This episode is presented by Pepsi. A hot dog is a sandwich. That deserves a Pepsi. I can’t believe we got to cook for Gordon Ramsay. Would you say you could die a happy woman now? Not until I get my last meal. Not until I’ve had my coffee. This is A Hot Dog Is A Sandwich. Yeah, I put ice in my cereal, so what? That makes no sense. A hot dog is a sandwich. A hot dog is a sandwich. What? Welcome to our podcast, A Hot Dog is a Sandwich. The show we break down our world’s biggest food debates. I’m your host, Josh Sharer. And I’m your host, Nicole Enayati. And today we will be taking a bit of a retrospective on all of our lives. Because we’re talking all things Last Meals. I don’t want to. Nicole, what is your greatest regret? Oh, really? Yeah, what’s your greatest regret? Oh, oh my gosh, really? I practice this in my car sometimes. Yeah, great. What do you think it is? Wait, for Last Meals specifically? No. Just, okay. There’s some questions that like I think about in my head when I’m driving when I don’t want to listen to like music and stuff. Um, my greatest regret is not being honest to my friends, whenever I was having a really hard time in life. Mm, reaching out for help? Reaching, no, just reaching out and apologizing and saying, Hey, I’m sorry I wasn’t myself during these times. Mm, mm, mm, mm. And, I understand our relationship is different and it’s changed, but I still love you. Nice. So that’s my biggest regret. Mine’s probably dropping out of college. It’s pretty, I was like in the fifth, in my fifth, I took five years to drop. No, I can’t go back. You can always go back to school. You could always go, you could go back and become, I don’t know, like a lab technician. Not trying to get an Adderall prescription as early as possible. That would probably be my biggest regret. Oh. Imagine I could have been a superhero by now. I think the fact that you didn’t take medication makes you the superhero you are today. Aww, but also there’s no stigma against medication, but also, Totally, yeah, get medicated if you got it. You know what I mean. Uh, anyways, today we are power ranking all the episodes of Last Meals. All of them? We’ve done like 44, 45 episodes. Fine, we’ll rank our top 10. Okay. Uh, Last Meals for those of you who don’t know, I imagine pretty much everybody does here, but it’s a show that we’ve been doing for, gosh, technically almost three years. No way. Almost three years. Was our first episode three years? First episode was January of 2022 with, uh, Rhett McLaughlin of Good Mythical Morning fame. Yeah. It wasn’t 24K Golden? No, he was the first like non mythical guest. Got it. Because here’s the funny thing. What we do is we eat a celebrity guest’s ideal last meal, uh, with them. Our wonderful culinary team cooks it, and then I sit down there and eat it with them and interview them. Yep. Um, how it started was I cooked my own last meal just because we wanted to do a funny one off video. With Trevor as Patrick Warburton as a Grim Reaper. Yeah, Trevor as a Grim Reaper and he piggybacked me away. But I couldn’t stop talking about actual mortality and existentialism as I was making, of course, a whole loaf of garlic bread with ranch, a carne asada burrito, and shrimp cocktail. Good times. Um, great times. Uh, and then we sort of got this idea that, maybe people would want to see others talk about death in that way too while eating their last meal. And when you’re launching a show like that, you, uh, kind of need an example to send to celebrities to say, hey, would you like to be on this show? And so we did the first one with Rhett and, uh, Rhett McLaughlin, and I believe the first couple episodes, I did not eat the last meal with the guest. And we left all the food out. Yeah, and we would let the plates compile on the table throughout the rounds, and so I would just sit there awkwardly staring at them and then go, Can I have a bite, like a hungry dog waiting at a table. I remember, I remember. Um, but yeah, so we only did like six episodes that first year, and then the second year we did 16. Whoa. And then this year I think we’re on track to do like 26 or 27. Which is really cool, it’s really picked up. We’ve had some incredible guests on the show. So today we are going to judge them not by the charmingness of the guests, there, there is some overlap but by how awesome their last meals were. What would your last meal be? Okay, let me pull out my notes. You have this? Yeah, I’ve had it. Nice, nice, nice. I don’t ever expect you to actually interview me on this unless maybe one day I don’t work here anymore and I become a big superstar. Oh my god, how cool would that be? Yeah, I mean, that would be great. I don’t know if that’s gonna happen because I don’t know how life works. Do it for like society or something? Yeah, sure. Well, again, this isn’t a pitch or anything, but like I think it’d be fun to be on the main channel. But that’s just. Yeah, sure, man. You know, we all. I’m just kidding. OK, so my last meal would be hot barberry bread with sour, sheer, sour cherry preserves, rose jam and honey with a Persian tea. That’s course one. Course two is Bay City sandwiches with the works. I’d want a tuna sandwich, a Salsalito turkey sandwich, and a hot pastrami. Not the Boars head Salsalito turkey. A hot pastrami and a godmother. Hawaiian Luau barbecue chips and an orangina, an ice cold orangina. And then that’s course 2. And then course 3 would be Pampas Brazilian BBQ, Picanha, Top Sirloin, Platanos, Black Beans, Pão de Queijo, Farofa, and um, the, the, the collards. The collards, yeah. The collards. And then, um, course 4 would be my mom’s Gorma