something

off the grill later. That's very sweet. Was your dad using that for cooking, or was he going into a room and just opening that tank? My father, George Weiger, was not suicidal growing up. And if he had any sort of issues, it certainly wasn't because of his son, which you're no doubt implying. Daddy, let's change the gas in the thing again.

No, it's already done. Hold on. I got a reply to Evan Susser sent both of us a very needy text. Did I do bad? Oh my god. Should I just text him yes? I'm going to text him yes. I said yes.

Okay. Oh, that is, that's a, what a loser. That's pathetic. Can we cancel the games? Cookouts, burgers, tacos. Let's talk fine dining a little bit, because I know you like to go to a nice restaurant. What is your favorite fine dining establishment in the city or in general? Let's do city.

I want people to go. Sure. Well, we do have listeners nationwide. Oh. I don't know. Well, 11 Madison Park in New York is probably maybe one of the best places. I feel like it's on a world list somewhere. Yeah.

Okay. 11 Madison Park? I feel like I've heard of it. And you do like an 18 course dinner and it's insane. When's the last time you went there? Last, gosh, maybe like last fall, I think. Gotcha. You've been to French Laundry before too, right?

You know what? We've been to French Laundry for like a, they had like some kind of like tasting event, but we have gift cards to French Laundry for dinner that we've had for three years that we can't use because you can never get a reservation at French Laundry. Yeah, that's crazy. That's ridiculous. And that's, if you're not familiar with French Laundry, it's Thomas Keller's restaurant. Thomas Keller is the celebrity chef who famously helped prepare the dishes that Pixar animated in Ratatouille.

And he's, it's like, it's supposed to be one of the best restaurants in the country. I've never been. Yeah. But it's up in Napa, right? If not, maybe that makes it onto a world list. I feel like it's way up there. It should be in a world list. Yeah.

And it's in Napa Valley. To make things even more fancy, it's in Napa Valley. It's like this small little town. Cottage. Yeah. It's pretty there. I've never eaten there. I saw it once.

And like a rat in Ratatouille, they shoot me away with a broom. LA, I like, we're, we're, we're celebrating our one year anniversary. Congratulations. Hey, all right. That's awesome. So we're going to go to Malice in Santa Monica. Oh, Malice is great. Yeah, I've been there.

I went there for an anniversary dinner with my lovely wife. The two of us went there and we spent a lot of money. Yeah. It's very expensive, but it's really, really good. But you know what? It was one of those meals that was so opulent that I can't even like remember individual courses. Yeah. Which looking back on it, it's like, okay, the thing about food was spending money on

food is it's such an expendable thing. It's such a momentary thing. It's the whole idea of like, oh, spend money on experiences, not possessions. Right. Because it's like, oh, that becomes a memory for later on. But like, I, I find when looking back that like a lot of nice meals that I spent a lot of money on, I like don't even remember what I had. Well, also if you're doing wine pairing, you're getting drunk.

Yeah. That's the other thing. Yeah. You really don't remember it. I don't know if I've ever done a wine pairing before. Oh, it's so fun. I should try it. Yeah.

I would go by myself and not be able to record it most likely. Well, you can, a lot of restaurants do it, even if it's not offered on the menu. They'll still like pair your wine. What is it like? You already have like three glasses or three servings of wine? Depends on the courses. Yeah. Depends on how many courses you're having.

Yeah. I've had a, we went to, have you been to Providence? Yeah. That was like one of the other places we were considering. Yeah. I went to, I've been to Providence and we got the wine pairings there and that was like, you know, it was like six or eight courses and you get a glass of wine with each course. And even if it's a half glass, it's still like just a substantial amount of alcohol you're

having throughout the meal. And I was just like halfway through, just completely fucked up. Oh yeah. And it's just like, it's one thing of like, you gotta think of like, oh, the classiness of a fine dining establishment, but then it just be like blitz. Like you're basically, you might as well be in a shitty Irish dive bar, you know, like, and cause you're just like blitzed out of your mind and then you're eating this like sloppily eating this caviar over foie gras, like super expensive, meticulous dish.

And such small portion. Yeah. Yeah. I don't like this mental image of you spilling caviar all over your shirt. I've actually never had caviar either, but hey, I'm on the man of the people, baby. Have you ever had roe with sushi? Yes. Okay.

I think you basically had the same thing. Okay. Fuck you. Here's my question to you. And this is a question to all the listeners, I guess. What would you rather, would you rather have a great, great meal at a fancy restaurant? Hmm. Or would you rather have like your favorite meal at maybe a lower end restaurant?

But I mean, I know that you have. That's a good question. I know you have some of your favorite spots. For me, I think a fancy restaurant is always nice, but I hate, I don't like dressing up. I don't like, like the idea, like if I'm on vacation or something, which I never am. So I don't like, like I haven't gone on vacation with my family in years or whatever, but if I'm on vacation with them and we go out to eat, that's great. And it can be really nice.

And if the food is really, really great than that, that might be the best experience, but I hate dressing up for one. Yeah. And two, like if, like I can just think of some of my favorite foods back home. And I'm just like, man, like going to Pizzeria Regina in the North End, like that might be like my favorite experience out of all of it. Yeah. You know what I mean?

What do you think, Amara? Yeah. I think I would probably choose the fancy meal. Right. Because it's such a, I love dressing up. Yes. Like all I want to do is dress up. I want to see other people dressed up.

And I like the Moose Booge. I like all the little parts of that meal. Yeah. And I like getting drunk. And I like that when you get drunk on good quality wine, you're not hung over the next day, so it's kind of okay. Like I like the whole experience. So I think I would do that.

Because if it's my favorite meal, I'm going to have that. Like I've had it a lot and I'm going to have it again. Right. Yeah. I think there's also two that's like, it's more of a special occasion to go and, you know, unless you're super rich, you're not having like these fine dining experiences. Yeah. All the time.

Exactly. Like every other month maybe, you know, it's not like a super frequent dining experience. Versus like, you know, a sloppy slice of a za, you can get basically whenever you want. Yeah. But yeah, let us know what you think. I use the hashtag food snob or food slob. Oh God. That sucks.

I think it was fine. I think it met the threshold of fine, which is all this podcast ever needs to be. Yeah. Our podcast is just fine. If we're not embarrassing ourselves, we're succeeding. Well, I don't know about that. I think we embarrassed ourselves multiple times over on this podcast. So let's get into fat burger a little bit.

Okay. So when did you start? Wait, hold on. One second. Go for it. You just, you steamrolled my car issues at the beginning of the show. And I just, if anyone out there has any car advice for me, because I can't be talking to my mom about this tweet at me.

I'll tweet out a picture of my car, but fuck you for not helping me out. Did you not have a mechanic? I, because I bought a car from the dealership. So I've been stuck with like, I had to deal with them forever for like the last four years. Right. Now it's over with finally. So I can go to another place, but I was, I was stuck with them for a long time. And the mirror is just a weird thing.

You've had a lot of issues with this car because you've had it for a while and you've had a lot of mechanical problems. I had a lot of mechanical problems and I bought it from that place. So that was a part of the issue. So yeah, I don't know. My dad has passed away. I don't know who to talk to about car stuff anymore. No, you know, like our parents' generation, like I feel like every guy knew how to work

on a car. Yeah, they know what it turned around. I don't know what they're doing. Yeah. There's also this feeling that your mom can fix everything, I feel like. Sure. Like I call my mom for stuff. I get it.

Like as soon as something goes wrong, I think I call her. Yeah. You're supposed to call. That's what they're there for. You're supposed to call mommy. Right. Yeah. Sure.

I'm not pathetic, right? Just not for it. Like you don't have to call your mom because you dropped some fruit snacks on the floor. We can live a major life issue. I think it's fine. She'll get under the hood when she comes out here in August. Yeah. You think your mom is going to single handedly fix your car?

Sure. Personally? Sure. I went to lunch with my brother a few years ago and it was just he and I and a cap on his tooth. He took a bite of something and cap on his tooth fell off and he immediately called his girlfriend. I was like, I'm right here.

Do you have just the one brother? No. I have four older brothers and older sister. So you're the baby? I'm the baby. Oh my God. How was that? Did that, did that, my question, because I just had an older sister.

