Doughboys - P. F. Chang's 2 with Kulap Vilaysack

Episode Date: May 30, 2019

The incredible Kulap Vilaysack (Bajillion Dollar Propertie$, Origin Story) returns to the show to discuss her history with PF Chang's, an American-Chinese themed chain restaurant. Plus, a gooey edition of Snack or Wack. Want more Doughboys? Check out our Patreon!: https://patreon.com/doughboysSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is a headgum podcast. The Andejanis are tyrannical to their people. Government troops should comfort them with benevolence. The Andejanis are greedy and extorting from the people. The government troops should rectify this by being generous. This is the strategic direction laid out by Chinese general So Tseung Tung to quash an uprising of oppressed Chinese Muslims known as the Dungan Revolution. A ruinous conflict that led to the death or displacement of tens of millions between 1862

and 1877, the general's magnanimous approach to the revolt, offering amnesty to the rebels who abandoned their post, backed up by the military might of his government troops, finally led to the end of the Civil War, helping to allow the Qing dynasty to continue its reign. The latter part of the 19th century also saw an influx of Chinese immigrants to the United States, leading to the development of a distinct subtype of cuisine called American Chinese food, created by enterprising Chinese immigrants to appeal to American palates while making use of widely available canned ingredients. Among the first dishes that was a hit stateside was chop suey, which roughly translates to

odds and ends or miscellaneous leftovers. Other dishes followed, often using ingredients like broccoli, tomatoes, and carrots that aren't native to China, and Chinese restaurants in the U.S.'s coastal cities came to feature separate menus designed for Chinese American and Caucasian clientele. And sometime in the 1970s, an unknown chef created a dish they dubbed General So's Chicken, akin to an American chef creating a sandwich called Ulysses S. Grant's Burger, a breaded fried and heavily sauced chicken preparation with an eye-popping calorie count. The dish made the Chinese military hero a household name in the U.S., although it has

no known analog in So's home province of Hunan. And today, another household name has come to indicate an accessible Asian fare. The brainchild of Paul Fleming, the owner of several Ruth's Chris Steakhouse franchises, and Philip Cheung, who operated a Beverly Hills outlet of his mother's beloved San Francisco restaurant The Mandarin. The duo's upscale-ish chain, founded in Scottsdale, Arizona in 1993, derives its brand from merging Paul's initials with Philip's simplified surname. Serving not just American Chinese, but a Pan-Asian menu that's specifically designed for Yankee

taste buds, today it's grown to over 300 locations. And like General So's, its name lets you know the food you're about to eat is accessible American Chinese. This week on Doughboys, we return to BF Chang's. Welcome to Doughboys, the podcast about chain restaurants. I'm Nick Weiger. Alongside my co-host, the nature boy, Thick Flare, the Spoon Man, Mike Mitchell. Whoo!

Oh, that was good. A little woo there. Or should it be, like, goo or something? Yeah, you'd say goo, for multiple reasons. That was courtesy of Nicky D, who writes, much love from a huge fan, hi you song you're a national treasure. If you have an insult, you like me, use it on a little Mitchell Duff show, roastspoonmanatgmail.com. Yeah, relax.

Everyone's horny for you song. Look, we talk about meals, but everyone wants to talk about the snack that is you song. He's turning red. Yeah, he's our employee. This is inappropriate. We're not supposed to say this. We got to get him signed on waiver or something to get sued. A waiver where we can call him a snack, basically.

You song we want to beat. I hit on you. Oh, boy. Uh, how to Spoon Nation, Nick, you know, I go by the Spoon Man. I go by a new name now, Mike Spoon Mitchell. Wow. I've shortened it. You dropped the man.

You dropped the the. Mm-hmm. It's cleaner. Spoon Mitchell. Yeah, like, like, uh, like Sean Parker in the Facebook movie. Yeah, it's cleaner, like Facebook, no love Facebook, famously clean Facebook. Mike Spoon Mitchell. That's right.

Okay. So please get that right from here on out. What? What do you have people who say like, who just call you the Spoon Man? What do you do? Are you still? I won't respond to them. I'll look straight ahead.

Okay. I won't know what they're talking about. In fact, I don't know what you're talking about. Are you sure about that Spoon Man? Wow. He really did not. He did. He left the room.

Huh? What's going on? Spoon. Okay. Mm-hmm. Nick, you know, I haven't given you an update on my song. Uh, Weiger and I made a bet that I was going to make a, uh, a billboard top 100 song. Yeah.

I did not agree to this. You bet $5,000. No, you're going to give me $5,000 if I do it. I don't. I did not agree to this. Why? I, you're not going to, first of all, you're not going to do it. Fine.

I agree to it. You're, you're not going to do it. All right. If I get a billboard top 100 song, you have to give me $1,000. It was originally $5,000. Oh wait. $5,000. Yeah.

Wait. $5,000. I shouldn't have corrected you. Hmm. $10,000. I'll just, I'll agree to it cause it's not going to happen. $5,000. I get a billboard top 100 song within a year.

Okay. Fine. It's not going to happen. Do I have to do anything if I don't get one? I mean, yeah. That's how a bet works. You don't get to make a one-sided bet. What do I have to do?

You have to give me $5,000. No, that's insane. So you don't, you're not willing to bet. You're not willing to bet on yourself. I have a, a mine is harder to do. Okay. So why don't I give you odds? So I'll give you $5,000.

You give me $1,000. If it doesn't work. No, that's still too high. I'll give you a hundred. So okay. You're wagering 100 to win 5,000. Yes. Those are insane.

I have to get a billboard top 100 song. Those are 50 to one odds. You're giving yourself. Yeah. No shit. It's the odds are even greater than that. It's a billboard top 100 song. So why are you so confident in it?

Because I think I'm going to pull it off. Okay. Well, give me your update. Uh, I haven't started yet. Here's, but here is a little drop. Not listened to beforehand. So we'll see how this goes. Okay.

Oh, I can plug it in. Oh, very exciting. Back. Yeah. What was, what was plug it in? Plug it in. What was that? Was that played?

I think it was played. Yeah. It's mystery solved. Is it? It was a, not a fun mystery. Here we go. All right. Here's the money.

It's not a fun mystery. Here we go. All right. Here's a little drop. The funniest thing I ever saw. Look at this. And I was like, look at this. I think I maybe recorded it.

Recorded it. Huh. Huh. Huh. Huh. I shit a little log into my hand. I believe you. I believe you.

I shit a little log into my hand. How does that connect? How does that connect? She's something more impressive than that. I was just trying to tell people to watch it. The athleticism is remarkable. I think I maybe recorded it. I wore out that.

Okay. I shit a little log into my hand. It's into your hand. It was me and a few other people. I gave the pleasure to see it. Well, I gave the pleasure to see it. So? People were walking by and saying, check this out.

Yeah. I'm proud of it. It's kind of good. It was nice. Sometimes you just shit in your hand. Yes, of course. Yeah. I didn't wash it since.

No, it's funny. I agree. No, it is funny. Wow. An Irma Meow at the end. I love that. There's your top 100 song. That was fucking good as hell.

That was great. And last of these people do a hate dog voice. It's big cat music squad back with another hot drop for the dough boys. Thanks a lot for all the laughs. Liars. I hope you can appreciate the stinky jam, which serves to immortalize the ironclad storytelling and awful expression of

human humanity that is the spoon man. I don't know who they're talking about. We have big cat music squad adore your podcast and offer this humble tribute to continued stank ass excellent. Long live the dough boys. Wow. Our warmest regards big cat music squad. Big cat music squad.

Wow. Big the cat from the sonic universe out. He's out. Wow. He's out. Fan outcry. We don't even know if he's in the new movie yet. I mean, if they, if he is, they better get his design writer

else they're going to have to redo it again. Who's going to get delayed until 2022. Mitch, let's introduce our guest. Yes. Thrilled to have her back. Wrong overdue. From a jillion dollar properties and who charted who knew the documentary origin story is now available on Amazon prime.

Cool up. The Lysock is here. Hi. Cool up. Hi guys. Hello. Spoon. Yes.

Just spoon now. Spoon. Okay. Is that sort of, now it feels like it's a demand. Like you want me to spoon you. Oh boy. Is that correct? Oh.

Gantled. I'm not demanding people spoon me. Right. Let me tell you, I bet there's some takers out there though. No shortage of people in the dope boys Twitter mentions offering to take you up on that. Oh, that's nice, Mitch. Yeah. I would spoon.

Spooning is nice. Spooning is not a, let's not turn this into a sexual. Spooning is a very non-sexual, nice. You see cute cuddly animals doing it all the time. It's beautiful. It's just for warmth and closeness. Yeah. Absolutely.

Sure. But it can be an app towards sex. It can be. It can very often be horny. It develops that way a lot of times. Sure. Cool up. I want to talk about your documentary a little bit.

Cool up. You were dancing to that song. You were really grooving. I loved the beat. Of course the content really blew me away. I hadn't heard that tale, but now I have. Yeah. With such pride.

Mitch told them. Your son. Mitch told that at a live show. And he told, he said backstage that I think you said you were going to say that if the show was going poorly. That's true. You're going to try to do it. Emma's nodding.

You remember I said that. I said, I'm going to pull out a story. If the show goes bad. I think you said it within the first 10 minutes. Yeah. Okay. It's like 935. You bust that out.

You just wanted to tell the story. No, the show was going. Oh, that did not even occur to me. Well, part of the issue is that Wiger's family was in the audience. They're good for four to six blank stares. Cool. Cool.

I've said this on the show, but Nick's mom, dad, his brother in law. I'm sorry. His sister in law and his brother. Yes. Came to the show. They were all having drinks at the bar afterwards. I'm talking to this family.

Nick goes, I'm going to leave you. Nick left before I did to see his family. That's amazing. First of all, they liked you better. I mean, yes, I get it. Immediately they liked you better. Like, hey, I can talk to this guy. He can have a conversation with that old man.

You left before I did. It was like within 10 minutes. Okay. So I had to tell Natalie. Natalie's like, I'll stay. Natalie wanted to stay here. Let me say this. And I think a lot of people out there who around their families

understand that you can gauge your own family's mood a little bit. They wanted to tell me a movie. I could tell my family was shitfaced. They were just hammered. And I love my family. They're good people. But sometimes that's not a fun energy to be around.

I know what directions would be. Your parents seemed all right. It was going to be fine. But I had to drive home. Your brother and I were going to fucking, we were going to do shots. Your brother and I were ready to take over the bar. Yeah, it's always going to happen.

You're going to do shots and then you're going to kick my ass. Okay. So he knew what was coming. You speak their language in great sense. I suggest you do a documentary about it. My origin story. Yeah. My origin story of moving 25 minutes from home and living out the

rest of my life. I think your origin story ends in fucking Cupertino, California. I'm saying you're a fucking AI robot, my boy. You're saying I'm a small wonder. You are. You're a devil. Yeah, you're a small wonder.

Sure. I'll take it. You gave it to yourself. Yeah. You didn't see your family. You left before anyone in the show, including me, Usong and Emma, because they were riding with me. Yes.

We had a good time. You haven't met Evan Susser's child. Okay. Well, that's look. What? We tried to do, I tried to set that up. He understandably, this again, this is like another one years old.

This is another thing we were trying to do. We were trying, we've been trying to have a barbecue and I have been, I have not, I have been available for that barbecue and you, and you put that somehow put on me that it's not happening because of me. I have been available both times. You're the cats and the cradling Susser's daughter. I'm not, first of all, that's like, I don't think you can

compare me to the cats and the cradle dad. Yes, it is. It's true. That has to be your actual father. She has a father figure, her actual father. You've never met, you've never met his daughter. I tried to do it. We had a couple of, we had multiple occasions where I was

going to go do that. I was going to go over there and, and the Susser's lovely people being very busy being new parents had to cancel also probably didn't want me at their home, but they had to cancel. I was available. I was trying to make it happen. Oh yeah. Oh, it's just double checking.