Sabzi, and my mother in law’s Rice with Tadig, and an ice cold Sprite. And an ice cold Pellegrino. And then for dessert, Full sugar soda in the last meal. Yeah. And then, um, for dessert, it would be a custard ponchic from Papillon, microwaved slightly. That’s an ode to my father. And then a jar of Nutella with a spoon, plastic spoon in particular, as an ode to my mom. Incredible. So very family oriented. There’s a lot of, yeah, whatever you want to do. That’s incredible. I, so I, I cooked my own last meal on the show, but that was, I cooked like three things from it. I recently I did an interview with IndieWire and they asked me what my last meal was and I kind of just wrote down what came to me at the time. You want to hear it? Yeah, I’d love to. Okay, let’s start with a seafood tower and a dirty gin martini with Castelvetrano olives, oysters, clams, shrimp, lobster, crab legs, three different crudos, some smoked fish dip with crackers. Then we’d go to Vietnamese banh cuon, Laotian papaya salad and smoked marlin tacos with a negro modelo michelada. After the appetizers, we have my best friend’s mom’s pao bhaji. I’d probably switch that to dhokri. Okay. Shout out to Gujarati food. And a San Diego style carne asada burrito, but made with American Wagyu ribeye and served with a toothpaste tube filled with foie gras pâté. Uh, I would drink a penicillin cocktail with that as well. For dessert, give me a gallon of McConnell’s sea salt cream and cookies ice cream with a whole bottle of Fernet. Fernet? Whole bottle of Fernet at the end. Wow, eww. Fernet menta too, not Fernet bronco. Oh, what a, Let me go down. Why are you ending on that note? Love it, dude. A shot of Fernet. I have so much to say. So many fun memories in restaurants, whether it’s in kitchens or out in the dining room ripping Fernet, fernet at the end of a meal. Oh, so good. Give me a espresso and a couple rollies as well. Yum. Okay. And I am in. But that’s it. Uh, so that’s, that’s us. I think our last meals have both ranked at the top. Um, but let’s start at like your number five. Who do you have at number five? Um, number five. Well, I loved, um, Shay Mitchell’s last meal. So her last meal includes chips and guac with a lot of salsas, fruit from the fruit cart, a margarita, a caesar salad, a smash burger, a milkshake, ketchup chips with seltzer, um, pat see ew, malai rigatoni, lumpia, banana pudding, and an espresso martini. Now, the first thing I’ll say about Shay Mitchell’s last meal is the fact that her entire meal was so bright and happy. Like, I could see the joy in her meal. And I could see that radiate from the choices she made, like a beautiful fruit, like a beautiful like tahini covered mango with like a seltzer. It just makes so much sense for her and the food, I mean, the guacamole we made was one of the best guacamoles I’ve ever had. I don’t know what the hell we did to that guacamole. It was phenomenal. We served it in the molcajete too, right? I think so. Yeah, yeah. And, um, the ketchup chips were a great touch. I know she specifically wanted a certain, oh, this is great. Oh, she’s Canadian. Yeah. Yeah. She’s from Toronto. So we just, so I believe she wanted Lays, but we ended up getting like a bunch of different kinds cause the Lays wasn’t going to come in time. Yeah. And then literally. As Course 2 started, we got a package, we opened it, and the ketchup chips were in there. And that was just a, and we literally raised it and we were like, YAY! Like, like the, the monkeys in like, um, 2001 Space Odyssey. Like, we partied, we were like, Oh my god, they’re here! [monkey noises] Literally, that was us. And we opened it and we just threw it out there and it was so exciting. And I just think the food, like the, the lumpia was delicious. Um, yeah. Um, the banana pudding, we got it from, we got it from Magnolia. Sometimes we get foods from outside places, because sometimes outside places do it better than we do. And I’m not afraid to admit that as a professional food person. Also, yeah, sometimes people make like these requests for international products. And sometimes we don’t get the last meal in for like four or five days beforehand. And then we’re just immediately scrambling to try and be like, We need to call someone in Philly to put Swiacki’s meats on dry ice! Yeah, is that leading into your next last meal? Well I want to say Shay Mitchell also would have been on my list 100%. She likes food the way that I like food. Yeah, right like the chips with guac in like several different salsas, yeah, it’s so good. It’s, it’s acid, it’s spice. It’s exciting, it’s crunchy. She loves to drink. She, she was here to promote her show about drinking and her or um, her alcohol, right? Yeah. Her, her tequila brand Onda. Yeah. Yeah. Onda Seltzer is an Ona, tequila Delicious. Which was great. And just getting ripped with Shay Mitchell. Dude, that was so, so, so fun. Uh, the ma rigatoni is an excellent, yeah. The happiness. I will say this is the happiest last meal we’ve had. Yeah. And it was an honor to see and honestly eat the scraps. I agree. Not afraid to admit I eat the scraps. All right, who am I gonna go with number five? You know, I’m gonna go, I’m gonna go John Boyega. Oh, I’m gonna go John Boyega at my number five, and he had me at his first course. So his first course were barbecue ribs with potato salad and black beans, then suya lamb chops with jollof, fried plantain, and fried plantain. The thing that I love about that, so like John Boyega, right? He is a British Nigerian dude, but who’s like spent a lot of in the American South, uh, eating food. And so you have this like, incredible, what