Okay. And if you have that many older brothers and sisters, are you like when you're having family meals and stuff like that, are you getting like the bottom of the barrel shit? Yeah. I learned to eat really fast because when they finish their food, they move on to my food. So I, I like inhale food. I have to like make myself chew.

Oh man. Yeah. Do you still like, did that, does that affect your eating habits nowadays? Yeah. Cause I just, I'm like full way before I know I'm full cause I'm just inhaling it. You're just wolfing it down. Yeah. So I had to start doing intuitive eating where you like mindfully eat your food and stop

when you're full. Like I read a book about it and just started practicing that and it helped. But we just ate and I inhaled my meal. I don't, I don't think I chewed. So what were, what were dinners like in your house growing up? Like what was like a, what would be the average like family dinner night? Well, we all didn't live together at the same time. Like my sister's 14 years older than me and she didn't live with us.

And then one of my brothers is like 10 years older than me and he didn't live with us. So I think like with three brothers and me and then my mom, just chaos. It was just everybody in and out of the kitchen. Like it was never, like we got called to meal time. But everybody, like we either like all sat down cause we wanted to hang out a little bit cause everybody's like 18 months apart. Or we'd all take our plate and go to the television and where everybody went to their separate room and stuff like that.

What shows were you watching when you were eating dinner? Cause I have a couple. Really? Yeah. We were watching, it was usually Sundays. It was like in living color and the Simpsons and Tracy Allman. I remember that. I remember that Sunday lineup so, so well.

It was great. It was a great lineup. It was a great lineup. Do you remember that, um, that TV show that was like the black dad and the white mom? What was it? And he was a dentist. I can't remember the name. Was it on Fox?

It was on Fox. And it was like around the Herman head, Herman's head. Oh yeah. He was a dentist? He was like a black dentist and he had a white wife. I think it was, was it called True Colors? It was something like that. Oh, maybe the True Color sounds very familiar.

I think it was called True Colors. It sounds like the name of a show. Yeah. I think the whole premise was just like, he married a black man. Herman's head, which the premise was he has people inside of his head. And it wasn't Lisa Simpson on that? Yeah. Yeah.

Yearly. Yeah. Yearly Smith. She was the, but she wasn't in his head. She was the secretary in the real world. And then inside his head was, I don't remember any of the actors. Oh, okay. My Cub Scout troop as a fundraiser.

I didn't attend, but as a Cub Scout, this was a common fundraiser in Southern California. You may have experienced this is rounding up like you're the baseball team or the Boy Scout troop and taking them to a TV taping. Oh yeah. And then they'll pay, the production company will pay like 40 bucks a head for every person you bring because they just need warm bodies in the audience to, you know, have the audience reactions. So that my Cub Scout pack went to go see a taping of Herman's head. Oh my God. And you and other Cub Scouts went to a taping of Herman's head. I didn't go to this one.

I did go to the Family Feud taping, but I did not go to the Herman's head taping. Why did you go to the Herman's head taping? That's a great story. I think I could. I just like, I don't, I think the schedule didn't work. I don't know. I don't remember. I just know that I wasn't able to attend this, but I did hear the story from my dad who did attend that the fat guy.

Where'd your dad go? I don't, my dad, I have an older brother. He took my older brother. Jesus Christ. Okay. My dad didn't go with a bunch of Scouts and not me. Okay. That wasn't what my childhood was.

Your dad was wearing one of those classic wagger spinny hats. I guess you guys know all your little adventures. He, but they went to, they went to the Sherman's head taping. And there was like a fat guy in Herman's head. I don't remember what his role was. Yeah, I remember him. A wolf. He's not listening.

He was, was he anger? Probably. He was like, yeah, it was whatever the, whatever's an inside out was the same thing. Yeah, it was basically an inside out. It's an inside out. Herman's head is just inside out. It's inside out with a man. Yeah.

Inside out really? Yeah. It's basically it, yeah. But anyway, so like the fat guy in that, this is not a great story. I don't know why I went down this road. The thing my dad told me was that was the standout was that a fat guy was supposed to burp and then he couldn't burp. Oh.

So he had to like, he kind of. That's so depressing. He had to keep drinking sprites like before each take and they'd have to do the whole scene. He was supposed to burp at a certain cue and he just couldn't deliver. And there's like a group of children were sitting there waiting for the fat guy to burp. I feel his pain, whoever he is. Such a thing of like you're like a theater, you like go to, you know, you get your MFA and fine arts.

Julia, yeah. Yeah. You get your MFA in theater and then you end up like being the fat guy burping on a sitcom. Wait, well, I want to hear what people, because a big one for me on a nightly basis was Jet 30. Right. And that was, and we would just watch that as a family. I would get every single question wrong like I still do. Yeah, me too.

But hit us up, hashtag TV dinner. I want to know what you're. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Very well played. Thank you. We didn't, we never watched TV during dinner. We always just sat at the dining table in silence.

You guys have a lot to talk about? We are. Chattie. I do, you know what? I do have a Chattie family. I'm kind of the quiet, the quiet youngest son. Dad, tell the Herman heads story. Yeah.

And my mom and dad and brother are very, very boisterous. Oh, wow. Yeah. I did not expect that. That's funny. Yeah, so I sort of just like internalized all that and became an observer. Oh, cool. I think I did the same thing.

I think I'm more of an observer. Well, let's get back into, sorry for taking us off on this wild tangent. Let's get into Fat Burger, shall we? Yeah. I mean, this podcast is known for its laser focus on the topics. So, all right, so Fat Burger. So, Yamaro, when did you first go to Fat Burger? Because for me, like, I didn't go until I moved to L.A.

I think they are in the, maybe they weren't when I was growing up in the Long Beach Lakewood area. There might have been some, but like it wasn't a place I knew about until I got into, until I actually moved to the L.A. city limits. And now here they're kind of ubiquitous. Right. My brothers and sister, like, I had, my love affair with food was basically through them. Like, they would go to all these cool. They were, like, older.

So, to me, any place they ate was cool, you know, anyway. Right. And they would get to come home with takeout. But I had to eat, like, our normal food that my mom cooked for us. So, they would come home with Fat Burger and it was always just me, like, can I get a bite? You guys didn't get me anything. Like, they never brought me anything. So, every now and then they would treat me and bring me, like, a Fat Burger and some Fat

Fries and, like, so I can't remember specifically when I had it. But I know probably, like, 12. Gotcha. 12, 13. Right. Yeah. What's your standard order from a Fat Burger? Like, what's your, what's your favorite thing to get there?

Uh, what I got today, a charbroil turkey burger. I used to get it with egg. Mm-hmm. Everything on it, no onions and Fat Fries. They do do a good turkey burger. They do a good turkey burger. Because I feel like there's a lot of, there was that turkey burger period when I was like, oh, turkey burgers are healthier.

And then they kind of just sort of became an alternative to beef because now they're, I think, nutritionally, people kind of consider them equivalent. But it's one of the places where I think it's worth it to get a turkey burger just on, just for a difference in flavor that's actually, it's like a well done one. You know, it's like, it's not like a, It's not dry. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

The turkey burger is just like a less good beef burger. They do, they do a good job. The turkey burgers are not, I've had the turkey burgers a couple times and they are not dry. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything. Their veggie burgers are really good. Yeah, I've heard that as well. I've never had their veggie burgers. People rave about their, about their veggie burgers.

The burger's good, you guys. The fat burger is good. I agree with that. And I will hold a lot of thoughts on it, but I really, really enjoy fat burger. Yeah. And also, it's funny to me that it's just called Fat Burger. Yes. Which is a funny name.

And this Yancy lady is, was it Yancy? Yancy, I think her first name was Lovey or last name's Yancy. Oh, Yancy, yeah. What a cute name. Miss Yancy does a great, she did a great, like to make that burger stand like, what, 60, 70 years ago or whatever it was? Yeah, 47, 69 years ago. Yeah, that's impressive to name it Fat Burger.

It was always called Fat Burger? Yeah, so I looked up the name a little bit and she explained that it was, as I said in the intro, she explained it was because it was like a burger that was so filled with, filled with everything that it would be like an meal in and of itself. But it was originally named Mr. Fat Burger. Oh. And she went into business with her boyfriend and then they split up and she just went out on her own, dropped the mister and it just became Fat Burger.