This is in no way related to the show with your parents. We're now just airing grievances. Yeah. That's like, sorry. We should have told you everyone. The show now is just us laying into each other. Everyone thinks wagers. That's a good guy.

I've taken little Suss to a Jewish deli. Wiger. Oh, wow. I mean, I don't think it's us. Not much of a, not much of a stretch to try to get Susser to go to a deli. That's like, that is not ever involved. He's probably already there.

And she's not going to remember. Yeah. I try to make Nick feel like shit because he, yeah, I know because he should a lot. Why? Because you're mean. How am I mean? You're mean to me behind the scenes.

People don't know it. We have a good time behind the scenes. We have some. We saw you song chortled. We have some guff, but we, we, we work through it. That's bullshit. We talk about our troubles and we have some conflict, but we get to the bottom of it and things are usually fine.

Are you harrumping? I am harrumping. I'll harrump all over this bullshit. I hope I harrump anything you say. Well, then how do you expect this to be a proactive conversation? How do you expect this to be like a good working relationship? Say something that's not harrump for the worthy.

I thought that you were like, my parents really liked you and my family really liked you and they thought that you were a great guy and they thought you were very talented. And my mom watched your Brooklyn Nine-Nine episode and she said, he is cute. Well, yeah. I should have stayed at that bar a little longer. All right, cool.

Take it easy. Not going to put George Raymond Weiger out of the picture. He's here to stay. Oh no, he's involved, baby. Jesus Christ. Oh, wow. Gosh, Mitch involved in an Eiffel Tower with you. No, Jesus Christ.

This got graphic. Dear God, edit. Hachi machi. Edit everything. So, cool up. As part of your journey in this amazing documentary you've got, you spent some time in Laos. And I'm curious, because I know last time, yes, go ahead,

bitch. I just thought you were going to steal my question. What is your question? Go ahead. Look, the documentary is, it's a wonderful film. You've did an amazing job. Thank you. And the subject matter is difficult.

But I have to ask, did you have some good food when you were over? Yes. Delicious food. Are you guys familiar with Laos food? Very peripherally. You've had Laos before, right? Yes.

So, Laos people, they opened Thai restaurants. And people already knew about Thai restaurants already. Right. So, there are kind of like Lao food sort of hidden in a lot of Thai restaurants. And maybe sweetened a little bit more for the American palate, like you mentioned about, you know, chop suey and whatnot. So, like, Laos is the national dish of Laos.

Oh, wow. You usually have it like chicken, but you can have it duck and fish and all of that. We, sticky rice, you've had that, right? Mm-hmm. That's, Lao people are called luke kaoniel, children of sticky rice. Oh.

And then there's like papaya salads. Have you ever had like som tam? Yes. Yes. And so, our version has a very funky unfiltered fish sauce in it called ba da ak that makes it more like pungent. So, we have spicier and more pungent food. By the way, Nick was a child of sticky pants.

I'm sorry, I didn't stop talking. Quickers, because it was ready for you. I didn't have to say it so bad. I did. He needed the time to come up with it. What the fuck? Like the 40 seconds for the rainbow wheel to spin in his brain. Oh, yeah.

I wish I was shooting shit off like Weigher does, man. He's like the Bill Hicks of our generation, man. The Bill Hicks? I don't know. All right. I hope you live less. Wow. I think I've already actually already outlived Bill Hicks.

I think he died very young. Oh, yeah. Was he 33? Was he a 30? Yeah, I think he was in his mid-30s. Yeah. Was he one of those, the 33, that number? That Jesus number, right?

That Jesus number. Isn't that also 27s also a number? Uh-oh. Oh, yeah. That's Janice Joplin, maybe? I think that's, I think it's the Cobain number, the Hendricks number, maybe Tupac. A lot of 27-year-olds.

They got a lot of shit done by 27. I know. Yeah. Bill Hicks was 32. Ah, missed it. 32 is a number two. Yeah, it's a number also. Another one.

You're not a guy who, you're not fucking the machine gun joke teller. I didn't say I was. It's bullshit. It's bullshit. We're having fun. You, so hold on. You roasted me.

You made a joke about me blasting in my pants. And then I responded by like, you're the one who turned that, you're the one who's turning that into sexual. Oh, I'm sorry. Children of sticky pants. I wiped barbecue sauce on my jeans. That's what you were saying. Yeah.

Means I've been spilling some honey on my lap. Yes. That's what it could mean. I was eating a big stack of pancakes and I got maple syrup all over my, my, my cockies. Jesus Christ. That's what it could mean. Do you think anyone, this is a real question.

Yes. Oh, okay. No, never mind. No, you don't have to ask. Now you gotta ask. Do you think anyone's ever put honey on their penis to try to get a dick out of it? I mean, what are you hoping to get out of it?

Do you think that would be like pleasurable or bigger baby? You're going to get swollen. Then just stick your dick into a high. Yeah. There you go. Of course. It's already got a hole you can fit into. Just stick yourself into that honeycomb.

Go straight to the source, friend. A child is sticking his ring finger in here. Is what the bees are thinking? What a hive mind. That's a bee thought bubble. They put all their brains together. They figure it out. They specify child?

Uh-huh. That's a bee thought bubble. They put all their brains together. They figure it out. They specify child? Uh-huh. I've never had Lao food. I don't think I've ever like sat down to have Lao food.

Well, I think, but I think it went to what? And, and, and cool up, please, please correct me. But I think to, to college point, perhaps you have just not, not realized it. But I'm saying like specifically. Yes. I've never, I've never, I've seen a Lao restaurant. I've had Lao dishes it sounds like.

Right. From, from, from what I'm gathering. Yeah. But did you say it was larb? The, the, the. Lob. Lob. Lob.

Lob. Lob. Yeah. But it's spelled L-A-R-B. Oh, okay. So I say it very, very, very wrong. Will you say a Mitch? Yeah.

So. I've, I've always, maybe that could be, that could be a white America. Like at Simpsons and stuff. I used to take order and they always would say larb. Yeah. People say larb because that's how it's spelled. Yeah.

But just, just say it like a Bostonian. You're gonna be good. Lop. Lop. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. Cause it was, um, Marissa Tomei says it as Aunt May in the recent

Spiderman film. No. She orders it. Does she get it right? No. She did her. Yeah. She's like larb.

But it's like, I'm happy that it's like being said. Right. There's a, there's a loud food movement happening right now. And more people are opening like loud restaurants. Oh, awesome. And people are talking about like foodies are talking about it more. Is it a lot of, is there, are there a lot of fish dishes? Like, uh, or is it, is it more like whatever protein or is it more kind of.

Yeah. At the sea. Uh, no. Cause, um, they're definitely fish and shellfish, but there's also chicken and pork. Yeah. Laos is landlocked. There is a river that is the, um, to the, uh, the west of it, which is the borders with Thailand.

I was thinking of your documentary and literally thinking of, of the river and how, I know, saw you were on the water in the movie and I just was not thinking that it's landlocked at all. I was, I was okay. A lot of people don't know about Laos. Yeah. That's it, which is a crazy segment in the movie. And also, uh, you go over your relationship with your mom in the film.

And at one point in the movie, your mom and the documentary, your mom brings, makes a big meal. Yes. When you go on visitor. And I said to you after the documentary, I was like, did you eat some of that food? Because it looks. Yeah. Out of control.

It looks out of control. Good. It looks really, really, really good. My mom, the way that she, she doesn't like, like it's hard for her to say I love you, but like her love language is definitely cooking food. And, um, so I came to interview her and it was nine a.m. and she had made foe. She had made egg rolls. And for some reason there was fondue, like a full thing of fondue, which was like, okay.

And she's like, I thought you came here to eat. And I was like, I guess we're all eating. Was she always an amazing cook? Yes. Yeah. Yes. And my mom owned a, she owned a Thai restaurant. Oh, okay.

It's called Daimintai. Right. And where you say, cause I, and I know you mentioned that a little bit before last time, but you had some Lao dishes there, I assume. Yeah. Yeah. And then I'm just trying to think what, what, I think definitely we had lab and there's certain like, um, like, like almost like ceviche, but like ceviche, uh, like sour,

spicy seafood stuff that's also allowed to. Sounds great. I get what you call it. Yum. Just hearing about it. Jesus. I know, I need to take you guys to like Lao food next time there's like a pop-up that's happening.

There is a place in Mission Hills. Oh, awesome. Um, that's called, uh, um, cup cup jai lai, which is thank you. And then, um, in Corona, there's a Lao barbecue place called crazy kais. That's amazing. And they were featured at the food bowl barbecue event with like Franklin barbecue and like, and they were there too, which was really exciting. That's rad.

What, what would you, is there like a, is there like a thing that makes Lao food different from, from Thai food too? Is there like a certain, I think it's the buttock. It's this unfiltered fish sauce because you guys are familiar with it. Like normal fish sauce, right? Which is this like umami flavor. Ours is like even more pungent, even more, um, there's more depth to it growing up. If your parents made it, it smells horrible.

It makes things taste great, but it smells horrible. They would make, they would put in like a big paint bucket and it'd be fish heads and it would ferment for hours and it would be underneath, it would be in the attic or in the garage. Like, and it would just ferment for like months and months. And when you'd crack it open, it just is slightly like death, but once it settles down, it really does make food. It gives a food, just this um, like unparalleled umami flavor.

So that's part of it. If you think of, I like to think this is probably inaccurate and people may take offense to this. Like Thai maybe is a little bit more like, like a fan, slightly fancier, I would say. And then Lao's like more country and hearty and flavorful and in my opinion, like, you know, there's a little bit more like you're tasting the herbs more, it's super fresh. You might have actually had Isan food, Thai Isan and that region is very similar to Lao's. So did you guys ever go to, there's Isan station, have you been to that place?

Okay, I've not been there. Oh gosh, there's this place downtown that I'm trying to pull that got really popular um, in Portland and then they moved downtown, oh, I can't recall. Was it Poc Poc? Yes. Yes, okay. Oh yeah. Have you been there?

I know of Poc Poc. I never actually been there. That's Isan food. Okay. Yeah. Oh cool. So you've had kind of, yeah. Yeah, I like Poc Poc.

Did they close Poc Poc? Yeah. They closed the LA one. I think it's tough to move, it's tough to have a restaurant that's not from LA, open up in LA. I think I feel like the locals are maybe a little skeptical of that, particularly Thai cuisine, which there's so much good Thai food already in LA. Yeah.

And it's like a white guy. Right, right. Oh, that's right. Yes. My brain is motion. I do now remember that your mom had a Thai restaurant. Was that, how was that in like, in Minnesota, in like, was it in the 80s where it was open basically or the 90s?

Yeah, 80s into the 90s. Yeah. So you guys spanned from before the Minnesota Timberwolves were a franchise to win. Yes. This gives you more of a setting. Yeah, I get it now. You personally. Nwager now finally gets it.

Now I understand. Eventually, you guys were still around when Kevin Garnett got drafted. Yes. Yes. Celtic. Great. Yeah, no. I started washing dishes when I was seven and I was a server at 11.

Wow. That's crazy. Because I know you've had a lot of, and I know your family from the restaurant, and I know you've had other food service jobs, including the chain we're going to discuss today. What is, looking through your gamut of before you had the current career you have, all the food service jobs you worked, does any comes to mind as like a favorite or at least favorite or a most memorable?

Well we've discussed Hulk Hogan's pasta mania. Yes. But I mean, we can revisit them all down the top. I mean, thick flair over here. Yeah. You know, as an honor. Yeah. One of the greats.

I hope he gets well soon. Yeah. Nice man I hear. Yeah. Hulk Hogan too. He's a good guy. People would say some negative stuff about him. I don't get it.