can only be called Nigerian barbecue plate, right? Like it’s lamb grilled over open fire with suya. And this is a really cool little thing. So suya spice is a bunch of different spices like alligator pepper and like grains of paradise, uh, chilies. And that’s supposed to be roasted peanuts or ground nuts, but we found out he’s allergic to peanuts. And so we put cashews in there and his whole team were just grubbing on the lamb chops afterwards, which is super cool. Uh, so that he immediately had me, um, but then, oh yeah, he had the, the chicken and waffles, cheeseburger and fries, orange chicken, all things that I love. But here is where, this is one of the most fun times I’ve had. Oh good. On the entire show. He asked for simply, seafood boil, extra spicy. Oh, yeah, I remember. And so we made this giant, like, Nor wait, wait, it wasn’t New Orleans style actually. It was the Viet-Cajun style? It was the Viet-Cajun style. Which is the best style. Because we put the garlic butter in it. Oh yeah. Extra spicy garlic butter. Where we literally, he tasted it and was like. Where’s the spice, bruv? That’s my John Boyega impression, and then we just brought, uh, like, habanero powder. Or maybe it was smoked, no, it was smoked ghost chili powder. Was it? And he and I were just, this man, uh, one incredibly charming, incredibly handsome, super, super eloquent, great actor, John Boyega rules, but he’s in this, like, Pinstripe white suit, and he’s about to go to an award show. Oh, did he? And we, yes, and we dumped out the entire seafood boil with the garlic butter and all the seafood juices onto the table, and that is how we found out our freaking table is slanted. And so I’m like interviewing him and I’m like talking to him about like one of his childhood friends dying or something, and it was a really emotional story, and like the seafood juice and butter is running towards his nice white suit, and I’m trying to like lift the table up. And he’s like. It’s so hard, I’m so, and anyways, uh, it got all over his white suit, um, but that was like, I think the single most fun time, and then he had peach cobbler, chocolate cake, or no, no, no, that’s, I’m skipping around, what do you have, oh, golden Oreos, red velvet cake, and sweet potato pie, and then some gummy bears on it, and, great last meal, great last meal, and when I was asking him why the seafood boil, he was just like, I dated a girl from Louisiana, she was wild. I’m like, yeah! But those are the memories I feel like you always want to recount whenever you’re like eating your last meal. Remember that one chick from Louisiana? Yeah, man. Why not? Yeah. Um, I also love the suya lamb chops. I thought that was, that was one of Lily’s first, um, like culinary, um, achievements I would say is making a bomb ass, her bomb ass cashew suya. I still think about it to this day as one of her like first and greatest culinary accomplishments in the kitchen. The best feeling for me is when somebody’s team, like, Whenever, you know, you have a big movie star show up, they have a team that’s like very serious and the publicist is coming to be like, Hey, like, can we not talk about this? Be sensitive about that. Yeah. Um, whatever, make sure the lighting’s right. And then when they get so hungry that all that pretense breaks. Right. And they’re suddenly like dapping you up because they’re like big time Hollywood publicist dapping you up with a lamb chop in their hands. Yeah. Like that’s awesome. That’s a good feeling. Agreed, agreed. Yeah. Next, I loved Serj Tankian’s last meal. It was short and sweet and delicious. And this was the first time I think we did a surprise, right? This was the first time we added a surprise. Yeah. To last meals, which I love doing. Um, you, um, pushed us to do it. I think it was the greatest decision. What did we make him? We made him a banana Banana, banana, banana, banana terracotta. Banana, banana, terracotta, terracotta pie. Sorry, I coughed. Yeah. So he just wanted like three, four things on his menu. He wanted, you want to do one more? Banana! Banana! Banana! Terracotta! Banana! Banana! Terracotta! Terracotta pie! Okay. Is it out of your system? Yeah, it’s gone. Okay. The system is down. That’s a good one! So he wanted four things. He wanted çiğ köfte, monti, tabouli, And then for dessert, knafeh, and some coffees from his, from his lovely coffee shop called Kavat, which is local in, in Eagle, uh, not Inglewood, in Eagle Rock. And I just loved his last meal because it was so him, like it was just, he’s a proud Armenian man and it was an honor to have a proud Armenian man eat. Armenian food. So I just love that. And then I love the addition of the, Oh, he also wanted eetch, which is sleeper hit, by the way, eetch sleeper, um, hit. I don’t know that I ever need to tabouli again. If I have eetch, I know it’s so good. And also as the senior culinary producer of these episodes, I reached out to every single Armenian person. I knew I even asked David, who is in law school to ask his Armenian friends, because these words. They have multiple meanings. Kibbeh means one thing to an Armenian person, a Lebanese Armenian person and to a Syrian, um, Armenian person and a Russian Armenian person. So I like really knocked down. I’m like, I need to find out the definitions of these words and what it means so I can give him the last meal that he deserves and truly wants. So like from a culinary standpoint, I just love the way that we were able to produce it. And then also, I don’t know, it was just, it was just great to see him eat, eat these foods and like, he had such a close cultural and emotional connection