I kind of like that too. She dropped the mister. She dropped the mister, that's great. That's very funny. That's like her version of Hollywood land. Yeah. The land. Well, like the, it's like the mister was up there and then the rocketeer flew into the

mister part of the sign and just made it into Fat Burger. And then he continued on and knocked over the land part of the Hollywood land sign. I'm sure that was a great Cub Scout trip when you went and saw that movie. Mr. Fat Burger is pretty good too. So even when they dropped it, she didn't, she, that's a great job for, for something that's almost 70 years, about to be 70 years old. It really is a thing because I remember, I don't think I've told this on the podcast before, but I remember talking with you about Fat Burger previously, Mitch, and that I first

learned about it via a news report. They had like a report on the, I don't remember the exact specifics of it, but it was one of those local news stories where they were like, Fat Burger is the talk of Ella, you know, and it was just like a local news report. And I thought it was a new place. I didn't realize it was like this long established place that they were doing sort of just like a color piece on. But I remember the name being like funny.

I was like, Fat Burger, like what? Like Fat Burger? Cause like Fat was, the 90s, Fat was like so unhealthy and so not anything you'd want to have associated with your food. We were just figuring out what Fat was then. Yeah, exactly. And it's like, but it's like. Unless it was pH Fat, which is also big.

That pH Fat was bigger on that time. I also remember around that time is when skinny fries came out when Fat Burger did skinny fries. Yeah, cause they've got the fat fries and the skinny fries. And there's a big difference between, like the fat fries I think are like four to eight times thicker than the skinny fries. Delightful steak fries is how I describe them. Well, there's a lot of talk about that.

Yes. Specifically, I'm going to quickly say that my introduction to Fat Burger was from the, today was a good day from Ice Cube. I didn't, in that song he sings about three in the morning got the Fat Burger. Oh yeah. And so I had never, I'm an East Coast guy. I had never, and I knew that song. I didn't really know what, I knew it was just like a West Coast, California chain.

So I had never tried it, but I liked Ice Cube and I was interested in it. And then when I came out here, I was like, oh, Fat Burger. I think I actually didn't know if it was pH or, or F or even, I think maybe even at one point I was like, oh, he's just talking about like, he got that fat. I think I maybe I even thought it was like a sexual term. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. Or if it was like, like a thing where he just went and got like a big, a big fat juicy burger

somewhere. So I like, I didn't know, I didn't know what it meant, but I was, I was excited when I like came out here, I was like, oh, this is an actual chain where you can eat a Fat Burger. And, and, and, and, and that's, that, that is all my, my history with it. And coming out here, it was like all in and out burger was like the, the, the thing that you heard people talk about. Yeah. And, and when I tried Fat Burger, I like it more than I like in and out burger.

Wow. I like Fat Burger more than I like in and out burger. It's a heartier burger. These are very strong opinions. I really think I like Fat Burger. It's, it's, it's what it's. So this was too much to drop maybe right off the bat, but it's so, it's very, very good. It's really good.

I, I can understand someone liking it more than in and out burger, even though I disagree. But it is like in and out burger is such like kind of a pristinely composed burger, especially if you get like one of their double doubles, like it's like a really well constructed sort of burger. And I feel like the Fat Burger is such as like a sloppy pile, but it's, but it is very, very tasty. So they're, they're kind of different experiences. I think they're also like a, the Fat Burger is a little bit more expensive.

I mean, it's more like a, like a six or seven dollar burger versus like a three or four dollar burger. Yes. A little bit of a price difference there. The burger, okay. So also it doesn't mean the whole restaurant is better than in and out burger. Right. Because that's another side of it too.

But the steak fries at Fat Burger are so good. They're so good. And when they're done, like when, and it's like one of the few places where you can get big, fat fries, steak fries that are cooked well and you can't get that any, like anywhere. Yeah. They do tend to get stuck in your throat sometimes. They're super starchy. They're so big.

So I think that both of you, the both of you prefer the thicker fry to a skinnier fry, just in general. I, I, it depends on where the fries from. Gotcha. I don't think Fat Burger does a good skinny fry. Oh, interesting. It's like too, there's something about it that's like too crispy. It's like the difference between a Burger King fry and a McDonald's fry.

Yeah. And I feel like like Burger King fries to me are just not good. They're not like, I like a wiry kind of floppy fry. Yeah. Sure. These ones are, these ones are more stick-like. They're like stick-like. Yeah.

Like pick up sticky fry. Right. Um, yeah. I mean, I like their fat fries, but I just, here's the thing, I don't like steak fries in general are too thick and too starchy. I have, you have to eat them one at a time. I like the part of what I like about fries, you can pick up a few at once and have them at once.

So when I'm at Fat Burger all off for the skinny fries, my wife, my wife disagrees with me. She goes with the fat fries and that's fine. It's okay for people have differences of opinions, but I'm just saying I would usually go skinny. Here's the thing. The thing with this, with this fries being over starchy, I don't, that's why I like the Fat Burger fries is because they're not too over starchy to me.

Like I feel like, I feel like they're very crispy, but they're like not super packed with like potato. Yeah. That's exactly what it is. Yeah. It's not like this sort of thing of like the texture of it and the crunch is so good. And I'm not like, it's not like biting into like a potato bite or like a potato, like there's none of that feeling.

Like it still feels like a french fry to me. You can reach in that bag and you can get a very hearty thick fry, but that's not too starchy. If it's still like hearty, or you can reach in like usually towards the bottom of the bag and you'll get like a nice kind of hollow crisp fry. Oh, those are my favorite. And those are the best. The little fry cocoons are the best version of them, the ones at the bottom of the bag

that are kind of like, like a lot of the potato is gone. Yeah. It's just this greasy shell. Yeah. It's just a greasy shell. That's kind of, I think, part of the delight of an order of fries. It's kind of like the mixed jelly bean phenomenon, but a much more muted version of it of like you never quite know what you're going to get.

And sometimes you get those perfect ones, they're like, oh yeah, this is great. And so they're all going to be fries, but sometimes you get those ones that are just like the right combination of salt and crispness and oil and potato and they just come out so perfectly that they're just like, it's the same sort of thing when you're eating a sandwich and you just get like, if you get two or three perfect bites, you're just like, oh man, this is what it's all about. Can I tell you the best fries that I've had recently? Go for it.

Cactus tacos. Really? They have an amazing fry. Wow. It's really good. It was unexpected. Really? Yes.

Just regular fries. Are they not thicker? Are they? They're like, they're not very thick. They're like, they're bigger than the fat burger skinny fry. Right. But they're smaller than the fat burger fat fry. And they're like long and there's like some softness to them so you can grab a few

and then dunk them in some ketchup. They're so good and they give you like this big container of them. Right. It's amazing. I've never, I've had the California burrito at Cactus which has fries in it. But I've never done, I've never done like a side order of fries before. I just got a side order of fries at like midnight and it was like so satisfying. Wow.

Cactus is so, it's one of my favorite places in LA. It's so good. It's loved on, people sleep on it. So we should announce too that we're going, we're going to be at Comic-Con, right? Should we announce that? Should we announce that? We can do that, right? Yeah, but I think by the time this episode's out, by the time this episode's out it will

have already happened, I think. Yeah. Right? No, will it really? Wait, hold on. It's in August, isn't it? Oh, no, wait. Oh, you're right.

It's going to be over. Yeah, no, it's in July. It's like next week. Oh, fuck. No, actually, you know what, Mitch? This episode will come out the same day, I'm looking at my calendar, this episode will be released the same day as the panel. Hey, get your ass over to Comic-Con.

A week. If you're just learning now, if you're at Comic-Con, get to Hall H by 2.15 p.m. if you're listening to the day this release. We'll be there getting asked zero questions. We'll be there sitting quietly while everyone asks Dan Harmon about Harmon Town and about community. And Weigur will wander off into the Rogue One room. But there's a California burrito place on the way down there that you and I are going

to have to try. It's really good. I don't know if there's any spots in San Diego either, but yeah, tweet at us, I guess, since we're down there. Tweet at us on some sort of local San Diego spots. Yeah, get us some San Diego spots. Hashtag, San Diego spots. Oh, my God.

I didn't feel like putting the effort into that. My God. You know what, I think our intern, Yu Song, who's out there, hi, Yu Song. He's waving, yeah. We should give him the task of just being on deck with hashtags when our brains aren't working, which is most of the time. He just buried his head into the couch. He already feels so demeaned at this job and rushed to give him another task.