We're trying to win back Hulk's image on the dough, guys. Fuck us. Look, we all have been in a situation where you rail your friend's wife, you don't realize the cameras are running. Yeah. You get a little candid. So relatable. So relatable.

So relatable. And we've all won multi-million settlement. We've all closed websites. Yeah, yeah. But that's memorable. Yes. Because it was just like this weird oddity, like that that business ever existed. Right.

And it's tiny corner of the Mall of America with Hulk Aroni pasta. How long did you work there? I mean, it was six months at that. And it was, this was a period of time, and I think we have discussed this on the podcast before, but when Hollywood, yes, this was, this was, this was a Hollywood Hogan era. Yeah. It was Hollywood Hogan. Yeah.

So when he was bad, he turned heel and, and, but also like pasta for a time, which is crazy to think about now in our carb conscious world was thought of as like, oh, this is a healthy thing. Like this is like, there was a time when people thought of like, like, I think that was part of what was behind his marketing spaghetti and like tomato sauce. Yeah. Was considered by like, my mom is healthy, right? Right.

Just imagine that like 15 year old, 15 year old me is like making stroganoff with like weird powder and like sour cream. I'm like, oh, this is okay. Like just left to my own devices while short clips of Thunder Road played over and over again. Don't forget your side work, brother. Got room to clean, you got room to clean brother. That's just, that was a, that was a special time.

So that's like memorable. What were the awful, oh, well, I did, um, uh, when I was like 20, I worked at, um, sushi, sushi, sky sushi, which was on, um, it was on Fairfax and Santa Monica and it was a combination restaurant or a combination business. So it was sushi and billiards. Oh, that's fun. Oh my God. Okay.

Billiards of course took most of the real estate, not mentioned in the, in the title of the business, but yeah, and then the sushi was just a small portion of it. And it was like, yeah, they like, I just got wasted every night. Like that was my job. That's such a difficult food to eat while you're like playing pool. It's so like, there's so much wrong about that restaurant in that also like, I don't really want sushi from a place that's a billiards place. You shouldn't.

You simply shouldn't. Right. Although it was the first time because our chef was from Hawaii that I had poke. Oh, wow. Oh, that's, wow. Yeah. So that's a long. 2000.

Right. That's so before the current poke craze. Yes. But I mean, we were in the Pokemon craze at that point. That's right. That's everyone was, people weren't talking about ahi with mixed with acid with the citrus. They were talking about Pikachu and Squirtle and Bulbasaur. That's right.

Do you know of these characters? Yeah. I mean, tangentially. I saw Detective Pikachu. I like that. And I really liked it. Everybody likes it. I haven't seen it yet.

It's dynamite. It's dynamite? Okay. Great. I can't wait. I loved it. I've never heard you say dynamite before. That's my thing now.

I say dynamite. My friend, Tony has pointed out how small Pikachu's ankles are and now I can't get it out of my head. Yeah. He's just so top heavy. Right. Just break all the time. Yeah.

The ankles. I know how he feels. You've got a substantial lower floor. All right. Stop looking. You've got some meat below the waist. Got a substantial lower floor is a compliment. Yeah.

It's strange. It does his squats and deadlifts. You get your lunges in. Oh, yeah. I go to a trainer three days a week. I love it. Jason Lockwood. Hello.

How about that? Shout out to Lockwood. And I was down eight pounds and now after PF Chang's probably up six. Easily. Easily. It's a wildly unhealthy meal. All right. So let's talk about poke real quick.

What's your do you like? Is that a favorite of yours or is that just like a thing you just happen to have early? So the thing you like? Yeah. I really do like it. But now I'm I don't crave it anymore. It's just so it's everywhere. It's like Pinkberry was like 10 years ago.

I don't understand whether so many I mean, I guess I do get it. It's cheap. Right. Well, is it cheap or it's easy to do assembly line? I guess so. I think that's probably it. You can chipotle it in. It's probably profitable.

Like it's like like cheap and cheap on their side. Yeah. I think it's I think it's I think it's probably profitable. I mean, it has to be so many of those places popped up. I just over saturation of the market, Nick classic. That's what I am talking like I know what I'm talking about. I don't know anything about. But it always feels like when there's a food trend like this, so many of these places pop

up too many and then you see him shut down. You start with to mention Pinkberry is sorry, the Pinkberry you end up with the red mangoes in the world. They'll start springing up and then everything is closing. Yeah. I think that you have to be in such a pokey mood that I think that if there's like was one pokey chain, that would be enough. Right.

I don't know about. We like sweet fin. We went and we had a recently used sweet fin with our I liked it a lot. It was good. It was it was really good, but there's another there's another pokey place literally two blocks away. Right. Just down that way across the street from the Fox Cafe and there's just there's there's

too much. Yeah. You know that Buddhist temple that's on the corner, Mitch? Yeah. No, pokey place. It's the pokey place. Pokey place now. I will eat there a lot now.

I guess your home office. Pokey place. I've been there. They have snacks to the the Buddhist temple. Yeah. Nick and I for rock dober blessed. I don't think there was a rock in there. It should have been a rock in there.

Why? Because that's funny. October blessed. October blessed. Yeah. It just it just makes it too confusing. Rock dober blessed as well. Why does the rock have to do with things?

We're talking about the blessed made sense because we're taught it was like a religious themed month or religion rocks in its own way. Okay. Okay. Okay. You guys did a religious month. Yeah. We did a month of we visited some religious religious.

Scott actually came on one of the episodes. We were we talked about Chick-fil-a versus hamburger. Have you not listened? It's weird when he was here, he was saying like, I hope my sweet koolop enjoys this episode. And then you spent like 30 minutes just blowing you kisses. I got to listen to it and it was our best episode. Yeah.

It was our best. Oh, I love that you did that. We went there and then we found that that place is like kind of known to be a cult by some people. Some people. There was some. Yeah. There's a little culty.

It's a little. I went there once and I have hard time with meditation. Right. Not great at it. Thanks for pointing out where the fuck I live, Nick. And more so. Well, there's other Buddhist temples. Yeah.

There are other. You say the name of your street all the time. Shut up. Stop mentioning it. I have a security system now, but the damn cats set it off. There's a motion detector and the cats will set it off. I've turned off the ones of the cat set up. What?

Boy, this thing you'd think it could tell the difference between cats and cat burglars. I met you right on that one. I grift the microphone like in a choking fashion. I wish I could have. I wish this was your neck. It's going to throttle me because you didn't like my bone moe. I thought it was pretty good. You're making it worse, your bone moe.

When's this end? What? This episode? Yeah. I guess. We're having a good time. We're having a good time. No.

I meant the show in general. Oh, the show in general. Yeah. I think it's true. I think it's true. I think it's true. I mean, we're having a good time right now. I think it's central conversations.

Hopefully. I mean, I don't know. We're not going to do it forever. Do I move back home? I should make a poll online if I should move back home. What's happening? You can. You can move back home and still do the podcast.

Nick just said this. I mentioned moving back home and Nick was like, instead of being like, don't move back home. His first thing was like, you could move back home and we could still do the podcast. I mean, you are right. I went on Kevin and being the other day. Yeah. Like Kevin's in or is it being?

I think beans and would be Island of Washington. Yeah. So he, like when I did the, did the spot with Jensen, it's like, he sees me. I can't see him. Right. Here I'm fine. He's like God talking. That's crazy.

He could be like God. To all Spoon Nation, I am like God. So I would just do it for my mom's basement, basically. You wouldn't get your own place. I want to live with mommy. He's moving in with mommy for sure. Why would you move? What's going on?

I mean, I'm not too much. And that's the issue. That's the part of the issue. You were just in a big Hollywood movie. Stop saying big Hollywood movie. I had three lines in a Netflix movie for God's sake. That's big. That's a real, that's a real, real credit.

It's a real movie. It's coming out. It's got movie stars in it. You're making me want to move home. You might get cut though. Yeah. You might get cut. That's true.

You could get cut. All right. I solved it. Okay. Okay. If I do, I'm moving back home. Wow. Putting a lot of pressure on the most production department of this movie.

What if they get studio notes to cut you out, not for performance reasons, but for story reasons? They're like, oh, we don't actually need this scene. We're pacing wise. We can just move ahead. Yeah. And it has nothing to do with you or your performance. It's like rules of rule.

I'm gone. That's the case. Okay. Wow. And you're still, but you're still upholding the rules for your Billboard 100 song. Yeah. That's still in effect. Okay.

I just want to double check. What's going on right now? And I'm just keeping track. That's happening. Wally and Irma won't move with me. They're going to stay in the apartment. Oh. So you're going to still pay rent?

I'm going to still pay rent for the apartment. And Nick, I'll need you to come and feed them on a weekly basis. So Nick is going to record from here. Everything will be the same here. You just will be with your mummy. Nothing's changing for me. I'm coming to Mitch's place to record. That's nice.

I do it. Sure. I don't make a difference to me. I got to come over here anyway. Imagine if you could record right from your apartment, Nick. Yeah. I was you. Seems like it's good.

It's pretty good. Why don't you just stay here? Yeah. All right. I'll stay. You talked me into it. You're doing fine. You're doing great.

You're doing fine. We're both doing fine. Good. I'm happy for you. Yeah. I'm happy for you. Good. All right.

You piece of shit. You're a piece of shit. You're the one who broke first. I was going to. I was going to keep it going. I was going to be nice to you. Let's talk about fucking PFJs. So what was it?

PFJs fucking Changs. That's what the F stands for. And the P stands for P. Yay. So you worked at PFJs roughly what time frame was this? Yes. How many years ago? Gosh, I want to say 2000.

Oh, because before the theater. Right. I want to say 2003. I can't remember. Somewhere in the early two. Somewhere in the early odds. And you were in. Junior year for me in college.

Yeah. Because I remember one of my fellow servers approached me because he wanted to do Sex Wieners and Boobs, a play. Oh, yeah. I remember that. Written by David Wayne. Okay. Steven Wayne, Shul Walter, and Trulio, maybe.

And I was like, yeah, sure. And then I pulled Cassidy into it and my friend John Glover. And so, and they, and they, like, I know Jolo came to a product. We did it at the Sea Valley. And Jolo came to it before I knew him. Wow. So I feel like that was like, I don't know. Somewhere, like a year span, somewhere between like 2003 and like 2005 or something like that.

Early, early odds, early to mid odds. Yeah. Well, we're all playing Mario and Luigi Superstar's Sega on our Game Boy Advances to sort of paint a picture. Yeah. It's roughly that time. Yeah. All of us.

I don't know how you personalize things. So you can drop, you can drop in that place with me. Yeah. I know where I am now. It's your time machine. Compared to the NBA or video games. I know where I am. I was watching the wire, FX is the wire.

Oh, no, no, not the wire. What the fuck am I talking about? The shield. The shield. You call it FX is the wire. FX is the shield. Oh, fuck. It's HBO's the wire.

FX is the shield I was watching. Yeah. With Michael Chiklis. Yeah. Yes. Playing my GameCube. Oh. Wow.

Yeah. That's it. That's pretty much does sum up what was happening with me. Nothing else. Kind of was happening with me. Mario, what fucking Super Mario Sunshine came out around that time. Sunshine. Yeah.

Sunshine was maybe a little earlier. Yeah. You know, you're right. That was right in that period. Yeah. Maybe 2002. 2002. Mario game.

Yeah. When did UCB open? 2005, I believe. Summer of 2005. Yeah. So it's somewhere around there. I feel like maybe it is closer to 2005. Right.

So we're somewhere in that range. Mitch is celebrating the reelection of George W. Bush. I was at Ithaca Man. We did not. We did not celebrate that. Right. We were very upset. So, so you're working there.