to all of them. And I just love the fact that we can do that for people, especially celebrities. It’s really cool. Yeah, this is, this is not only the best episode of Last Meals I think we’ve ever done, but this is the best conversation I’ve ever had in my entire life. Good for you. That’s beautiful. Serj has been like, One, my favorite musician of all time, but then two, just a hero in the way that he carries himself and the impact that he’s had on the world. And uh, we had a really, really touching moment for me that I’ll never forget because he took Anthony Bourdain around Armenia. Right. I love that episode. Yeah, yeah. Great episode. And um, you know, I was talking to Serj about the, the Bourdain episode and also the fact that he took his own life and kind of reaction to that. I was talking about that was the first celebrity death that really hit me hard because Bourdain was the North Star that I’d always sort of tried to track my trajectory towards. And when we weren’t filming, Serj was just like, Hey man, I want you to know that if Bourdain’s your North Star, you’re well on your way. Because you care about the actual issues and you cut through all the BS and you use food as a lens to tell those stories. And dude, and then he read my freaking, You read the coffee grounds. Yeah, he read your fall, fall gear. Oh my god, that was, yeah, dude, Serj, what a, what a guy. What a guy. Put out a new EP called Foundations, go listen to it, go listen to it. Uh, I’ll use this to transition into, no, let’s go, let’s save that one, let’s save that one. I’m gonna go, I’m gonna go Kelly Rowland. Oh, we love Kelly Rowland in the Mythical Kitchen. We love Kelly Rowland. What is our group, our group chat name? Kelly Rowland Sidewives is our group chat name. Because she kept threatening to steal, I believe, both Lily and V away. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, rightfully so. And live in her home with her loving husband and children, as she should have. So Kelly Rowland’s Last Mirror. Kelly Rowland’s last meal. Caviar with potato chips, A5 Wagyu and mashed potatoes, Cheeseburger and french fries, Crispy tacos, Peach cobbler, Chocolate cake, And chocolate peanut butter pie. The last thing. She said one pineapple margarita, but throughout the course of this meal, we drank three pineapple margaritas. We shot on a Friday. She had a party to go to afterwards. Give me one margarita. Sorry. And so we literally, we sat there, Kelly Rowland and I probably had five shots of tequila throughout, uh, this entire meal. You were like kiki ing. You were like having the best time ever. We were kiki ing, man. It was incredible. But also the meal itself, like, I’m somebody who, I love cheeseburger and fries. I love crispy tacos, right? I love a chocolate peanut butter pie. We did a taco flight. We did a taco flight. We did a whole taco flight. Yeah, yeah, we did. Yeah, we did like, uh, like your kind of like street taco carne asada, and then we did like the crispy like, you know, H Town tacos. Right. That’s where she’s from. Um, but like the caviar, I just, I love this amalgamation of foods. Me too. And then also somebody who would just Show up to set and just go, yeah, I’m going like Marg for Marg with you. She was an incredible guest. Was incredible. And also she said like maybe the sweetest thing ever about death. What’d she say? Um, cause you know, she, she’s like a very like, she’s a woman of faith. She’s like a very practicing Christian woman. And that’s like a, There’s an element to that belief that I’m very, very envious of, right? Especially when it comes to dying in the afterlife, you know? And I was asking how she was, uh, how she communicates that to her children when she’s talking to a ten year old who like, you know, maybe just understood what death was. Because Kelly did a horror movie and her character died and she was watching it. It wasn’t even like a horror, it was like a comedy horror, but her character died. No, it’s like a new one. It’s like a newer one. Oh, the Freddy vs. Jason one of those? No, that’s, dude, that was like 18 years ago. Oh, sorry. No, it was like in the last four or five years. Uh, something on Netflix, I think. But her kid, like, saw her die and started freaking out, and so she had to have the death talk. And then, I asked her what she said to her child, and she said, um, dying is, like, you see the most beautiful light you’ve ever seen and then you get the warmest hug you’ve ever gotten and I almost started crying that especially because I was, you know, six shots of tequila deep. Sure and then we arm wrestled and I smoked her [bleep]. Yeah, you sure did stop arm wrestling you I I know I haven’t lost in a while. Yeah, uh, I let her beat me the first time and then she immediately was like line it back up. I know you let me win. Don’t let me win and so then I really just like You know, I, I control it. Demolish it. Yeah. I don’t, I never want to do this with you. I’m not going to arm wrestle, but I’m going to show you what, what you do. I don’t like arm wrestling with you. gotta, you lock in. You gotta kind of jostle. You gotta kind of do this much. Okay. And then right when you start, a lot of people just want to start going like that, but then your wrist gets like that. But you know, you have to, you have to, yeah. Yeah, you have to fight for control. You gotta go over the top. And then you’re gonna lock this in. I don’t want to play. I don’t want to play. I’m going to lose. I know it. I don’t like to play games. I already know I’m going to lose. Kelly Rowland’s last meal was really special. It really was. That was so fun. Okay. We