It's a fun creative job. When I was at the Simpsons, they let me tweet as Homer a couple of times. Did they really? Yeah. Did it go well? What kind of joke do you have, you fucking asshole? I mean, that explains why Homer was so upset about the flight gate. You fucking asshole.

I thought you were going to insult my intelligence, so I'm happy you didn't. Oh, that would have been a better angle. Why does Homer seem extra dumb? All right, great. I'm glad you worked it out. Yeah, I got to tweet as Homer a couple of times. So this is like that for you, Yu Song. It's going to be great.

He's leaving. He quit. He's storming out. He's storming out of the room. Oh, well. Back to Cornell for him. Let's get into our meal a little bit. Okay.

Also, just to go for a cover. One last quick side note. In that drop I played, there was a weird thing about Quincy, and I got to find out what that meant because I'm going to forget if I don't mention it now, where we was talking about there's a news report about Quincy. Whoever's dropped that was explained what was happening. I think that was viral marketing for Independence Day resurgence. Wait, really?

Yeah, I think there was a strange buzz over Quincy, and it turns out to be. You know how in the movie, which you've seen, that the aliens come down, and they're like, we got to erase this shitstain from the earth, and they immediately nuke Quincy, and then all of America cheers. They're like, hero aliens. But then they turn on everyone else, and they're like, oh no. Weiger. Quincy's a beautiful place.

God damn it. I don't know if you've seen The New Independence Day. I have not. Oh my dear God. Is it bad? Listen, I don't even care about it. I didn't even care about it going in, but it may have been the worst big blockbuster movie I've ever seen in my entire life.

Wow. It didn't even make any, like it was weird and confusing and so bad. It felt like Starship Troopers like Five or something. Right. Wow. I mean, it was so bafflingly bad and weird. Like Direct to Video Calibre. Direct to Video Calibre, yeah.

People were so mean to Batman vs. Superman. Can I just say, I hate to get into this again. It's not, that movie's not that bad. I'm a BBS Defender. You fell asleep? I fell asleep. Well, it is like three hours. I'm a parakeet.

I fall asleep as soon as it goes dark. Right. Really? Yeah, any theater, I can't help it. I think I have an arc of love scene. I do. Right? I think so.

I do. You might. I don't sleep anywhere. Because I love movies. That would drive me nuts. I love going to the movies. That's one of my favorite things to do on the shitty earth. In this movie, I would have rather fallen asleep through.

But people, I think Independence Day maybe has a better Rotten Tomatoes score than fucking Batman vs. Superman. People were too harsh on BBS. I think it's very, it's a little, it drags a little bit, it's a little boring, but it's very watchable. They don't want to get any points by calling it BBS. I think it sounds cool. All right.

Cool. Let's talk about Fat Burger a little bit. So the three of us went together before this recording session. We met at the, with one of the Burbank locations. And I feel like the service there is, I mean, it's counter service, but they're always friendly and they bring you your meal to your table. I've never had a bad experience with a service at a Fat Burger. I feel like they always do a good job.

Yeah. I've been to so many different ones around town and at different times of the day. It depends. But like right after I had Reagan, I was faced with the drive-thru by my mom's house. She lives in Baldwin Hills and there's a Fat Burger there, the Magic Johnson one. And so we went through the drive-thru and normally they wear gloves to like, to do your lettuce and tomato and stuff and the girl wasn't wearing gloves and it freaked me out for some reason.

Oh boy. Yeah. And I stayed in the line and didn't know what to do because it was like, I pulled it through like the prism of having a kid. So I'm like, I have to stand up for my burger because if this were my kid, then like, what would I do? Right. You know what I mean?

So like, I like to sit there for a while and then accept it the burger and set nothing. That's what I would have done. Yeah. And on the way home, I was like, man, I let Reagan down. I'm never going to stand up for her. I let a stranger disrespect my food. So I called and I like very meekly was like, um, excuse me, they weren't wearing gloves and they gave me, they gave me a coupon.

That worked out. Yeah. And wait, did Reagan eat this burger or was this your own burger? No, she was like, she was like six months old. Oh, okay. You were thinking ahead though to a future scenario where this happened. It's like, because, because we tend to like just let strangers get away with bad behavior. Right.

And it's like, well, I can't do that anymore because I'm a parent. Yeah. So now I have to like, so this was like my first like, I got to stand up for myself. This is where I start. And that was the cause I chose. Yeah. Like me with my kittens, but way more serious. Yeah.

Yeah. You can, yeah. You can map it over kittens. Yeah. I would give the burger to them still. Um, I, so here's an issue with that burger is that they're all individually owned, right? Uh, I, you know, I think they're, I mean, I think they're franchised. They're franchised.

But it is, but isn't there a weird thing with, this is what I've always been explained to me is that the reason why there can be a really bad fat burger is because each of them are like individually owned. Oh, they're individually owned and operated. Yes. So they don't have like a, the parent company isn't like very hands on with each location. Yes. That's, that's, that's what I've heard before.

And so there can be, there can be good fat burgers and there can be pretty bad fat burgers. But I'll tell you, the one we walked into tonight didn't look like the best fat burger. Right. For sure. It, it, it looked like, uh, on the level of good and bad fat burgers, it was, uh, it was, it was, it was a, it was a dumpy one, I would say closer to the dumpy side, right? Sure. They had no, remember they had no salt and pepper in their shakers.

Yes. Yeah. They had fakers. They were all decoys. And it seemed a little sticky on the floor. It was sticky on the floor. Yeah. Yeah.

It wasn't the clean. It was the service from the atmosphere, because they're not always the cleanest establishments. They're not. No. Right. The floors were, say, as sticky as a teenage Nick Weigar's floor. I think I was jacking off onto my floor. What kind of monster do you think I am?

Also, it makes me think you grew up with, like, laminated floors or something. Yeah. Yeah. It's probably more accurate. It's from almost getting down plastic. I'm just dropping cum loads all the time. Jesus Christ. This one was, you've got to admit, it felt a little bit like I'm not a great fat burger.

Yeah, it got you. It's fine. It's fine. We also went in, like, into the day. Yeah. So, they could have just given up at, like, four. Yeah, they may have given up. Yeah.

Yeah. Still, the food was very, very good. Yes. Well, let's get into what we each got. Yep. So, I got the, I usually opt for a burger there. I got something which I don't normally have because just a couple weeks ago, actually, I had had a fat burger and so I have a very recent memory of one of those.

But I got a, this visit, I got a crispy chicken sandwich with cheese, which is their fried chicken sandwich. I got, and I got an order of onion rings and also an order of chili cheese, skinny fries. And then for my, my drink, I asked for recommendation on a shake. And the guy said his favorite shake was the chocolate Maui banana shake, which was a, a sort of a alchemist concoction. It's not officially on the menu. Can I also say that that was weird that you asked for a, for a shake recommendation?

Why is that weird? Oh, there's like six shakes. Employees have their favorites. I asked him what his favorite was. And then he gave you the equivalent of, like, a, like, a coke and orange, like, orange soda mixed together. I think he was trying to be cool and give you like a secret menu item or something. Yeah.

I think that's fine. Because I feel like though, I feel like employees will usually be, food service employees will usually be fairly candid in terms of what's good and what's bad. If you, if you press them on it. Cause they don't want you to have a bad experience. So like, I've heard people, they'll just say like, Oh, maybe get this instead. You know what I commend you for?

It's fair to ask. Jesus Christ. I ask, I ask a server, I don't ask what's good anymore. Yeah. I ask, what do people get the most of? Oh, okay. You know what the issue that sometimes I have with that though is that they'll steer you towards kind of the, especially if you're like at a, if you're at like a, like a popular restaurant,

they'll sometimes steer you towards like a very sugary cocktail or something. Cause that's like what's popular. Like, oh, everyone loves this thing. This is our most popular item. And then you'll have it and be like, oh, this is a little too sweet for me. So, um, yeah. But I mean, you can have some success with that. What do you think of the shake?

It was a real good shake. I mean, I thought it was real good. It was pretty good. It was real good. I tasted it. I didn't taste a lot of banana, but I also only took a small sample. Yeah. It wasn't heavy on the banana.