I will say that the impression of George W. Bush is really funny. Yeah. Dana Carby's. Yeah. Well, Dana Carby. Oh, wait. Did Dana Carby do a George W. Bush too? I think no.

He did HW. He did HW. He did HW. But I think he's done, he's done the sun. And I think the, And then Will Ferrell. Yes. Was better known in SNL.

George W. Bush like as a comedy character is very funny. We had two back to back very funny presidents in Clinton and W in comedy terms. We had Horny President and then Stupid President. Yes. They're both monsters. Yeah. It is like, you know, from a sketch comedy perspective, it was a golden age. Yes.

So, okay. Then Obama came and ruined everything. Just for sketch. It has been back to back presidents that it's been hard to have a take on. One is impossible to parody and one is just kind of like doesn't have a characteristic that is particularly. Zip your mouth. Alec Baldwin knocks it out of the pot with Mr. Trump.

I forgot about Alec. I'd like to forget. He keeps coming up on that show. It won't give me some space. Yeah. Now I'm really searching. I feel as if maybe it's 2003, 2004, you know. Yeah.

So somewhere in that range. But so, so you were going to be of change. Which location somewhere? Burbank. Burbank. Okay. Is the Burbank one still open? No.

It's closed. It's closed. It's closed. It was like the one that felt available of all of them. And it was open still. I was like, oh, the Burbank. And I ate there probably two to three years ago. Maybe three years ago now.

Okay. But now it has since it has since closed. Yeah. And I believe they had a Beverly Hills location that had been to it could be wrong. But that one, that location was was thriving for a time. And then that one. That seems like a, well, I guess with Beverly Hills, the change, the changes to the taste change quick.

Right. And I feel like maybe that's, but that seems like a, that seems like a place that still should thrive in Beverly Hills. I think it reached a point where it was no longer high end enough for people who live in Beverly Hills. I was telling you guys that I was so surprised looking at the menu, how much it changed since I worked there. Right.

Like it's very Pan Asian right now. Yeah. And when you, so when you work there, it was very much just like American Chinese food. Yeah. But then they, there was this like attempt a little, I mean, it was American, you know, yeah, there was an egg food young, but like there was a, because it was walk bay. And I actually really enjoyed the food. Maybe too much.

Like this was around the time when I was super poor. And then if I had to like do, like be where you're clearing dishes and stuff, I would like, I would sneak like dumplings and stuff. Oh yeah. They're meant for trash. You're not supposed to eat customers food. Right. Right.

But I would, I would eat the food sometimes. Hell yeah. I encourage it because I think it's like, it's not wasteful. Right. And it's like, if that stuff, foods otherwise going to be thrown in the trash, as long as you're not, as long as you're not endangering your own health. Did you draw a line where you're like, if something has a bite taken out of it, I'm not going to, I'm not going to eat it.

I'm not going to do it then, but look, if it looks untouched and I'm hungry, I'm going to eat it. I think that's fair game. I feel like that's especially okay with pizza. Yeah. Of course. Yeah. Pizza pie.

You see like half a pizza on a table. I say go to town. I mean, like, let's just an unoccupied table. You mean you're not talking about going around to a random table, a slice from some guest. If some guy went to the bathroom, his pizza sitting there on the table, fucking go down. So you're like a pizza burglar. Yeah, kind of like the hamburger with pizza. Okay.

I can understand that. I mean, the concept that it on great, right, rubble, rubble, rubble, rubble, rubble. You see, you say rubble, rubble instead of rubble, rubble. Yeah. This is the pizza guys. It is rubble, rubble. That's your catchphrase. Why does he say rubble, rubble?

I don't know. Oh, Rob. Like Rob. Yes. But he burglars. He doesn't rob. Why doesn't he say burgle, burgle? Because that sounds too much like burger.

But I mean, that's the whole pun. Oh, yeah. Hamburger is a pun on that. I was, I wrote an episode, I wrote a storyline for a comedy bang bang involving a character called the ham robber, which was a, this was for the TV show for a hamburger analog. And I changed ham robber's catchphrase to burgle, burgle, because I was like, the logic actually follows. That's what Scott.

You were trying to write a wrong. Yeah. That's when Scott decided that the show had gone long enough to shut it down. My contract was not being extended. And his too. I quit. I quit. When I top burgle, burgle.

Yeah. No, that's already, I mean, there was like the apex of comedy, like we got to get out of here. When I worked there, we had, well, first I started as a food runner, even though I had like years of experience like working with my parents and like their cafes or like, there was just some righteousness, like they needed to learn our system. They have their own hierarchy. Yeah.

So I started as like a freaking food runner. Wow. And it earned my way to be like un-tipped as a Burbank waitress. Oh man. That's, that sucks. And then back then you had to make special sauce, which is so stupid where you have three, like a hot sauce, I think the three sauces that you guys gave me, but you came with this like sort of presentation.

Oh yeah. How spicy do you want your sauce? Oh right. Like, you know, so it's like mustard hot sauce and like soy or a ponzu, and then you would like make a show like of making sauce to their liking. It's like, you can put it on anything, it was such a waste of time. Yeah. So it's not like table side guac, like it's not interesting to do.

That said, I do love table side guac. Oh, so do I. Of course. Of course. As annoying as it is for the server. I just like. No, it's delicious. I love it.

I love it. On the same way. Did you ever see anyone up there? I know it's Burbank, but did you see any Hollywood folk? I feel like I did, but I don't remember. Yeah. I don't remember. I remember just being annoyed with like the click that like, like there's clicks everywhere.

Right. I was really annoyed with like these, the favorites that got to take off so they could play like softball with one another. And then I was like, you're a loser playing softball with people you work with. So mad. And, but then also just like truly having walking pneumonia for like maybe two weeks. Oh no. This was Christ while working at P.F.J.

So I'm sorry. Damn. I'm sorry, but I didn't have health insurance and then that's what happens. I was hungry. Yeah. What you guys are hearing is I was very hungry. I didn't have health insurance and I'm mad at softball. We'll take a break.

Way back before Doe Boys. Welcome back to Doe Boys here with Cool Off the Lies sock. We're talking P.F. Changs. He's a very strong welcome back. Her former employer. Yeah. I come back strong.

I come in hot. Yeah. You can hear it. It's loud. We got a show to do. Keep the energy up. Spoon. It's not right.

It's not right. Spoon. That's it. That's it. Spoon. Do you like the band? Mike Spoon Mitchell. Huh?

Do you have to say the whole thing? I can't just say Spoon. No, you can say Spoon if you want to. There's a band called Spoon. Out of Austin. Great band. That sucks for them that when people do a Spoon that's going to show up for me. Wow.

That's interesting. The Google Hits are going to make me. That you believe that to be true. Do you guys remember there was a submarine game called Spoon? It was SQ-O-O-N. You fucking dork. It was the weirdest name for a game because it's hard to even do a search for. I like video games too.

Every single thing we say you're late back to some fucking game. It was a side-scrolling submarine shooter. You're in this little undersea thing and you go around. Can I see it? Yeah. Hold on. I have to unplug my charger to turn this laptop around. Hold on.

It's going to be a small screen shot because it's NES resolution. What system was this? This is for NES. It was one of those games that I always looked at. I just would go and hold the box. Were you like an Atari guy or was it called Colecovision or whatever? Colecovision? Colecovision?

No. No. NES was my first home video game system. I did like Sega, but we were a Nintendo family. But no. I've played Atari, yeah. But that predates me a little bit. I'm not that old.

Okay. And also if you're that old, that's fine. Stop age-shaming. You're agist. You're sizest. I'm not. Okay. Yeah.

We both have our deficiencies, so we need to work on. So when was what? I do feel like every episode you guys deepen your relationship. No, I don't know better or worse, but it's a deepening. And maybe, what about it's deepening to the right to the left? It's like drilling to the right and left. Right. Yeah.

I have no deficiencies. Oh. Maybe a testosterone deficiency. Yeah. We both got that problem. I have too much testosterone. I have to take estrogen. Is that true?

Yeah. But I'm also trying to get pregnant. Oh, okay. But that is part of the reason why I think I've had trouble. Can you hook Nick and I up with some testosterone? I'll take some of that. No. Well, how am I?

I'm taking estrogen. I just give you some of my blood. Yeah. Okay. Why not? We could do rage exercises. Like a drastic inquiry. Wait.

What did you say? Just do rage exercises? Right. Maybe that could, I don't know. Yeah. There's not enough rage in this apartment. But don't boys need this more rage. Well, that's testosterone.

Yeah. That's true. That's the issue. We're exhausting all of it with our peace with each other. No, we're not. We are not. We do have very low testosterone. We are very low.

Yeah. We have low T. Yeah. We're low T people. Also, you know what? Check out Adam's Ruins Everything. That's low T thing is a myth. Adam blows the lid off of it.

What the fuck? What? Adam ruins low T. Low T is a myth. Oh, great. Thanks, Adam. He's the ruined low T. You can't blame low T for your deficiencies anymore because of Adam.

You're going to have to find something else. I know you worked at PF Chang's. When was the last time you ate there? You had a meal there? I feel like, I want to say like five plus years ago, I truly enjoyed the food. I liked the lettuce wraps. I think it was the first time I had like lettuce wraps and I liked them vegetarian and I liked the chicken.

But yeah. Your new song's attention. Your new song's a huge lettuce wrap fan. Yeah. It's a lettuce wrap freak. Yeah. You should have him sign an NDA though, I think, just for your safety. Just, I'm getting just a sampling and I thank you guys.

Well, before the show started, I said that I loved lettuce wraps, right, Nick? I let people know. With a lettuce wrap, with a lettuce wrap. Here goes a lettuce wrap. Romaine's spring mix. That's for me. Salad. Oh, wee hee hee.

Oh, wee hee hee. Lettuce. Lettuce. Lettuce wrap. It's a lettuce wrap. What time is it? It's a lettuce wrap. Oh, fuck.

Remix. Baby spinach. That's for me. Oh, it's continuing. Okay. Do something about arugula. Arugula. That's for me.

Yeah. All right. You got me on board. Yes, spoon. It's good. Oh, you're going to be out five grand, dude. Yeah, I know. Once that gets on the air.

That was somehow less inspired than my name is Mitch and I'm here to say I like lettuce in a major way. Dressing, dressing, pouring on. Oh, no. Don't forget one big crouton. Lettuce wrap. It's a lettuce wrap. One big crouton.

Yeah. So like toast? Imagine like the big cube of ice in like a craft cocktail. Oh, interesting. Lettuce wrap. It's a lettuce wrap. Man, when you drop the ate away on that though, I think it's going to be fire. You know, I used to be good at rapping.

Nope. I used to be able to write. I used to be able to like do. I could do a rhyme. Sure. Yeah. Okay. You wrote a poem, but there's no way people used to people used to get me to freestyle.

And that's like an improvie skill you can get like you just sort of like learned a, okay, I'm going to set up what word I'm going to land on by saying it. Yeah. Sings a rhyming word. My brain is rotted now. I can't do it anymore. It's a skill. It's a skill you practice.

Except that was really good. I don't know. I did do it there for quite a bit. So I hadn't eaten at PF Chang since the last time we reviewed it, which was, which was last year of the, you know, some new items on the menu, but largely a similar experience. I went to the Santa Monica location with Natalie yesterday as of this recording. That was Memorial Day. And we sat at the bar and, which I love to do.

I'm a big, I'm a big bar seat guy, especially as a couple, easy to share food. But are you saying I'm an alcoholic? That's what you say? No, no, that's not it. You're saying I'm a high functioning alcoholic as we say all the time. Yeah. And what kind of alcoholic are you? Which is a chocoholic.

So I got these speaking of alcohol. We got a couple of drinks to start off with, and that's it. I called it a one and sit at the bar getting plastered like you're accusing me of doing. Who are you proving this to here? I'm proving it to you and to our listeners, to all the followers of Spoon Nation, all your acolytes who take what you say at face value and they assume things about me. Chocolate, no thanks, friend. The fuck, I can't even rhyme.