love binging with Babish in the mythical kitchen and when he came to the mythical kitchen We’re like we’re gonna make this guy the best meal of his life And I truly think we did we had corned beef hash with over medium eggs Republic multi grain toast with butter and jam French pressed coffee chicken parm and pasta aglio e olio with a glass of bourbon amberjack sashimi salmon belly nigiri and uni Um, maple syrup poured over snow and cinnamon crepe just with vanilla dip. Um, I love this so much. Well, first of all, just him coming into the kitchen and cooking for him. It was our second time doing it. The first time we cooked for him, we made him blood. Yeah. We made him on Food Fears. He’s one of two Food Fears and Last Meals dual guests. Who’s the other one? I’ll tell you in a second. Oh, okay. And, um, I just, I just adored the way that he came in with so much grace and I don’t know, like humility. I don’t know if that makes any sense. No, it does. He’s got a very humble aura. Yeah. And I could feel like in the back of his head, he’s like, man, I wish I came up with this idea. You know what I mean? I could feel that a little bit, not from a jealousy perspective, but like from a real recognized, real perspective. And I just thought he was an incredible guest. I thought his food was incredible. The maple syrup poured over snow. Now, whenever we have the ability to do things that are a little bit outside of the box and really make us grind our own gears. I think that’s where the most exciting moments happen. Like we, we had to make snow. We live in LA. When it was, when did we shoot this? Like in the middle of like March or something, there was no snow anywhere. So we literally had to make our own snow. We had to buy this special machinery that clips onto your KitchenAid to make snow cone ice. And then we, we tried doing hot maple syrup. We tried doing cold maple syrup. We ended up making a, a, almost like a caramel out of the maple syrup cooked to a specific temperature, pour that over, use different types of tongue depressors and sticks to make sure that we did it the right way. And it’s just like those kinds of food moments. just stand out to me because it was a clear food memory for him. And to be able to recreate that within the confines of our walls is just so cool. And we’re so lucky that we are able to do that and just send people back almost like the ratatouille moment. Like we’re so lucky that we get to do that for people. Oh, I’m gonna get emotional. I just love it so much. And then all I mean, like making chicken parm aglio like he loves the chicken parm. Don’t tell me what we did with the chicken parm. We did two different kinds of chicken parm. You did your chicken parm, and then his chicken parm, and then you went on his show and did his chicken parm? Yeah, I went on his show Botched, where I claimed that he botched chicken parmesan, and I made my version of it, and he ate it and was like, And I think mine tastes better, but this is more chicken parm. And so we made both for him. Right, right, right. Yeah. And I just love, I just love little moments like that. And I thought his meal was, was really beautiful. And of course, Republic’s a great restaurant. So anytime we get to show that place off, I’m a happy camper. That was a fun time. Uh, yeah. I love what you said about the emotion, man. That’s what this food is. Like everything is just telling a story and it’s the story of this person’s life, their fears, their ambitions, their hopes, their dreams, what drives them through the lens of food. Yeah. And I love that. And speaking of which, man, the next guy is just full of all of those. This is the most full of emotion and energy and zest and anguish and fear person I’ve ever met in my life in his last meal. was stupid. Harry freaking Cruz, the most showy, the most food you ever had. Cruz. I think he thought he, I think he thought that we would edit it down, but instead, and he loved all of it. These were all dishes that meant a lot to him, but we cooked every single thing for him. Spicy tuna, crispy rice, crispy bang, bang shrimp, miso, black cod, green salad, rack of barbecue, spare ribs, collard greens, baked beans, bison, ribeye, roasted broccolini, sweet potato, a flight of three smoothies, zucchini, flan, pause. Zucchini flan. We had no idea what it meant and we had to like google it a bunch and then Colby made this incredible like savory Steamed egg custard layer. Go Colby go. Yeah. Okay back in. Frittata affogato. Pause. We had to google. No idea what that was. I don’t know if you know this we know everything there is to know about food, just about. Basically, and there were two dishes that stopped us. Uh, for Tata Affogato, it’s an Italian, uh, baked omelette. Means drowned. Yeah, like covered in tomato sauce. Back in. Peri peri chicken, double cheeseburger and fries, and a strawberry shake. This man. Too much food. He won, is like, you know, 240 pounds or whatever of just food. pure twitchy muscle. Uh, and he like works out, uh, so, so, so often. And he doesn’t eat until at least like 2 or 3 p.m He intermittent fasts? He intermittent fasts, yeah. And our call time was 2 p.m And I was like, Dude, have you eaten today? He goes, no. I didn’t know that! Yeah, yeah, because I knew that from the research. And so he had not eaten a single bite of food and he shows up to set and he also was like the most energetic, cogent storyteller and he’s so open and that’s a big part of his whole like, uh, ordeal is that keeping things in kind of increases shame and other people can learn from you being open and even though he makes a It’s still a net good. And this man ate and talked and listened and emoted more than any person in an episode. Terry Crews, dude, what an experience that was. Woo! He was the other Food Fears guest. What? And he was the other Food Fears guest. Oh, he was the other Food Fears guest. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I picked that up after I realized. Yeah. Turkey testicles. Yeah. And his last meal has about four times as many views. There you go. As Food Fears. We love Food Fears, but it’s never coming back. I have what I would consider the goat. In in my in my graces. Well, this is your number one. This is not my number. This is my number two Okay, tom hanks autumn shank So when i’m shank what? Autumn shank. Oh, is that like something that like is that from like snl? That’s simpsons. Oh, whatever. I don’t watch the simpsons. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you Okay, let me tell you his last meal taste cholo in and out double double Um challah bread french toast traditional greek salad Add avocado and calamari with pita and tarra masala to dip, white chocolate coconut bundt cake from Doan’s Bakery. So, aka the Tom Cruise cake. So, whenever we got the note that Tom Hanks was coming into the Mythical Kitchen, we all kind of like freaked out a little bit and we’re like, this is real now. No, I kept saying that it’s not, it’s not real until his coming. Car enters the parking lot. I didn’t believe it. Well, I thought it was real. You thought it was real? Of course I did. Whenever I saw the emails, I’m like, this is 100 percent happening. I’m so excited. We really have to tighten up the ship. Um, so we just, so you guys, so you and Annalise and maybe one other person, did Maggie, did you go to El Cholo? Oh, so Josh, I think, Oh, no, we like actually went there and dined. Yeah, it was just me and Julia. Oh, you, Julia. And then Annalise and Jared, her husband, we met at the movie theater to watch Tom Hanks’s movie called Auto. That’s right. So you went to El Cholo. I never had El Cholo before. And then we went on a wild date. Goose chase to try to buy the plate from the place. And they’re like, we gave KG the PA, not PA the KG, KG the PA. We gave her like all the petty cash in the drawer and was like, go ask how much they want for the plates. I was like, uh, here’s a budget of like 200. Apparently KG goes up to him and just goes, I have 200. Can I buy your plates? We’re like, no, that’s not how we do it. But, um, that was a really fun, whenever he came in through the doors, I was like, okay, time to get real. This is about to be a great fricking experience. Even if we never do this again, like the fact that we get to cook for Tom Hanks is very cool. Um, you and I had a little bit of a tiff this day. Do you want me to unpack it earlier? Unpack it. Okay. So, um, in the traditional Greek salad, um, you told me to. Ice the red onions. And I said, yeah, yeah, for sure. And then you said, no, no. And then I had to, you said, look at me. And I said, okay, you said you need to make sure that the, that the red onions are ice, like in ice water, ice water, ice water until the last minute and then dry them off and then put them in the salad. And I’m like, was that intense about it? Yes. Well, yeah, Tom Hanks was coming. Yeah, I guess. And I don’t, I don’t think Tiff is the right word. I just think you had high expectations and you wanted us to also have high expectations. So yeah, It was a good thing. It wasn’t a bad tiff. It was a good, it’s a, it’s a normal. A tiff is bad. No, I don’t think a tiff is bad. Now this is a tiff. Now you’ve created a tiff. Now we’re tiffing about the tiff. I don’t want to tiff about the tiff. Okay, it was a non tiff, but basically, but you basically made me feel like I was like very like nonchalant like, okay, whatever. Like I was going to blow you off about it and not do it. And I was like, I’m going to do it. So I think they’re unpacking so much more than just food here. Oh, yeah. But. It was just great to have him, like, and also, um, everyone on his team thought the tarmacellata was homemade. It was from a jar. It was from a jar. I’m sorry, Tom Hanks and your team. We never lied. Um, they just said, how did you make it? I’m like, oh, I, it’s a recipe. That’s not a lie. That’s just a long search of the truth. But yeah, so long story short, the fact that he wanted such cool, um, Um, Greek food. I know he’s Greek Orthodox. He converted for his wife. But like, I just thought it was cool. He had so many like, delicious like, LA classics. He had some great Greek food. And of course He showed that he really cared and thought about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He really cool. And um, the Tom Cruise cake. Tom Hanks eating Tom Cruise cake. How funny. Taku cake. Taku cake. Taku cake. Taku cake. Yeah. And then Taku cake. He was talking about whenever he like, has the cake and it just, by sliver by sliver, just disappears over time. And I thought that was really funny. Yeah. I loved him. He was great. Um, so During that, Tom Hanks was here for like two and a half hours and he and I, at the most meaningful moment for me was after the cameras had cut out and he was super talkative with everyone. He was talking with our cam op and editor Taylor. He was like, Oh, where’s your family from? Oh, Joliet, Illinois. Cool. Um, but afterwards, you know, we’d been talking about history throughout the whole thing. And then, um, Tom just looks at me, cameras are completely cut. He could have walked out the door. He’d already wrapped and he just goes, And I just, I told him I was reading a book about the history of food in World War