I think they're a mix. They might have been more chocolate than banana. And I usually will prefer a vanilla shake to a chocolate shake, but they do a good shake there. If I'm itching for a shake and a burger combo, I think fat burger is a good place to turn to. I will say this. Yeah.

And hopefully to not anger the ghost of Harambe, but I don't like banana in my chocolate. I like to keep them separate. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You... You... You... You...

You prefixed that with so as not to anger the ghost of Harambe, the girl at the Cincinnati Zoo that was killed with a sniper rifle. Yes. You're tweeting about all the time. I thought that you would maybe... Yeah. At this point, something that will happen two months ago. Wait, what was the one that was just killed the other day?

That was the alligator. Bantu, the gorilla died. Bantu. I thought you meant the alligator. I don't know. I think the alligator got killed. The zoo's... What's going on with zoos?

They're fucking crazy. Everything's going crazy. I saw a baboon escaped. But no, you don't have to worry about angering the ghost of Harambe because you don't like bananas. What? I think I have an intellectual understanding of that. I just want to cover all my bases.

That's all. I don't... I don't like the banana mixed in with... Right. Especially if it's blended... I don't know. I don't need the banana taste. So, you don't like a banana in peanut butter situation?

I like a banana with some peanut butter on it. What about strawberry and banana? A strawberry banana smoothie is kind of different to me. I don't like to specifically get the banana in my chocolate. I feel like a strawberry banana is decent, but I feel like they complement each other better. I wouldn't want to put it in a vanilla shake, a strawberry vanilla shake, but banana and chocolate...

You think they don't mix? Yeah, I just feel like I'm tasting two different things. Right. Yeah. So, you don't do banana splits? I don't do banana... My sister and my mom love banana splits and I never really ate banana splits grown up. Got it.

But even that's a little different, though, too, because don't you just get like a little piece of banana and then there's cream and... It's a little banana. It depends on how you eat your split. I think splits can be good. How are you supposed to eat your split? I don't know. I think it's different for everyone.

I don't eat a lot of splits. Yeah. How do you feel about a chocolate-covered banana? Oh, I've never had one. Really? No, thank you. See, I don't like it. I don't want a chocolate-covered banana.

You know, out there, let us know what you think about combining chocolate and banana. If you like bananas, hashtag go bananas. And if you don't like bananas, hashtag no bananas. Oh, my God. Thanks to you, song, for the assist on that one. He held up a whiteboard to the window outside our studio. Don't blame that terrible hashtag on you, song. God.

Yamara, what did you have at the Fat Burger? I had a charbroiled turkey burger. I had everything on it but onions. I had cheese on it. I had it on a gluten-free bun. Yes. And I got some fat fries. And I got a Diet Coke.

I got a Coke Zero. How did everything come out for you? Good. I was happy. I was surprised by the gluten-free bread. Yeah, what was the texture like of that? It looked good. Very good.

Yeah, it was fine. I was shocked. It was like... Like, I love the softness of a real bun. Of course. You know what I mean? But it was fine. Like, it didn't dilute the experience for me.

Like, it was better than just going protein burger. Right. I felt like. Yeah, I mean, like, gluten-free bread is very hit and miss. And if you can... I mean, that one, like... I think the... Honestly, the look test matters a lot for that.

Because that looked pretty indistinguishable from the sponge dough buns, what they normally have. And fat burger has really good buns. They have good buns. Like, their normal buns are very tasty. I like... I like fat burger buns a lot. Yeah.

But it's not maybe my favorite part of the burger. So, I went off on the tangent of saying, I love fat burger more than I like in and out burger. But I have more thoughts on the burger as a whole, too. Right. So, I got the large fat burger, which is a decent-sized burger with cheese. And I got all the toppings on it. And that's...

What is that? That's tomato, lettuce, onion, relish, mayo, pickles. The works. And yeah, the works and mustard, I believe. I'm amazed that you have that all committed to memory. I think that's what it is. Oh, wait. You're reading that off of a tattoo on your arm, the bento style.

I love the burger meat in the fat burger. It's so good. It is really good. That, to me, is a burger. Yeah. And you're in and out fucking burger patties. Sure. They're good.

Yeah. But that fat burger, like, that's what a fucking burger is. And they don't look... They're not, like, perfectly shaped, either. No. They almost look like you made it at home. Sure. Truly.

And it has, like, the nice crispness from the grill. It looks so good. I got cheese on mine. I was just... I was looking at it and it looked... It's a burger, to me, more so than an in and out is. In and out is just a different thing. It's still a burger.

Don't get me wrong. It's just... It feels kind of like a little, like, California. Like, this is our California kind of style. Yeah. And yeah. I think fat burgers were the parties at. I think in and out is more business casual, that's what I'm saying.

Okay. I like... Okay. I think that's a good... Yes. I like all of these. I'd say I'm a business casual guy and Mitch is a total party animal. Oh, great.

We're both losers there. Eating burgers in the end. I got that and I got myself some fat fries, because I'm with you, Mara, on the fries. You gotta go fat. When you're a fat burger, you gotta go fat fries. I think you're completely wrong in this case. Look, I'll say that I'm in the minority here. I prefer the skinny fries, but I would say, for anyone out there for your made in fat burger experience,

yeah, go with the fat fries. I mean, that's what they're known for. I think you might just not like fries, because you like in and out burger fries. What the fuck are you talking about? Oh, you like in and out burger fries? I do. I like their fries. How do you even...

I don't like fries, because I have different tastes in fries than you. Oh, my God. That's insane. This is the thing that got you the most mad. I'm just... That's ridiculous. I don't like fries. How could you think I don't like fries based on my tastes in different chains fry preparations?

I love fries. Oh, my God. I look, when I get a steak, here's how much I like fries. They're like, you want baked potato, mashed potato, I say, can I get fries? I get fried chicken. They say, you want mashed potatoes? It's like, how about some fries or some potato wedges? Okay.

It's my favorite potato preparation. So you're proof that you like fries, isn't you? Order fries. Yes, I like... Yes, I think that's proof enough. Fine, you have bad taste in fries. I have different taste in fries. All right, fine.

How do you like your fries in that fry light? Yeah, I just get the... No, I get the normal fry. I don't worry about getting the fries well or fried extra well or fried light. Any variation, I just get them as they come. And I think they're fine. I maybe add a little bit of salt because I like my fries salty. And you love chili fries, too.

I do love chili fries, big chili fries. Natalie's rubbed off on it because she's a big chili fry fan. Yeah. And yeah, it seems like you like them, too. That's probably the one part of our marriage that is definitely working is that we both like chili fries. No, I got the chili cheese skinny fries today. And they have to do a really good sort of just dense, meaty chili there.

It's just like a really... At Fat Burger, it's just like... I'm not sure if I love the chili, which is an option to get it on your burger. So you can get an egg or bacon or chili on your burger. Yeah. You're a big... Or all three, you can get all of them. You're a big egg fan on your burger, right?

I like egg on my burger. Yeah. Nick and I were talking, we're not as big on egg. But they do it well at Fat Burger. They do. Because it's not, as we're saying during our meal, they don't give you this over-easy egg where you're getting yolk everywhere. It's like an over-medium egg that's well cooked.

And so you're getting that egg flavor, but you're not getting just a bunch of runny yolk that's going to get all over your hands and totally disrupt your burger. Mm-hmm. Yeah. It's not going to make your burger soggy. Yeah. Yeah. And that's...

And I like it. And then when it... It's that funny thing because I don't like runny yolk all over my burger. Right. But then when you do cook an egg through, it is kind of like, why am I eating this thing? It kind of tastes like... Like, it's hard to even pick up sometimes the taste of it. I will say it's the...

I used to always get it. Every time I went to Fat Burger, I'd get an egg on my burger. And I've kind of like... I think just because every place started doing it, I've kind of gotten less into having an egg on a burger these days. But I think it's a place where they do it really well. It feels like... I used to do it all the time and it started to feel very decadent. Yes.

I was like, oh, I don't need the extra calorie of like an egg on my burger. Yeah. I'm already getting like a big burger. Yeah. It's true. But yeah. So the chili there, it's like a... It's like this very meaty sort of chili.

It's very similar to the Tommy's chili. Tommy's the chain we reviewed with Jim Woods. That kind of just very, very dense, super thick meaty chili. Yeah. I mean, it's a lot. The onion rings, I think, are great. The onion rings. And I think they just do a fantastic job.