This is so fun. This is the best runner ever. You're doing it to yourself. Go back to lettuce. Lettuce is where my hunger ends. Lettuce wrap. It's a lettuce wrap. Chocolate, chocolate, no thanks, friend.

Lettuce is where my hunger ends. Lettuce wrap. It's a lettuce wrap. So earlier at the show, you were asking, when does this end? To me, I'm taking this as a sign that it should be today, like this should be, this should just be it. Oh, come on. You're having fun?

I'm having fun. You're going to go home and tell Natalie all about this. She's not going to want to hear about it. Natalie, Natalie, lettuce wrap. It's the lettuce wrap. Did you steal this from Mitch? No. Why are your bags packed?

So the peach boba breeze is what I got, black tea and popping boba pearls, sweetened with peach and fresh squeezed lemon. And you can spike it. Okay. And you have a little Knob Creek bourbon, so that's what I did. Dice amber color in this, Collins glass with a boba straw, you get that big wide mouth straw to suck in those boba balls. They're like these smallish peach boba balls that were quite scrumptious, very, very peachy.

This one was like a lot like a Snapple Peach Ice Tea in intensity, just like a little little syrupy, very sweet. Honestly, without the bourbon, I think it would have been too sweet for me to drink. It needed something to cut it a little bit because it was super duper sweet. I think it's like kid's sweet. But I will say, I'd never had a boozy boba before and it was a lot of fun. So I'd be into it. I'd be into it.

So, but they had the plastic straw, I thought those are not. I think there's maybe an exception carved out for boba straws because there isn't a substitute. I don't know. Maybe they banned a specific bottle of straw, but yeah, that's what I got. I got, I got a plastic boba straw, one of those big thick ones. I mean, what do they do? I haven't been to a boba place since the straw band, so I wonder what they're doing there.

Yeah. Maybe those straws are just exempted. I don't know. I think I read an article where at least one, I don't think it was the boba guys, but somebody else is like they're selling their straws now, like they're selling, yeah, like specific straws. Oh, okay. I don't know.

Try to, try to do an end around to the band. I'm curious. Yeah. Yeah. And then just sell merch basically. So now you're buying straws. And then Natalie got herself a dirty olive gin martini. She likes a gin martini.

I agree with it. I will just say that this was super, duper dirty and she liked it, but I mean, it was the color of brine and very olive-y, the sip I had. So, you know, if you're like, if you want that sort of martini, take it at face value, the dirty martini they put on their menu, it's going to be, it's going to be pretty damn dirty. Mitch, what did you get drink wise? I got myself, Nick, like usual, I got myself a Chang's Mai Tai, classic Mai Tai made with

three different rums and tropical juices, definitely a favorite bamboo glass, beard, pineapple wedge. I don't know if that was exactly it, but the other thing I got was a blushing Buddha. And I'm trying to figure out, is that what it was called? Blushing Buddha, but, but I can't, I can't find it. Mitch, two drinks, Nick, one. Interesting. Yeah.

How about that? God damn it. I mean, we did have two drinks for two people, it was a party of two, isn't drinking two drinks alone. I went with molasses boy, Alan McLeod. Alan came with you? He did. What about, how about that?

It was, it was, it was, it was very nice, it was a very nice night. I told him, Nick, and we should announce now, yes, that his waffle house score, do you want to let people know? Yes. So Alan McLeod, a molasses boy who launched this fan campaign to get himself onto our Alabama episode, the one we did in Huntsville, where we reviewed Waffle House with our buddy Carl Tartt. He then deep six the Waffle House review and gave it, it was at three forks, three and

a half forks. He gave it, he gave it a subpar review, this wonderful chain, Alan's review is nixed. The molasses ban is back on. So that means that Waffle House is canonically in the platinum play club as per Carl and Mitch and my reviews. That's right. So congratulations, Waffle House and molasses boy. Get on the ball.

Wow. What's opposite of congratulations? Fuck you. Okay. Fuck you, molasses boy. I was going to try to say like can't graduations or something, but fuck you is better. It always is, isn't it? It's so fun to say.

It is fun to say. The change my time. I've read a couple. There was one with light and dark rum and then like a Myers dark rum and and then orange Cures house. Yes, but then I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I think now maybe just a mix of tropical juices. I'll tell you this much like we said their menu is ever changing. This my tie. I had the last time we went Nick the my tie was not good. If you remember it was very boozy yeah and this time it was good and then my follow up drink was the blushing geisha wasn't the it wasn't the blushing I love this I know. I know. I agree.

I thought it was the blushing Buddha makes feels better. Yeah. Right. Okay. The blushing geisha is was that I was going to ask if you got a boner while drinking it. You know me. I'm so sorry.

Go ahead. Continue. It's the only time I can get a boner. I got to get some booze in me. The blushing geisha is crafted with deep deep eddy grapefruit vodka and blood orange purée then topped with chia seeds. Oh fun. Okay.

Weird. It was good. It was a decent. It was a nice decent drink. Look the BF James closed at 10 p.m. and Alan and I got in there at 930 and I told the guy there I said we're just going to get some apps. We're going to get a couple drinks and a dessert and then I get two dishes to go. I'm going to tell you all of it now because I know you got and there was a big crowd.

There were like a ton of people in there maybe because it was Memorial Day but I was letting him know that we that we were going to get in and out of there because I felt I felt bad. It's nice of you. So I even ordered my two drinks like early on. That's nice. Yeah. Because most people are not considerate like that.

Right. Well I know I know it just was it was too close to them closing up. Yeah. There are people who will like come in with a party of 12 at 955 and stay there for like two hours. Yeah. So yeah. That was nice of you.

I tried. I can never tell what that means is 10 p.m. mean everyone out or does that mean that like where no one can be seated at 10 p.m. I think that's like kitchen closed. Right. Okay. But I would assume like as someone who's who's working food service which I have not that like you would there's kind of like a an expected window of when the last customer come in and when it becomes a dick move.

Yeah. We gave them a nice tip to we were very we were we were nice. I think 30 minutes before closing if you're sitting down it's still that's like that's like kind of like right on the edge. So I think you were. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

But okay. So depending on the place of course. So and then that's a great question. The cutoff time a cutoff time for a restaurant like 45 minutes like a because I thought half an hour. Right. We got two dishes ago. We like made sure that it was all right.

There was another couple that came in that with us that did not care. Yeah. But we were yeah but they also were out of there pretty quick too. But I wonder what people think is a good cutoff time like an hour before or or what hashtag. Dine out cutoff time. I love it. Let us know.

I do wonder. I don't know what it is. What I'm sure people who are in the service industry will say I mean Neil Kylie owns the fat cat will probably tell me you fucking asshole you shouldn't have come in there with a half an hour ago. You know what I mean. Like it depends. Like I can't tell.

Well let's we'll open it up to everybody. Wait. Dine in. Yeah. Dine in. Oh yeah. We'll go in there at nine fifty nine p.m. See who was stealing our racks can't wait for me and Neil to beat the shit out of you.

We would have been here at nine except Mitch was fifty nine minutes late. Okay. So the and let's get into our food a little bit. Yeah. I'm sorry. Did you share all your thoughts in your cocktails? I thought the my time was better this time. It didn't blow me away but it was it was a much better much better concocted than the

last time I was there. The the Blushing Geisha bad name tastes good but it was it was tasty. It was it was very fruit heavy that orange blood orange puree was yes took over quite a bit. I think I liked the my time better. Yeah. But aside from Natalie's drink it's very sugar heavy sounds like both your guys. Yes they were.

That's that's I think a big issue with with chain restaurant cocktails in general a lot of times I think because they're designed for people who don't normally drink alcohol so they're just loaded up with sugar to cut the booze but go ahead Mitch. Oh I was trying to figure out I think Alan had a whiskey sour is there. Can you get a bourbon sour? Does that make sense? Sure you can. Maybe got a I'll figure out what he got but but he got two of the same drink does I would

say text him but unfortunately Alan McLeod molasses boy texts as slow as he talks he get like one word at a time over six hours. We'll get an answer after we've wrapped recording okay so let's get into our food a little bit. I got myself a little bit of a hot a cup of hot and sour soup the menu description rich and tangy broth silken tofu chicken bamboo shoots and egg you know I would say this was it's not really hot or sour but it but it did come out very fast the the the the two kinds of tofu chunks I like the two kinds of tofu preparation the chunks and the silken tofu rather just this was like it just basically was like tasted like bouillon thickened with

flour it was just like a very very beefy sort of broth despite the presence of chicken in it and just not a lot going on in it it was fine the bite the bites with the what I thought were more mushrooms but what I would later realize in the menu description where bamboo shoots were nice but mostly it's just a just a very fine soup it's nothing special um what did you guys start off with? I got two I got two apps yes oh Alan whiskey sour he got whoa how about that fast wow that was blazingly flat yes for Alan um we started off with uh that we did the the lettuce wraps I won't wrap again mm-hmm Nick how about you try a lettuce wrap lettuce wrap it's the lettuce

wrap other other vegetables are totally crap oh okay that you've won that what that's okay I like it was a nice light touch because when you mess up it's just like a brick the most accurate thing I've ever heard about me ever when I do mess up it is like a brick I love you man uh we we did the lettuce wraps with chicken they were it felt like kitchen closing lettuce wraps sure no which were not but they were still that being said they were still good they were still they were still pretty tasty did you hear closing time coming from the back of the house m a sonic that was my high school graduation like song it's a great song that's like tight that really puts the sort of time 98 yeah that's a good one uh what was mine

it's something unpredictable oh yeah he is right I hope you have the time of your life parentheses damn it isn't that what it is isn't it damn it is it damn it I think it is in parentheses boy I know I feel about that um why wait how old are you I'm uh 30 I almost said 20 I'm 30 I'm 36 I just turned 39 there yeah I was I was 2001 Nick was my graduating class I was uh I was also 98 I'm 38 right now 98 yeah all right yeah yeah good year it was a good year you got to experience college in the 90s I mean like yeah just a touch of it yeah did you go to your 20th oh I don't know that shit I haven't gotten to any reunion Nick have you ever gone to any reunion Nick is no but I did I was in Vegas recently and I met someone else who went to