II, which is the most Tom Hanks thing to answer! And then, um, his team asked for my address afterwards, and I get a A, a typewritten letter, he collects old typewriters, that just said, Josh, I think you’ll enjoy this book. Thanks. Hanks. Oh my gosh. And it was a copy of a book called The Monk of Mocha by Dave Eggers about Mokhtar al Khanshali escaping the Yemeni civil war with coffee beans. How cool. Um, and that was cool. And so I mailed Tom Hanks a letter written in crayon, uh, cause I collect crayons, in my favorite book about food, which is Taco USA by Gustavo Arellano. And I also mailed him the washed, um, uh, Taste of History plates from El Cholo. That’s very nice of you. Yeah. That’s very nice of you. He was like guest number seven. Guest number seven. That’s so crazy. Alright, I’m going with my number two. This is another personal hero of mine, um, and this is before a lot of the fame, not to say that I was like, you know, OG on the train, but You know, been watching him since he was drafted in like 2013 or whatever. This is Jason Kelce, man. Nice, nice, nice. This is Jason Kelce. His meal, chocolate chip pancakes, King Kong French toast from like a place in the valley, Mama Kelce’s dinner rolls, skyline chili dip, Dallas Sandro’s cheesesteak. Shout out Delco. Ribs from Joe’s Kansas City. Trio of chicken wings. The Cabanosa sausage from Swiaky. Meats. Fancy beanie weenies panang curry and garlic naan two things that do not go together from completely separate countries Pralines and cream ice cream stocks pound cake and fish town in a bowl of fresh berries and when asked why the berries goes I just feel like you know, like bears like bears eat a lot of berries. I’m kind of like a bear adjacent, man You know, so it just feels like fitting when i’m eating a bunch of berries so cute agreed um, but this meal like This is another person who loves to eat. There’s no pretense. You know, he has Cincinnati represented where he went to college. He got home represented for Mama Kelce’s dinner rolls. They were like crescent rolls with the marshmallows baked inside. And then the marshmallows would disappear. It’s a metaphor for Jesus on Easter. The marshmallows evaporate out like Christ evaporating. LOL! Disappearing from the grave. Um, and I mean, he just like, Eight and eight, and we chatted, and he also, not to put Jason Kelce on blast here, but he also said he would bring his own beer, because it was from like an obscure brewery in Ohio. And he forgot, and I don’t know if you remember this, the day before I was like, yo, get some Bud Heavies, just to have in case. Okay. And then this is when we were still getting like demonetized. For drinking on camera, and then we found out that we could just do that. And so we were just, we had side Buds going the whole time. Right on. Paper bagged. What paper in a paper bag? Yes. Yes. Yes, and we had an incredible conversation We talked about you know The fears of CTE are retiring from football early and I got to tell them that my lucky Eagles hat won the Super Bowl for them Because they were down and then I turned it around and Derek Barnett gets the strip sack And that was really special and then afterwards we ended up going to a tiki bar And just continuing to drink. You hung out later? Did you not know that? No. Yeah, he had like a red eye flight out. I wasn’t invited. I’m sorry. I definitely invited you. It was Shabbat, dude. Oh, it was probably Shabbat. It was Shabbat. It was Shabbat. You didn’t invite Jason Kelce and I to Shabbat. I should have. Anyways, yeah, we went to uh, uh, Tiki No, and he took down like a whole bowl. Bowl? Yeah, scorpion bowl. LOL. Um. I keep saying LOL to you. Stop it. Jason Kelce and I. Go Birds! Go Birds! That’s a hearty Go Birds. Okay, now it’s time for my number one last meal. Number one! Uh, I don’t know who it is. Yeah, you do. Do I? It’s Gordon Ramsay. Gordon Ramsay. What a treat it was to have Gordon Ramsay in the Mythical Kitchen. What a, what a, what a process it was to get his [bleep] in here. My god, you know, it was crazy. I flew to Vegas to compete on his show. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and you won. I won. I barely, I barely beat Rhett. Rhett had a really good showing. Um, so his meal was a full English breakfast with scrambled eggs, butter chicken, chicken wings, and a double double from In N Out, beef wellington, engine and tonics, dicky toffee pudding, and a deep fried Mars bar. Do I think he curated this list? No. Absolutely. I think his maybe one of his assistants or a publicist or a friend or something did it for him and that’s fine, we’re, I think he had influence. I think celebrities, you know, they come in here and like they don’t they don’t really they’re so busy Like they don’t have time to really like lock it down or spend too much time like mulling it over which is totally okay Like we’re here to just make a great show and to make them happy and comfortable For two hours while Josh interviews them about dying and death and things like that and have delicious food in front of them, the fact that we got to make some of his most iconic dishes for him was incredible. And the fact that he was so complimentary of all of it was so impressive. And just making Gordon Ramsay a beef wellington is a crazy feat. And to see Trevor do that was, and then peace out afterwards, incredible. One of the best, Trevor’s swan song. One of the best mic drop moments of all time. And it was so impressive to see him do that. Um, the sticky toffee pudding Lily made was frickin gorgeous incredible stop the the amount of thought and dedication that went into should I