They make them fresh every day. They handbread them in store. And yeah, they're really, really good. The first two onion rings I had, they were kind of like the thinner ones at the front. And I was like, oh, these aren't that good. And I remember these being good. And then I had one of the bigger ones at the back and it was really, really good. And I think I just had kind of two of the skimpy or not as good ones at my first taste.

Because they're into the litter. I think fat burger was my first onion ring. Interesting. I think I didn't... I grew up not liking onions. Yeah. And onion rings seemed gross. And I remember like a piece of an onion ring getting stuck in my fries.

Yeah. And that was like at fat burger. And that was my introduction to onion. I think I did... Or I like tried my mom's or something. I was like, oh, this is a nice taste combination. I liked it. I like fat burger.

I remember onion rings. I think the first time I ever had onion rings were with fish and chips. Oh, interesting. Back home. That's like a fish and chips platter back home usually comes with fried fish and then french fries and onion rings. They'll throw a few on there. Wow.

I would say that if they're well done, I sometimes like fries more than onion rings. Not always. I can have fries more often, but really like a well done onion... An ordinary onion ring. Wait, did you mean to flip that? You like onion rings more than fries? That's what I was trying to say. Yeah.

Sorry, I get to flip my head. Yes, if they're well prepared onion rings, I'll take onion rings over fries some time. Not every time. I'll have fries more often, but I like onion rings a lot. I never think to order an onion ring. Hold on a second. You just flipped out on me like crazy because I said you don't like fries. I do like fries.

I just sometimes prefer onion rings. I know. We determined that. Jesus. It doesn't have to be my... You know what? I will always prefer fries over onion rings. Yes.

I think. What do you think out there? If you like rings, use hashtag I'm with Sonic. Oh my God. And I went for the fries, you loser. And if you don't like onion rings, use the hashtag I'm with Dr. Robotnik. No, I knew you were going to say that. Dr. Robotnik doesn't hate the gold rings.

Does he? I don't know. He's trying to stop Sonic who loves rings. Okay, fine. I think the math works out. All right, let's get to our final thoughts on Fat Burger. Fair. So here's how this will work.

Yabara, we'll go around. We'll sort of give our closing argument, our overall assessment of the chain, and then give it a fork rating from one to five forks. Okay. We'll start with you. I am a huge Fat Burger fan. I think it's very nostalgic for me. I'm always going to go.

It's a thing I can crave in the middle of the night and know it'll be there. Yeah. I think the food, what I order is wonderful. I think they do a good burger. I love the Fat Fry. I haven't had the milkshakes, but yours was tasty. Yes. And I think as an overall establishment, I think like it really depends on what time

of night you're going. I think if you get your 2 a.m. Fat Burger, like you're going to get your 2 a.m. Fat Burger experience. Right. Like certain people are going to be in there. But overall, never had a problem with it besides the lady that didn't use gloves. And then as far as my fork rating, how many forks do I get? One to five.

I'm going to give it a, this is tough. For nostalgic sake, I'll give it a, can I do four and a half? Yes, you absolutely can. You can do four and a half. Four forks two times. Wow. Very good score. Four and a half.

Great score. Go ahead, Mitch. If you're going to Fat Burger at three in the morning, which ice cube was, then you're going to have a great Fat Burger experience, especially if you've been drinking a little bit because it's really, really good. And especially if you're off the high of having scored a triple double in a pickup game. So you know what, there was too many highs in that song. Yeah.

There was too much good stuff going on. You should have saw it coming. You should have saw the end coming. Three in the morning, the Fat Burger, like that alone to me is a good day. So I don't know how, he got all that other stuff that he's saying about in the song going on. It's a really great, that's a great day. Yeah.

Yeah. You should retitle that. Speaking of ice cube, he would be proud because I got a lot of his namesake in my ice cold lemonade. Oh, boy. And I want to point that out because their lemonade is fantastic. Yeah. They do a really good...

Is it not just like country time lemonade? No. I think it's in-house lemonade and it's in one of those little fountain buckets that we all love. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's really, really good. And they got slices of lemon floating in there. Their lemonade is fantastic.

I love Fat Burger. I didn't... And I made that clear early on, but here's the thing with Fat Burger and I like it, but it's a very... If you get everything on it, the experience is kind of like... It's kind of like a pickley relishy experience. They put a lot of relish on there. They put a lot of pickles on there.

I love that. But that might turn some people off, but here's the deal. It doesn't turn me off. I enjoy it. And my testament to Fat Burger is that I've been trying to diet and I should have done it tonight, but, and Nick, you know of this, Fat Burger is one of my go-to spots when I'm dieting and eating keto and I'm not doing any carbs and I have nowhere, everywhere else is closed.

Going and getting like a Fat Burger patty or a couple turkey patties. It's so good. The beef is so well done. That grill, I know it's a big greasy grill, but they fried up really nice on there and just the quality of the meat is so good. And the cheese and like that to me, that is a burger to me. And I genuinely do not control you. I do like it better than In-N-Out.

I don't think that it gets the respect that In-N-Out gets. And it's kind of confusing to me. I don't understand why people don't really respect it. And like maybe because In-N-Out is like a little like, I don't know. I think In-N-Out has more, because In-N-Out is like known to be like a very good company that treats their employees very well, like they have other things going for it. I think people just don't, I don't know, I think they don't think about, it's like Astro Burger.

Yeah. Like people don't think to go to Astro Burger. Sure. People go In-N-Out Fat Burger and then if you know about it Astro Burger, so I feel like In-N-Out just has so much going for it that got it known by more people. Are people going to think I'm crazy for thinking Fat Burger is better than In-N-Out? I think it's probably an opinion a lot of people who are familiar with both have. Yeah.

Yes. I don't think people are going to think you're crazy. I don't think you're crazy. I disagree with you, but I don't think you're crazy. It's just that, that big fat, that fat burger patty is so tasty and so good. It's just a testament to eating that alone with no bun is so good and the shakes are good and I love the fat fries and I got to give it five stars. I think, wow, five forks.

I think five rings. I think that a hit on it is something that we talked about earlier of like sometimes the quality of a Fat Burger can be different between locations, but if you're getting the best Fat Burger that there is, it's usually pretty great and I usually don't have a bad experience with Fat Burger. That's a great score. Now, Mitch, think for a second because you said your opinion, you put down In-N-Out Burger, my beloved In-N-Out Burger, my favorite fast food restaurant, neck and neck with Del Taco

and you said you preferred Fat Burger. Think of how insane you would become if instead of me just sort of politely saying like I hear your opinion and I respect it and I disagree, I'd said, what? You don't like hamburgers and I just thrown that in your face and made you defend yourself with this bullshit argument. But you like In-N-Out Fries that are known to not be good. They're good fries, they're known to not be as well liked as some other fries, but they're good fries.

By the way, that's my lemonade shaking in the background, I'm sorry. That's all right. It's just confusing that you would go to Fat Burger and you wouldn't get the fat fries. I like the fat fries, I like the skinny fries more and I like Fat Burger. Fat Burger is really good, it always delivers. I'd say I've generally had a consistent experience, maybe the number of, maybe I've only been to well operated Fat Burgers and maybe I've dodged some of the ones that are a little bit less consistent, but I've always had a good Fat Burger experience.

I love the toppings, I do love the works, I get what you're saying, Mitch, that it can be kind of overwhelming with all the different produce that you get on there, but I do think it's nicely combined, especially if you add some more protein elements like you add the cheese, you add some bacon, you add some chili, you add some, you add the egg maybe. They have great bacon there. They have really good bacon. I think if you load it up a little bit with some more protein, it balances out with all those veggies and I think they kind of anticipate people doing that, which is kind of why they

throw all that stuff on there, but also you can customize it. Like a five guys, you can customize it, the difference is opposed to five guys, they actually have a default burger that they'll give you and they kind of have that at five guys. They kind of have your normal thing you can check out, but it's a little bit different. The crispy chicken sandwich was very impressive, it was really well done, really crispy skin, really moist, well breaded, well balanced, great with the cheese, just a very, very good chicken sandwich and that's a thing like, I think that's a testament to the overall quality of the food there.