Long Beach Polly High School that's doesn't help at all I said go jackrabbits he said go jackrabbit you guys were the jackrabbits Jesus Christ it's a great sports school we were talking about how they just won the women's relay race state championship we're just talking about that the North Quincy High School Red Raiders won the 19 I know problematic name won the 19 won the 1992 Super Bowl for football Nick the what like what do you the Super Bowl the Super Bowl they won it all I was there it's like the state championship the other team ran the I ran like a like ran in what they thought was the game winning touchdown it was snowing it was at Boston University's wow and they wiped the snow away and they saw that they hadn't got in and

dramatic it was great dramatic loss for them a great yeah a great loss from a great win for us the I got the Mongolian pot stickers as well Nick oh yeah this that's that was a new menu item around yeah a new twist on a classic handful the dumplings with savory Mongolian beef filling sweet and savory dipping sauce they were good I liked them a lot they were they were they were a nice little touch I'll say this they feel like we were saying this place is supposed to be like the Cadillac of like yeah of fast casual or whatever and this feels more like it's going this like feels more in the Chili's Chili's direction I think yeah I think they're going maybe a little bit too bad but no but when I saw the menu of the the avocado egg rolls I was like

oh this is different yeah it's definitely a different vibe it's trying to be and and the the the crispy avocado spring rolls which is what we admit when they asked me and Natalie got a newer edition the menu like the Mongolian pot stickers is it's basically a clone Natalie pointed out of a menu item they have at CPK so that kind of speaks to like okay this is how how much they broadened the the the category of food they're operating in so the description here this is these are spring rolls with with creamy avocado edamame and water chestnut served with a sweet orange honey dipping sauce they are deep fried which you may not get from the menu description although the sword crispy indicates it greasy as hell they're just like this super crisp

greasy crispy crunchy flour wrapper and the avocado filling am I know you also had this one some curious on your thoughts but it was just it was very just like guac like I just thought it was guac kind of mushy it's just this mushy avocado um and the dipping the dipping sauce that came with it was just like super duper sweet here's the issue with with pfjang's becoming more like a chilies or other places that it is so like kind of oil right yeah and heavy that like once a place is like once the overall quality of a place goes down if you can I'll get into it later but you can taste some of that oily friedness right so I mean like I'm not saying I'm saying that the actual food has gotten less good too I think is a part of the issue with pfjang I yeah

like just looking at I was just I was just shocked by the menu yeah it really was and I was like and I felt like it was healthier before sure I mean now as I looked at the the menu you can see the calories were before you that wasn't a thing right we all had to do thanks obama care but like yeah there's a way more fried items right on the menu yeah and and this was this is one that maybe you like look at and superficially it's like oh this seems like this might be a healthier lighter option to your point but it's not at all it's like it's super heavy the way that I thought of it in my head was like it's a taquito filled with guacamole that you dip in in marmalade it's just like so it was like a duck sauce but just like a super super sweet fucking nightmare that

combination you just said right there that said I kind of liked it I don't know well what did you think I mean it was it was good it wasn't it wasn't nearly as crispy as I expected yeah was the and they advertised crispy avocado roll I wanted to be crispy right but that I also got a takeout so that doesn't help yeah I don't know if it was crispier in the restaurant it was pretty crispy in the restaurant all right so maybe that's my fault um but it was it was fine it was yeah kind of bland I thought I thought it was it was not bad but it was not necessarily a thing I would I would get again I almost wanted something crispy or crunchy like in the roll like in the with the avocado like if you're gonna make it like guac put like some onion or something in there for like more

texture instead of just like mushy yeah exactly there's there's there's not much going on in there except for just mushed avocado yeah um and then a I mean there's supposed to be at a malmay and water chestnuts in there but I just didn't get a lot of that the the other other app slash veggie we got sishwan style asparagus which is red chili paste garlic sishwan preserves sliced onions very similar to a a green bean preparation they have there also greasy as hell however loaded with garlic a lot of flavor this to me reminded me of like a just a a greasy in a good way dish from a Chinese takeout restaurant like and I was like this was honestly one of the best maybe the best thing we had I was really happy with this this asparagus it was mostly cooked

pretty well and um and yeah just just a just very very dense with flavor and and you know greasy in a good way and and it was good that it actually had some add something to it other than just being uh just being asparagus sitting in sauce um uh cool up what what did you get uh food wise I got the green beans okay you got so that version right and it was I was just like oh I want to pick stuff that I had before and like that was it's so it's to go so it's not but I it's pretty that if the flavor profile seems the same yes with a little bit more steaminess of the to go right um and I was oh this is good this is comforting I did feel like it was maybe more greasy than I remember yeah um just because they're so funny because like when you work there it's like we

would do the thing where if there's a new menu we're tasting on the food we're drinking the new cocktails we're touring the walk-in um fridge like it like it matters yes you know like this is where the ribs are and and there was such pride in the how like walk doing the walk is like healthier right you're not putting as much oil you know and this I don't know it just I felt a flavor profile the same except a little bit more greasy right yeah I there there there was a dish that I got to go well I also want to say that the part of the problem with the lettuce wraps which also they should be lower less calories the lettuce wraps yeah I think so you would think so they put the crunchy part on it they're you know what they did there was no they didn't even they were

this was this was last minute oh well that's where the calories would be is the crunch is the crunch because it's fried it's like fried noodles yeah but shouldn't be so bad with just like the chicken and sauce okay sodium yeah there's a lot of sodium um I meant you were dipping it in some butterscotch that you brought though I don't bring fucking butterscotch you know Beyonce brings hot sauce in her purse Mitch brings butterscotch in his pocket just loosen his pocket he just ladles it into a spark and when it's time to go bye bye I do not have loose butterscotch I did use that peat the kind of the brown peanutty sauce with the with the lettuce wraps the lettuce

wraps are they're one of their famous things there they were even even even this kind of rushed version was good I was I thought the apps the absolute we were having fun I wanted to make it clear sure I wanted I were enjoying our drinks and enjoying those apps um and then I got the two dishes to go should I talk about that before I go back to the dessert yeah let's let's let's talk about our mains a little bit okay I got the beef lo mein and this was so I I brought it home here's the whole thing we were I got it to go yes me and molasses boy we we head out of there old molasses boy you know take us 45 minutes an hour to get to the car with molasses boy um just gotta put my left foot in front of my right foot

now to repeat the process with my other leg and now we're walking wow this is fun oh whoops I left my phone back at the table oh fuck time to turn around first 45 degrees now another 45 excuse me sir as they're locking up the place on him we were driving back home yeah I have the to go stuff today I had a beat I got a beef lo mein and I was gonna get the the honey chicken the god crispy honey chicken yes and uh my server talked me out of me said if you're if you're getting if you're getting something for the road I don't think that it will travel well okay and so instead I got the sesame chicken now wasn't the thing where he just didn't want was the crispy honey chicken something that was gonna take longer maybe that no no okay thanks for you just giving

you good advice yeah okay so I had those two those two meals Alan and I get going we're on the then we take it I was dropping Alan off we take it we go up a side street we see a kitten run in front of my car oh six months you know probably six months at least but like still a little but looked like a little baby at least we thought it was a kitten yeah and I get out of my car and we start looking for it and then I said Alan why don't you look under the uh under the the car there and I'll look in this little like a parking lot area okay let me just bend with the waist real quick well you should have seen the last boy movie looked under the car there was a family of raccoons wow and one was a fucking the tallest motherfucker I've ever seen this tall fucking

tall ass raccoon and I was like whoa and he you know he ran he ran away and we were so much and I was like was the raccoon trying to chase the kitten was it trying to eat the fucking kitten yeah and then I was like I think I saw the kitten up the tree and so and he's like in the raccoon chased the kitten up the tree so we went to a tree and we were shining our lights in this tree and there were these two huge raccoons in the tree and I was like are we sure it wasn't a baby raccoon that you saw he maybe saw a baby raccoon that looked like a kitten or the kitten wasn't up the tree and we were and we were in this was a good 45 minutes yeah we did trash band does eat like are they predators I don't know the that's I wasn't sure we're more scavengers yeah kill well one

went into the sewer and the other two went up went up a tree and what Alan thought was the cat kitten or a baby raccoon uh-huh but there maybe also was just separately a baby it was critter country we the Pasadena's critter country was insane but that was a good 45 minutes of our time we didn't we couldn't we drove around we try to find the kitten again we couldn't find it and I'm heartbroken because yeah that's things that keep me up at night boy cry the two of you searching for kittens and some of them pond raccoons that's like a scene it's like a sea story from a Jason Bateman comedy he's two he's two oafs animal services yeah I was going to say I was going to be nicer isn't say it feels like a cohen brothers movie oh yeah yeah thanks nick

it's a sea storyline from a Bateman movie uh I said Bateman's got chops I like Bateman but I'm saying you're you're the sometimes the quality of the movies are in our great I'm saying that you guys would be like sort of up some broad comic relief and so okay thank you it'd be fun yeah we didn't buy the kitten I was heartbroken dropped Alan off took him another 45 minutes ago in my car so where that that's the reason maybe the sesame chicken isn't I get home the food is still warm wow I gotta hand it to them the food was still warm the sesame chicken was like a little like it was just sitting in its sauce too much and like I know that was a time travel but then also I I like with Chinese food I think a big thing is traveling and I think a big thing is leftovers

I and I know that I know that pf Chang's that's not exactly their thing yeah but also going forward I think that that is something that they have to think about if they focus more on take out they have maybe have some smaller footprint dining rooms yeah they're gonna be a walk like more like a walk cano or whatever those kind of Chinese restaurant right places are yeah little dragon yeah something like but the the the I thought that the sesame chicken my problem more with it so was that it just wasn't that flavorful yeah and I was sad that I didn't get the the crispy honey chicken and then the beef lo mein there's some some in there still neck it was just some and where the in the my kitchen okay if you you I mean you're not gonna try but it was it was so

smoky and oily I just thought you meant like your stomach I was like oh okay that's a process there's some in there Nick you think I talk about my stomach that way I don't know what you're what in there was and then it would just smoothly transition into that song that I heard earlier god damn it um it was smoky and it was like just like oily and like oily and just like tasted it just like it was burnt like smoky like that it tasted like a little bit look I know this is this was last minute lo mein yeah so I can't be too I know but it still was you know they're still making I there should be no reason why it's smoky it was it was bad in the way that like I'm like it just was like bad fried right over oily just it was a it was it was bad it was the the

to mess up noodles yeah that's tough yeah I just there was so much oil and sauce and it was just it was just it was too much the the sesame chicken was was was good though and then today I got you song went and picked up an order and I got him to grab the thank you song I got the crispy honey chicken and you know what it traveled fine it did it really did I thought it traveled pretty decently not that that the server was a great guy I know but did he encounter a raccoon family I mean it wasn't like an exact sort of you son did you encounter a raccoon family on your on the way here no he did not so you have to factor that okay that's fair yeah but um I but the the the crispy honey chicken today was was good but also my issue with it still it was good yeah

it was better than the the two dishes I took home last night but still just like what was the flavor it was just kind of bland I got weird that's I mean and and that's kind of a similar assessment I'd have to to one of the two dishes I had one of them I enjoyed one of them I thought was okay um and uh what the first the tradition referring to is the Thai harvest curry with chicken which is a which is a red curry with some vegetables and some Fresno peppers on top you know this was also like again I thought the I thought it was okay I thought the the comparing it to curry from a local Thai place not really fair there's great Thai in an LA but I mean like it wasn't really in the same ballpark it was it was like a very it felt like a very generic version

that was that didn't have a lot of a ton of flavor it is so strange to me that they have Thai food yeah it is weird bizarre yeah they have Thai food they have sushi they got it all those are totally they're all it's like different flavor profile right they're trying to do everything um so uh the dominant element is was this always was this a come this was a I didn't listen to your intro I zoned out um yeah I know this this is this is a white the white guy started this company and a Chinese and a Chinese guy yeah okay it just feels this feels more and more drifting away it feels like the more and more more like it's so funny because when we would like when what I was like uh orientation they don't this was new to me the Ruth Chris guy right because they

really focused naturally they focused more on the Asian guy yes Paul guy right his name's Paul I think yeah it's Paul and Phil I think yeah yeah and oh by the way I was like Paul is the white guy Philip is the Philip yeah Philip so we mainly would focus on the Philip version also I was the only Asian person on staff it was truly wow yeah it's truly um and there weren't many Asian chefs or anything like that but yeah okay so I didn't realize he was the guy who also started Ruth's Chris yeah well no he didn't start he was a successful Ruth's Chris franchise owner oh yeah the there the woman woman Ruth for tell us sort of makes sense that Ruth Ruth Chris yeah but the uh so yeah here's what I'll say about the the curry the dominant element of vegetable wise

was cauliflower which was it was a lot of cauliflower and was a little undercooked the mushrooms were nice a lot of friends of chillies on top which was great um but I characterize this is to put it in like in sports terms this was like a replacement level curry it was it was nothing special the other dish we got I I think we both enjoyed oolong chile and sea bass wild caught tea marinated filet ginger soy sauce walked spinach uh an expensive menu item by pf chang standards which is already a kind of a pricey place but they did give you an ample piece of fish I didn't feel like I was being ripped off it was a little overcooked but it was it was good um not super sweet not heavily sauce just sort of this light smoky miso adjacent flavor