It's like good food, I agree with you on the burger patty. Really well prepared, I enjoy their fries, I enjoy their shakes, I enjoy everything about it and I think I am going to say, it's just shy of the perfection that is an out burger, but it's still very, very good. I will also give it four and a half forks, four forks two times. That means that Fat Burger is in the Golden Plate Club, it is also not in the Handholding Club, but it is. It's a two person Handholding Club.

It's a two person Handholding Club and also it's in the Ballpark Buds Club. I have an addition to make to my comment about Fat Burger, I forgot that one thing I really like about it is that you can pick different sizes of burgers, which I think is cool. The location I'm used to going to has a baby fat burger, which is a very small, it's like this big. Oh yeah. You don't see my fingers, but they are making a small circle. They look like a small, yes.

It's just a small burger. You feel like wimpy in Popeye eating it because it's so little and you're just like, oh, glally, pay you Monday, remember this. You're just eating this little burger. Also their lettuce is great. Good lettuce, yeah. I like a shredded lettuce and I also like that they have chili peppers because it makes me feel like I'm at a burger stand and instead of a burger restaurant.

All those elements are great. Also too, you can go big there, you can get like that King Burger, which is huge. Huge. Very, very massive and out stretches outside the limits of the bun. Yeah, fat burger is great. Check it out. And they're everywhere. They're in California, but they're also in Pakistan.

They're in Dubai. They're in Great. They're in Victorville, where we drove to that fucking... By Steak and Shake. What's that? Steak and Shake, yeah. And they're all over Canada, apparently. A lot of them in Canada.

By the way, give it a shot. If there's ever a Popeye's reboot, it's probably going to come down to you and I for the role of wimpy. So, we talked about Herman's Head and Weiger's Head. Yes. Fat burger, it does a job, it just doesn't get it to the... I just want to see what was inside Weiger's Head. If it was like Herman's Head, what would be in Weiger's Head?

Weiger's Head would be like Herman's Head or Inside Out, except instead of four different warring types, it would be four very relaxed guys like me, all sort of nodding in agreement. We're on the same page. Oh my God, that's terrifying. By the way, I just want to say, you could give it five forks and also give it an out five forks, but... Yeah, I think it's close to five forks. I don't think it's quite the level of perfection of things that we put the five in and out

a lot, so that's all. I like both places. Let's leave it at that. All right. I got under a skin today, that's for sure. We've got a food stuff and we're going to determine if it's worth putting in your mouth. It's snack or whack.

So what we've got today is something that my wife Natalie secured for us, banana Twinkies. Now I've only had... I'm a Twinkie fan. Yamar, you like Twinkies? I can't remember. I haven't had one in so long. Oh wow, it's been a while. So this will be something of a throwback for you, although with a little bit of English

on it. Mitch, what about you? Are you a Twinkie man? You know, I didn't eat them a bunch when I was younger, but I'd have one every so often and they're fine. There you go. They almost go out of business. Hostess had some financial problems, but their brands were so strong that I think some angel

investors stepped in and rescued the company. You song out there, what do you think about Twinkies? Thumbs up or thumbs down? Big thumbs up for you song. Big thumbs up. Two thumbs up. Oh wow. Wow.

It smells like banana pancake. Is that what a Twinkie normally smells like? It doesn't have as much banana to it. Yeah, this is, I mean visually this looks identical to a conventional Twinkie. Wait, this is a banana Twinkie. This is a banana Twinkie. Oh okay. Yeah.

So this is, we're doing snack or whack with a banana Twinkie. Is that correct? Yeah. Oh okay. Did I never introduce that? Did you say it was a banana Twinkie? Yeah. I said a banana Twinkie.

Oh okay, alright. I didn't realize you said banana Twinkie. No, you just zoned out. Oh, good. Oh, the ghost of Harambe will be happy. Here we go. Hmm. I don't know you guys.

Okay. Oh gross. There's a weird aftertaste. It is really weird. It is like, it smells like banana and it has a banana aftertaste. This is like my banana and chocolate sort of thing. It doesn't smell good. Very artificial.

Twinkies are already artificial, but the introduction of a usually fresh ingredient banana that is so clearly like a chemical equivalent of it. Yeah. Amara is done with her. I took a very small bite and then threw it away. Oh man. I'm eating it. I want a Twinkie.

I just want a Twinkie. Yeah. I mean that's a thing. Because Amara, we're talking a little bit about all the Oreo variants before the show. And there's some Oreo variants I prefer to conventional Oreos. But I feel like you have in terms of justifying the existence of a variant flavor, would I take this in any circumstance over the default? I don't see how I would with this banana Twinkie.

It is just like the banana flavor is really weird. The aftertaste I agree is very, very unsettling. And it kind of also doesn't sync up with the Twinkie cream. I don't know. What about you guys? I think I found out what my issue with mixing bananas in with stuff is that if I'm not eating the actual banana, it's like has so much of that just like, it smells like a banana peel or something.

Right. So much of the smell of banana is like, because when you eat banana, like the taste isn't really overpowering. It's like the smell. I feel like the smell of banana is more over, is like, more powerful than the taste of it. And so with this, it's like eating, having that banana taste, I'm just like, what, like, it tastes like I'm eating a banana peel. It doesn't taste like I'm eating like artificial banana flavors, fucking nasty.

Yeah. I mean, I'd rather have like a banana pudding over this, this with the cakey texture. It's just also that's a great, that is one thing I do. I like a banana pudding with like vanilla wafers in it or something that's good. That's amazing. Like, I guess you have chunks of banana in it and it's like vanilla and it works well. This does not work well. It doesn't work well.

And also instead of the like, instead of the banana dough, why not have like a banana cream, like a normal dough. That's how I thought it was going to be. Like a regular Twinkie with banana cream. Yes. But you know, they say that Twinkies are going to be like Twinkies and cockroaches are like the last things that are going to be alive on earth. Famously loaded with preservatives.

Why are Twinkies the fat guy joke? I don't know. Because they're like little cake fingers. Yeah. They just, it looks like someone would put each one on each finger and then just suck them off their fingers and that's how ridiculous they'd be. They're roughly the size of one of Mitch's giant fingers. What the fuck?

Now I'm going to feel self-conscious in the photo. I'll have my hands in a fist and it will be, the fist will be going into Wiger's face. We need to, we do need to, we need to duke it out. Yeah. It's about time. I feel like that almost happened over that French, I think. I think so too. Maybe that's what, maybe that's what Susser is alluding to with the Olympic Susser games.

He's just going to be overseeing a pit fight between the two of us, which I will be soundly defeated by a man twice my size. Whack. That's, yeah. I say whack. It was, it was bad. Yeah, whack all around. I didn't even eat mine.

Boy, what a disappointment. What, what, is there a flavor you could do with Twinkies that's not banana that would be like a strawberry or like, is there something? I don't know. I think Twinkies are kind of okay, but kind of bad too. Yeah. The one I do like is the Chocodile, which is functionally like a chocolate-covered Twinkie. That's pretty good.

But yeah, I don't know. I mean, if I'm going to have a Twinkie, give me a Twinkie, don't give me this banana shit. I feel like strawberry, it was like a strawberry cake. Yeah. Like that would work. Like you were saying this should be like banana cream. Yes. If the cake was kind of like a strawberry, like little bits of strawberry or something.

That might help it. Yeah. It wasn't good. Well, anyway, deal with that shit, ghost of Harambe, you don't like your banana Twinkies. All right. See, that's what I wanted out of you, you hate Harambe. Just like a restaurant, we value your feedback. Let's open up the feedback.

Today's email comes to us from Cam Carter, aka at Cam Carter 2010. Cam writes, Thanks to y'all, I have derailed two diets this year and I'm sure that my future holds a myocardial infarction for me. As a public health educator, I should abhor your podcast, but I can't stop binging it on my days off. That all said, I think it's time to take drinks out of the cooler and off the sideline because I want to know if y'all have a chain you go to that has their soda game on. I'm back and forth between Austin and Dallas and drop into Whataburger sometimes just because

they have the best Dr. Pepper. There's an extra something in there aside from the extra syrup. Do y'all have a specific chain or location of a chain that puts some love and care into their sodas that stands out noticeably? Any thoughts? Can't wait to hear your thoughts on Rogue One. Yamara, anything come to mind as a chain that has a standout soda fountain? Oh, you know what?