just a little tinge of it uh and um and yeah great sear on it uh and they give you a shitload of spinach it's like two bags of spinach like just like so much I think of I think of vegetables in bag terms now because it's how I buy so many greens um and yeah it was a shitload of of spinach that was a good counterpoint don't you buy bag don't you buy like bag salad yeah that's how people buy it like you know I mean yeah sure sorry that's an old item that was like if you sold that like you were upselling right like you were you wanted people to get that sea bass because it's a high priced item right um I I mean I liked it I thought it was I thought it was pretty good the only the thing I'll say about this the service was mostly okay I think they were kind of uh distracted by

others by other parties you know sometimes behind the bar you don't get the the most attentive service which is fine I understand the bartenders have other work to do uh but they hurriedly brought the check without asking if we wanted dessert and we did get dessert and we were just sort of took it as a queue was like okay we're gonna get out of here we opened our fortune and we closed it out yeah um but they they cost themselves uh they cost themselves a sale uh here's what I'll say here are fortune cookie fortunes mine was keep your eyes on the prize and you will find success and Natalie's was you will soon discover a new talent wow oh yeah oh so general yeah I have I have the salt and pepper prawns which was like an old favorite of mine okay so it's to go

so there's that element right I do feel like the recipe is different right and I I the to go container is the same as a rotisserie chicken that's weird it's strange yeah I was very hungry so I ate most of it right but I mindless eat all the time you guys gotta know this about me well we we were we were saying while we were while we while we were eating here like you do a lot of damage with calories at with pf chang so fat like you really don't you don't feel you can you can down a thousand calories and not even and be like yeah I'm half full or something yeah it's just like an app probably yeah yeah it's it's it's it's dangerous like that and I don't I mean I guess you know like like a lot of kind of americanized chinese food like that is not the

most healthy for you anywhere but it's surprising with pf chains where I ate this this crispy honey chicken and I was like oh that was like 1100 calories and I am not satisfied have you guys talked about that controversy of that uh the the white lady who named her chinese food after her her her husband and said it was like the healthy chinese you guys hear about that and then people got really strong but like super angry that I forget for what it was but like it was like the better chinese or something like that people got so mad and they had to just like half apologize then full apologize and yeah I can't remember is it's awful anyways um did you do you have a fortune by the way oh no I haven't I I don't like fortune cookies because my mom went to restaurant

and I odied on them wow I followed again my fault I just ate them over and over again but I do like to know the fortune I got you will your your willing heart will help you achieve the impossible nick did you get did you have a fun pf chains fact on the back because some of them have fun facts let's check yours in my shirt pocket I believe oh no it's in butterscotch it's gone I don't know where it is here who are the fun facts on the back of ours uh first fun fact two ingredients integral to the pf chang's menu are garlic and ginger and the other one is inspired by its namesake the great wall of chocolate is a pf chang's tradition so there you go that's the origin of the great wall of chocolate it's inspired by the great wall of china wow yeah

alan had uh an important meeting this week will happily change your future oh boy that's a big one yeah okay I have an audition this week alan thanks a lot you fucking stole my fortune piece of shit lemongrass is an important flavor to many pf chang's vietnamese style dishes okay the one you love is closer than you think nick oh my god oh boy this is gonna be very disruptive for both of our lives maybe it's gonna be me and ockerman who kick your fucking ass i don't mean scott and i cannot get any closer we're just gonna be inside of each other's bodies i don't know what although i would like to operate him from within hey i got a new one did you eat the cookie without taking the fortune out no scan it with your tongue

what's your fortune say your charming ways okay so far so good will soon help you get something special the beef slices and pf chang's mongolian beef are hand carved before hitting the walk okay i feel like their food facts are kind of wack yeah not particulates i like like like you lemongrass is a part of their vietnamese dishes yeah that's just talking about this vietnamese food in large it's not specific to pf chang's what are you doing what are you doing i caught it mr me a fortune cookie and i caught it very well i bet your fortune's gonna be you'll catch a cookie okay uh chinese sail walk is great for cooking because it requires less oil than a flat bottom pan hey pushing the health food thing again here we go keep your eyes open to emerging opportunities

oh how about that okay i don't even like these fortunes that much i think this was meant for you mitch keep your eyes open for christening opportunities he thinks i have no eyes i mean i guess happy american pacific heritage uh let's get to our final verdicts on pf chang's so uh yes oh you have dessert tell me about your dessert i got alan and i got vietnamese chocolate lava cake molten chocolate cake milk chocolate ganache uh which is what was that the chocolate sauce basically yeah like the yeah a hint of roasted coffee did not see that at all with vanilla bean ice cream why was this vietnamese i have the coffee that they're trying to play with yeah i think so yeah you could not taste it at all i'll say this i think that i said to alan we both

liked it the outer rim of like the outer edges the bottom outer edges of the cake were like a little overdone right a little burnt in but it was still fucking delicious this i think a chocolate lava cake with vanilla ice cream is like maybe my favorite dessert i like it so much yeah you get a good one it's a lot of fun do you something like skillety and that's why like it just seemed like maybe it was just a little bit overcooked but it was still very very very good we were very very happy with it there were some fresh fruit blueberries and strawberries on there that were nice but but uh but it was the the vanilla the vanilla ice cream we we we cleared the entire plate right just a few minutes um but also shouldn't that be not a hard one to do too i mean it feels like an easy thing

to do yeah and i bet it's not even vietnamese coffee that they yeah yeah yeah yeah no there was i mean it just tastes like a like a like a good chill like any chilies or applebees or whatever lava cake it was good though it was good we were yeah it's just and nally's take was the ingredients don't include anything remotely vietnamese we didn't order it but um that was one we were eyeing but yeah it is a kind of thing of like just putting the just putting like a country's name in front of it doesn't imbue it with anything and and also if you want to do that why not call it like like the i don't know just call it something kind of vaguely asian like call it like like dragon's food you know whatever i just dragon's food cake like oh instead of devils yeah home run

nick all right um okay let's let's get to our final thoughts on pf chang's uh we'll each go around we'll sort of give a summation of our of our experiences at this chain over the years and then give it a fork rating from zero to five forks uh coolop you are a guest we'll begin with you i mean to give it one forks is just a dammit yeah okay so i'll give it two then oh my god damn i i think it's an abomination abomination that they have sushi at the restaurant yeah and i did not try it yes but you try the Thai food yeah and i think that's cuckoo bananas as well yeah i think it's this pan asian thing i and what i had it was just again i will admit that it was to go but i'm thrown off by with that rotisserie container and it's not i'm taking in what everyone's

saying and it's not the pf chang's that i grew up in right yeah and so for that i give it to two forks wow tough score there's there's no doubt to be my reviewed there's just no doubt that the quality has dipped i mean right i mean there's no arguing that that's what happened yes we all feel this way yes it feels like it's yeah it feels like it's not what it was a lot of these chains it's undeniable also that i did have fun there with with molasses boy right um but you know two the two entrees they had were kind of a let down the apps and drinks were fun this time around yes i just i don't know what the future of this place is because i think that they have to scale back i think maybe they should make it more of a to go place or or they get a they get

get a re-upper listen is pf gonna stand for passionate food oh wow or is it gonna stand for pretty funky is that bad yeah i don't know how bad that is seems fun yeah it's like it's like george clinton and parliament funkadelic i've never seen you drop into a character so quickly pretty funky oh boy which pf do you want before the chang's do you want to be do you want passionate food i kind of want the for the pretty funky or like i said pretty okay it makes me think of bootsy collins yeah like i'm seeing the glittering sunglasses right now the boots because for me a lot of that food was was funky and not in the cool way yeah it was it was it was it was not in the cool lettuce wrap way yeah yeah so let me wrap up my review oh i should

here's my fork score i'm giving to you i'm not gonna give it five because that shows this place brick i'm not gonna give it five no way man this place is jive i'm going with three forks man by the way is jive offensive three forks three forks that's my rule let us laugh let us laugh mitch is cool jesus christ i overall enjoyed my experience three forks three forks from mitch i overall enjoyed my experience uh you know it did feel like the and and maybe it was the day maybe it was where we

were seated but it did feel like we were we'd kind of half attentive service um it might have just also been our individual server which you know i never you never know what someone's got going on but it wasn't it wasn't they weren't super conscious of what was what we were uh what we needed and or are paying attention to us um like i mentioned the they they kind of rushed us out with the uh bringing the check early uh but i think the the food was hit or miss but more hits than misses and it was fine you're spending a lot of money there i think if you if you've gone there for you know if you've gone there after junior prom or something or i mean like i think like whatever you people go here for special occasions for like a for like

a birthday or something i think you it you could have fun if you if you order the right things it's just knowing which things to order and maybe being skeptical of yeah you went after junior prom you're saying isn't that it that's like a thing people go people go to maybe not after before i don't mean this visit you were going no we didn't go to we didn't attend junior prom and then and then what do you think chains would be because i definitely went to like a a fan to your restaurant which would change in that category i think for some people yeah i think i think i think for some people a cheesecake factory or a or a pf chang's is that is right in that uh zone yeah in that zone um that said i'm kind of rambling here let me just say that i think

this place is this place has got some deficiencies but it's okay at what it does now like you guys yeah just like us well okay is being charitable oh my rap was pretty perfect now we went higher than i expected she she gave it three forks three times i liked what i got uh and um and i think that's uh but i think that's the right the right general ballpark i have no reason to disagree with her so i'm gonna say i'm in the hand holding club with my lovely wife three forks three times uh three it's got some work to do but we had a pretty good experience of the Santa Monica location despite a few uh a few misses you know i was i was closer to i was closer to four i was gonna my original thought was 3.9999 forks yes but as i've thought

about it more it is it's getting it's closer to a three and a half i'm gonna move mine to three and a half wow three and a half because but it just it's got issues it's gotten bad it's great it's not good like hula up said what is its identity now it's all over the map they got to do something don't care about it anymore like but you know what isn't that a lot of restaurants i mean sure some of them come and go some don't some don't stick around so i don't i think if i was actually maybe it would be better if i went into the restaurant and i it would be a three but i'm i stick firm to two but also i i think i also think that you might what the hell is that a different oh we'll talk about it we got different kinds um but i also think that you would if you

go into the restaurant sometimes it is kind of a sad state in there too is the other okay yeah yeah um all right well uh that was our review of pf chang's it's time for a segment it's another edition of snack or whack so we've got a couple of goo goo clusters actually we got three different varieties of goo goo clusters different variety it's a variety package someone gave these to us yes someone on the road in uh in either alabama in huntsville or in uh in nashville we should have written down who gave us the goo goo clusters well whoever it was thank you tweet at us yes so a big a big uh thank you we're gonna have to we're gonna have to share some of these yeah you and i can split them cool up you can have these to yourself um should we get a little should we get a little

knife or something what should we do or should we just nibble nibble opposite ends just nibble it all right we're gonna fucking lady and tramp the oh yes clusters so we've got three different flavors that the first one is the original peanut caramel and marshmallow new get wait nick i wanted you to do a lettuce wrap for your score by the way fuck what you don't seem excited lettuce wrap it's a lettuce wrap pf chang's sure ain't total crap three and a half three point three seven five four that's bullshit well then because with nick i'm like i'm like i'm gonna listen let me come closer to him he draws i'm like pulling back so nick draws his audience in um nick also you said the the you said the the you mispronounced the how you say these these

treats how do you say i'm goo-goo clusters they're goo-goo clusters mitch put his thumb in his mouth he went nick goo-goo oh god why does your sound fucking perverted because i've been a bad baby babies don't say that babies aren't bad well i need a diaper change jesus okay so well the original is peanut caramel and marshmallow new get covered in milk chocolate you open these things up it is like a very you can see the clusters it's very uh you're gonna you're gonna take the first bite of all these you take the first take the first bites of all of them i don't care just try to steal the ship have as many no you get the first bite of that one i

don't want to i want you to have the first bites of all of them this is weird now grouped out a goo-goo cluster we i've nick we got the original here yeah we the original and then we've we've also got the peanut butter and pecan which we'll get to um all right you guys are taking bites of these none of us have ever had goo-goo clusters before emma you goo-goo clusters you saw ever clusters okay no from you song in the other room i feel like every week you song gets further and further away from when we were where we record yeah he's sitting on the front steps right now he's gradually just trying to move out of state um okay let me take a bite of this that's fucking good that's rich is this like a regional tree it's gotta be i assume yeah nashville tennessee

clusters so we got em in nashville made since 1912 i kind of remember them giving us the goo-goo clusters and i don't remember goo-goo goo-goo sorry goo-goo clusters baby hunky baby tai-tai god that's so gross i'm baby go poo poo i bet you there's a small faction of our listeners fucking jacking it right now they're fucking sick fucks out there okay next one okay so we'll move on to that one so we should we hold our thoughts okay well we can hold our thoughts on these as we go the next one is the peanut butter which does not have a you take the first bite i'm gonna take the first bite of this one boy this one really looks it looks like a like pangea

like it's like got this this weird continental shape to it uh all right let me take a bite oh wow that is different it's a lot different thank you so much i'm interested thank you i mean just swapping out marshmallow for peanut butter makes a makes a big difference there's no caramel in this one right i don't think so okay oh wow oh you're right this is very that's a much simpler one that is just kind of like a crunchy reaches crunchy Reese's yeah yeah wow all right my eyes are starting to dial it yeah this is and the last trigger city we got is a pecan um by the way these have some instructions on the back they do how to enjoy tear open place in mouth chew carefully it's a little a little cheeky that's fun um so that emma you can have

that to mitch you can take the first bite of this one oh so this is this is the same thing except except it has pecans right it has pecans instead of the peanuts in the from the first one i will say that i like as far as nuts go in desserts i'm a pecan fan a great uh like pecan sandies those are great a pecan pie that's a delight let me take a nibble of this bad boy wait have you guys had tarvers candies mm-hmm yes we have it's delicious mm-hmm delicious pecan does treats the mascot brand now available at qvc it's wild that we've had two guests on the show jew tarver and the coolest guy i know jeff dutton whose families have candy factories it's wild and that is crazy they they chose another life yeah but they should do it

it's enjoyable yeah everyone should do origin story um i'd say the pecan i think if i'm if i'm gonna rank these i might go pecan wow i love peanut butter but i honestly might put the original above it because i think the peanut butter it doesn't isn't anything special and put the peanut butter in third and third place but they're all good i enjoyed all of them it's a good quality chocolate coating what do you guys think how would you rank these excuse me i i just gonna say these are snacks all around yeah they're snacks all around all three get snacks the list like high quality snacks high quality like you song to your snacks that's right don't feel uncomfortable you're not allowed to feel uncomfortable you're fired what i have to say to these is

nick i almost have the opposite ranking of you i would maybe say the peanut butter ones first just because i love peanut butter and then the original second and then the pecan ones third right but the originals are our neck and neck with the peanut butter one the pecans were my least favorite because i just think that the pecan stands out too much yeah i got you that's like the original it just the mix of flavors is a little bit better to me right the the peanut butter ones are intense but i really love peanut butter if you like Reese's peanut butter cups and then you basically it's just almost the same thing but with the little peanuts on the side right and it's they're really good um but i think it is a peanut butter baby

but i'm shitting my pants yes she's describing things that are currently happening no not currently happening uh my mom said when i was a baby i never even i never had a dirty diaper well then it sounds a lot like the song i heard it was just a neat little log that was in my hands to be fair um goo goo all around nick good these are these are i have the same ranking as nick i went on original peanut butter your baby voice is creeping me out too much that i can't i can't think straight nick do you have do you have a baby review uh baby pitching a tent in his diaper a baby is for me i don't even know that's

like legal i don't know to say sign a waiver every listener has to sign a waiver fucking baby with a heart on for god's sakes it's only a chubby mix it happens directly it doesn't happen uh and cool up he snacks all around he gives you these little snacks yes definitely i think i think we're in relative agreement here uh that was like you sung you sung on a carousel snacks all around just like a restaurant value feedback that's what the feedback today's email comes to us from reed in minnesota reed writes my grandma used to make pop tarts for us and then spread butter on the hot pop tart so that the butter would melt i also had a friend growing up whose mother would spritz the family orange juice with sprite do you have any memories of plossing up food

in a way that makes it unnecessarily unhealthy or odd oh that's good and i am not going to be able to think of anything i don't think one thing immediately came to mind and this is a thing i know i've said on the show before but my family akin to the pop tarts thing when we'd get cinnamon rolls we get a big thing of butter and put that put that on top butter and margarine on top and then microwave them and so does it's got a shitload of butter on top of that already thing that's loaded with frosting and sugar and it was so unhealthy and so delicious so delicious i'm trying to think well it's like minnesota what up reed i mean just hot dishes right i'm just trying to think of well my dad would add like sugar to regu like the can regu like additional right

sugar to it i'm trying to think of what else um i've had the uh this is a thing not that i did but i had a roommate who did is that he would take cheezus pour them in a bowl cover them with milk and eat them like cereal that's fucking disgusting that's disgusting yeah cheezus ew it was yeah i was wild and did not act like it was on you like thought it was like it was normal and he's a zero killer i don't i know what he's up to i do know he had to copy a perfect 10 magazine wasn't perfect 10 i think it's it's like perfect it's like uh yeah you're a perfect you know okay it's like a classier it's like a slightly classier than hustler yeah it's like a classier hustler uh the forum articles had perfect grammar i can't i honestly weirdly enough i know that people

thinking me me as a big bad unhealthy asshole uh my dad was so like uh the my dad was health conscious so he would oh like my in the you know like there's some stuff like bread and stuff that he wasn't aware of but right he had heart disease in our we had heart disease in our family so a lot of like he always used like skim milk which is like people are like oh skim milk isn't like good for you and for different reasons or whatever but like skim milk and egg beaters and stuff so we didn't really do much of like unhealthy things up i feel sure yeah so i can't really think of a nothing on your own you ever get like get like a slice of pizza but you know what i'm remembering that there was a kid in school who he would take he would get a slice of pizza and a mcdonald's cheese burger

and he would put the slice of pizza inside the mcdonald's see i'm not much of like a franken food person either yeah that's that is maybe another part of the issue i mean like when i made craft macaroni and cheese i used the full like quarter stick of oh yeah and all the milk that you gotta though it's so good it's it is so good but like that is like so extremely unhealthy yeah yeah so yeah i mean i guess that's the menu of fat sals right right yeah fat so i mean i've had fat sals but i like i don't i don't love to franken food stuff up too much i honestly can't i mean like besides like getting buffalo chicken wings from one place and then getting a pizza from another place i can't really think of stuff that like we did that was that crazy i know that that seems weird but

i don't i don't really i mean yeah for me it was just like an abundance of food right there's too much yeah that's yeah too much food now like yeah like dano will drive me to wendy's and then i'll like hide the wendy's going into my house and eat like twenty dollars with the wendy's in my basement and then hide it for my mom if you if you want me to get real with that that's yeah yeah i'll like put it under the car i'll i'll sneak it under the garbage so she doesn't see so then and then so then she'll just still make you dinner is that the idea no no i'm just saying she'll be mad if i i this is usually have a night of drinking or something so i've probably eaten or whatever yeah yeah but i can't think i can't think of things where i've were unhealthy did up

i've never heard of the example of the the spritzing of the spray on the orange juice no that's that's fine it's like a mixed drink or whatever but i'm into that um i try that i don't i don't i don't i don't have one i'm sorry well uh let us know if you have anything that comes to mine hashtag unnecessarily unhealthy let us know how you how you plussed up i want i want to mention this because at the beginning of the of the record i looked at my snapple fact yeah i'm texting my sister by the way to see if there was anything that we did she would do like croissants and blue cheese but which is a snack you did i've done that yeah that's a lot of fun it says america's first roller this is a snapple fact america's first roller coaster was built in 1827 to carry

coal from a mine to boats below bullshit that's bullshit that's fake right i made that up i think they have some isn't that a mine cart yeah that that's not a roller coaster yeah they have some fake ones in there there's one yeah yeah they do that you're just calling things other things yeah what is what is the deal with what is the deal with the snapple true fact they are some of them are fake is this how you get going into your tight five on snapple facts yeah already the first punchline really knocked everyone out of the park knocked out of the park nick what is what this is like the longest running thing that i don't get yeah i know i used to like them but i used to drink a lot of snapple i know but we were younger and we're like oh yeah sassy's funny

right yeah not into it anymore this is a diet snapple to be fair oh okay that makes more sense what what flavor you got that i got the half and half diet snapple it's 10 calories okay okay it's a nice little uh treat i used to do the diet peach snapple all the time i drink that oh that's that's great it's a good good flavor they're probably bad for you right i'm sure they're bad for you i stopped drinking diet drinks it's a lemonade iced tea nick uh or i think it's half and half but for you one third lemonade is the nick weigher yeah i made myself one at sharkies earlier one third lemonade two-thirds tea get yourself one get yourself a nick weigher treat yourself what do you get what do you get to eat at the sharkies a big salad right um do you

have anything to sing about that big salad he doesn't what did i get at sharkies today a big salad in a major way all right if you have a question or comment with the world of chain restaurants you can email us at doewayspodcast at gmail.com or leave us a voicemail at 830 go doe that's 830 4636844 and to get the no boys double our weekly bonus episode join the golden plate club or platinum plate club at patreon.com slash doe boys cool off the livestock thank you so much for joining us the documentary is origin story tell us about it real quick it's super funny you know what there is a lot of there are a lot of funny moments in it like uh first of all you're very funny and then your your your your mom and you talk about your relationship with your mom she

she's she says a lot of funny stuff in it she's a character um guys uh if you didn't know this already when i was 14 i found out that my dad wasn't my dad in a very horrible way but it took me 20 years in this documentary to kind of finally ask the questions and figure out what what what actually is my origin story right so it takes me you know i'm in la i'm uh you know uh you get to see what your wolf used to look like if that makes you excited but also i go to home to minnesota and then go to laos where i meet my biological father awesome and people can see it on amazon prime amazon prime uh you can rent buy and then on the 10th of june i think it's going to be on google play uh and then july 10th it'll be on itunes and there'll be some more rollouts monthly

and i'm not saying this because i'm a friend even though i am a friend but it's a fantastic documentary did an amazing job and it made me laugh and cry it was it was it was very special you should check it out it meant a lot to me that you and arman showed up for me yeah i really appreciate it of course it was it was it was awesome you should you should you should watch yeah watch it on amazon prime it's it's great it's a great watch check that out and hey that'll do it for this episode of doe boys until next time for the spoon man mike mitchell i'm sorry i'm sorry no wait i didn't know who you were talking about okay until next time for spoon oh it's weird match mike spoon mitchell until next time for mike spoon mitchell now i don't know how to finish the

rest of my sign off because i get it all in muscle memory i know the rest of it goes now now it's it's too formal for mike spoon mitchell it's already good looking at me he's having a fucking this is nick what fuck i don't remember how it goes next time for the spoon man mitchell this is nick wait i don't remember how the rest of it goes now i can't say it anymore i think you say i'm nick weigher happy and right okay for mitch spoon mitchell no wait mike spoon mitchell yeah okay so for my everything up for mike spoon mitchell i'm nick weigher happy and right wouldn't that be it yeah see ya that was a hate gun podcast