I grew up with McDonald's their orange drink. Their orange drink is just good. They do have a very solid orange drink there. Also too, on the McDonald's front, we talked about this the other day, I know what they're about to say. They have a good... McDonald's has good coaxes. McDonald's has a great Coca-Cola.

I think they've got some sort of backdoor deal with the Coca-Cola corporation to get us the good syrup because their McDonald's coaxes, I think, are there's a McDonald's right next to a Carl's Jr. near our new-ish apartment and the coaxes from the McDonald's are just better. They don't taste as syrupy. There's something with it. We were talking about this just the other day, I don't know if it's the ice ratio or whatever it is, but McDonald's coaxes to me always taste the best of any fast food

chain. I don't understand why. Do you guys like Coke over Pepsi? I'm a huge Coke over Pepsi guy. Really? Yeah. Pepsi over Coke. Are you really?

Really? Yum. Yum. Yumara. I know. Coke is so spicy. I wish you brought this up 90 minutes ago. I would have got kicked out on my own.

Wait, did you say that Coke is spicy? Coke is spicy. It burns. Wow. I'm drinking. I just had Coke Zero, which I like. The Cherry Coke Zero is amazing. Cherry Coke Zero is great.

It's a great invention. I feel like I'm just tasting Cherry Coke, like I'm suspicious of it. I mean, it's probably killing us, because I drink it too. When you drink it, you're like, there's something wrong with that spot. There's something wrong. It's too good. I'm really suspicious of the chemicals and that. Yeah, it's probably not good.

You know what, that makes me think there was a, the fat burger I used to go to used to be right next to a Rubio's, and in the Rubio's, there was a time when they had a fountain that dispensed vanilla Coke, and it was the only vanilla Coke fountain I'd ever seen, but it was really good. That was like, I would go to the fat burger, get my drink from that Rubio's, because that vanilla Coke was really, really tasty. We've talked about this before, but I like it when you get a real vanilla Coke or a real Cherry Coke or so.

But I will say, I know that all about the bread and a few other, I'll give credit to five guys, because they have one too, which we brought up on the podcast before, but they have the Coke All Star or whatever the Hell Machines are, what do they call them? Yeah, those Coal Machines. The 360 Machines or whatever. Yeah, they've got the iPad, like Freestyle maybe? Oh, yes, those ones. I don't know what they're called.

Coal Machines. Yeah, the Freestyle Machines. They're big, Hell-sized computers that have an iPad on them, and they can give you any sort of flavor concoction. Yeah, you know what, if a place has that, I'm always excited to see it, because those are pretty consistently good. Yes. The computer has just figured out the carbonation to syrup ratio.

But besides that, I'd say Taco Bell always has its drink game on, because it has a lot of cool creations. But Coca-Cola McDonald's, for whatever reason, I think that is my one, where I'm like, it tastes like they really do great with the sodas, or specifically the Coke. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know what makes their food taste good. Oh, yeah.

They have it down to a science. Yeah, they know all the shit. You know what is a big thing for drinks for me, because I, a lot of times, most of the time, I think I'll go for iced tea, just try to save some sugar on that beverage. If I'm really feeling like indulging, I'll get a full sugar soda, but I'll usually go for the iced tea, maybe with a splash of lemonade in it. If I go to a place that has, like you were talking about the house-brewed lemonade, if I go to a place that has some like fresh-brewed iced tea, I will always like that over the

place that has like the gold-peak iced tea machine, where it's a little bit more, you know, just sort of a processed, like that's never as exciting of an iced tea, like a good iced tea, I will always be excited to encounter. But yeah, as far as big chains go, I don't know, I think McDonald's is what comes to mind. McDonald's does it for me. They could do a good soda. They do a good soda and get fried.

Yeah. They just have, they just can have that consistency down. I guess that's part of the thing of the economies of scale. Really? You like Pepsi better than Coke? I like Pepsi. Really? Yeah, I do.

Steam is coming out of Mitch's ears. I mean, I like Pepsi when I was younger, I was like, oh, I like Pepsi too. But Coca-Cola Classic is just so, I get where you're, now when you're saying spicy, Coke has almost like, a lot of people will say like it tastes like almost like cinnamon or something, right? Mm-hmm. Like people have said that about Coca-Cola before that has kind of like a cinnamon-y taste or something.

It, I get more air with Coca-Cola. Mm-hmm. See, that's why I like it. It's kind of more bubbly. Right. And Pepsi is kind of a, is more syrupy to me. Pepsi reminds me of Dr. Pepper and I really like Dr. Pepper. Oh, interesting.

Yeah. See, Coke reminds me of Dr. Pepper. Interesting. Is Dr. Pepper a Coke or Pepsi product? I don't, I think Dr. Pepper is out on its own. I think it's a lone gun. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.

Okay. Yeah, I like Dr. Pepper a lot. I actually, Dr. Pepper used to be my favorite full-sugar soda, interesting that's called the pepper soda sector. Although there's all those rip-offs that are all like very different, yeah, yeah, yeah. Those are all, that's the pepper soda sector. But the, we were a Pepsi family growing up and then when I started to go out on my own, I first gravitated towards RC Cola.

I was a Royal Crown Cola guy for a time and then later I became, I settled into Coke and now I'm just a Coke guy, but I appreciate a Pepsi. I like a good Pepsi. Pepsi, it's not bad. I just, I think Coke is, you got a rum and Coke, you know what I mean? Like Coke goes well with other stuff. I say, yeah, I don't like rum and Coke's. Oh man.

I don't, I don't, yeah. I just will, I'll get a Coke Zero, do a Diet Coke because most places don't have like a Diet Pepsi. Have you guys ever had expired soda? No. Yes, it's awful. It's really bad. My, my lovely grandma, she had some sodas just in her fridge and never drink some, but

just had them in case any company comes by and, you know, we were there once and like, I'll have one of these Diet Pepsi's she's got in there and I started to drink it and it was just like, it tasted like pool water, like salty pool water. And I was like, what the, what the fuck is wrong with this? And then I turned it over and expired like two years earlier. I was like, Jesus Christ. My grandfather kept Mountain Dew in his fridge and like, you know how bad Mountain Dew is for you by now?

Yeah. It's awful. It's like drinking nitrogen. Yeah. She's this old 80 year old guy that will drink like four a day when we come over there as kids and down on them and was like, oh, that was terrible. I love that. They're so good.

So good. I love that. I will never make it to 80, but if I do, I'm going to be drinking some Mountain Dews. I'm sure of it. I'll be joining Harambe and Hells and enough. Jesus Christ. What is Dr. Pepper? Is it a, it's a pepper soda?

Pepper soda. Yeah. It's very strange to me. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know what it is. Did you yell at your grandma? Like you yelled at me about the fries?

No, I didn't yell at my grandma. All right. Good. I politely poured it down the sink and then we just started the rest of the- Through the camera? No. You threw the rest away? Yeah.

We threw the rest away. Good. Yeah. If you've got a question or comment about the world of chain restaurants, you can email us at doeboyspodcast.gmail.com, check out our Facebook page, Doe Boys, follow us on Twitter at Doe Boys Pod, if you have free second, rate and review us on iTunes. You're our tailor. Thank you so much for joining us.

Thanks for having me. Thank you for coming. This was great. We're going to have to get you back based only on your preference of Pepsi to Co. I'll go, I'll do a taste test and I'll do a blind taste test. I'll have Ryan set up a blind taste test for me. All right. Then I'll give you some like honest feedback.

A whole group. All right. Pepsi challenge. Yeah. I'd love a follow up. Have we asked this on the podcast before of your team Pepsi over team Coke? Because I want to hear if people are... Yeah, yeah.

There are definitely a lot of others like you, I'm sure. There are. I'm all over the place. Let's fight the cola wars again. Mitch, much like how you want to refight the Civil War. Oh my fucking god. Let's have people refight the cola wars. Jesus.

You sang, what about you? Are you a Coke or Pepsi guy? Right here? Thumbs up for Coke. Thumbs down for Pepsi. Thumbs up for Coke. He's a Coke guy all the way. Yeah.

All right. Yamar, do you have anything you would like to plug? Watch Black-ish when it starts to come on again. Awesome. They'll do it for this episode of No Boys and until next time for the Swoon Man, Mike Mitchell. I'm Nick Weigher. Happy eating. See ya.

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