make a canal? Should I do it like this? Should I do it like that? Like again, we’re I’m seeing these meals from from the back end Yeah, and you’re seeing it show up on the table along with the guests So I guess the way that I’m ranking these last year is a little bit different than you would but um It is interesting to see you rank them though because so much in one it, you know, it’s heartening to me that it seems like you, uh, you, I know you do care a lot about the process. It’s cool to see how much that’s like stuck in your mind because these are really special to shoot for me. And I’m glad it’s the same for you. Oh, it’s so special for us too. Like it’s just, it’s just great to, it’s great to do and it’s great to produce and the end result of having the millions of views is cool and all, but even if, even if you didn’t get millions of views, like it wouldn’t matter. Cause I feel like as a, as a collective, it’s like worth it. I love the views though. I will say, I will say the views are nice. The views are nice. Please keep watching. Me, it doesn’t matter as much as this for you. But like, whatever. That’s, that’s also too deep. But, um, yeah, making him an English breakfast and making those scrambled eggs. I bought a masterclass. Yes, you did. I bought us all a masterclass and I’m like, sit down and watch these videos multiple times a week. Understand it, learn it, make this your whole entire personality for like the next week and then you can delete it from your mind. And I did that with every single person that was responsible for making the foods. And I’m so glad I did because it really created a beautiful product and made for a great interview. And, yeah, also he hated the deep fried Mars bar, and I love that so much. That was my favorite, whenever he’s like, ugh, deep fried Mars bar, mmm, disgusting. Like, that was one of the moments where I’m like, yes, like, even, like, anytime we get an emotional, like, visceral reaction from food, good or bad, like, I’m just like, yes, I’m so glad he did that. So It was definitely the greatest last meal, in my opinion, from a food perspective, from an interview perspective, from just an all around perspective. It was one of the bucket list moments, and every time someone says, say something cool about yourself, I say, I made Gordon Ramsay scrambled eggs, so. That was, uh, That was the biggest turning point for for mythical kitchen in in general. Um, that felt very much I mean Tom Hanks was of course that but like Gordon Ramsey was truly like, we have for real arrived. I was marching through the prep kitchen earlier that day just going. This is our super bowl Yeah, happy Gordon Ramsey day give them nothing and take from them everything and I kept saying happy Gordon Ramsey day Um that interview for me was really really special and I you know I’d been critical of Gordon Ramsey in the past for kind of portraying this like mean caricature ish person on television screaming in an industry that is filled with so much verbal abuse in that way. And, you know, I really kind of held his feet to the fire on that and, and the thing that I learned is that it’s not caricature form. He like, Yeah. Is filled with true belief that this is the way he can help people and who the [bleep] am I to tell him That he’s wrong right and for him. He’s like he has helped people yeah, and there’s there’s all these people who are like, um, Oh you he doesn’t act like that with the kids and I was like that’s because it makes bad tv But from his perspective, I don’t believe that’s the case anymore for him. He’s like When we get these business owners on television or fully fledged adults who say, I want to be a chef and I see they’re not doing the things that are going to make them successful, I’m going to hold their feet to the fire until they are doing the things to make themselves successful. And that’s increasing their overall happiness because if not, they’re just going to fail. It’s like all these, all these restaurateurs, they are already failing. Why would you want me to be? He’s like, People have been soft on them their whole lives. Again, I don’t know if it’s my exact, you know, uh, methodology that I would use per se, but this dude has been a lot more successful than I am, so who the hell cares? He actually influenced me during that interview to be, yeah, way meaner to people. No, not meaner, he, he, uh, influenced me to hold myself more accountable, and hold other people more accountable. Because that is ultimately good for them. Dude, Gordon Ramsay was awesome. I got a wild card for number one. What is it? It’s my favorite last meal of all time. Oh my god, I already know what it is. Corbin freakin Bleu, man. Oh, the wheelbarrow! Corbin Bleu, we wheeled him out in a wheelbarrow. Corbin Bleu, one, I mentioned earlier, the early guests on Last Meals who had to take more of a leap of faith, cause who the hell knew what the show was at the time. Corbin was one of them, and he is still still to this day, the only guest to request to just have a FaceTime meeting with the chef. That was great. To discuss the specifics of his last meal, Corbin Bleu. I love you to this day for that. And so he was like, I just, I love curry. It’s my favorite food, but there’s so many different kinds of curries. And so I don’t know which one I should do. And I was like, what if we just did like a curry sampler from around the globe? We do like Jamaican oxtail curry. We go like Massaman curry from Thailand. And then he said the same thing about pasta. And we literally just diagrammed. All of this out. And he was like, I love poutine because his wife, Sasha, who’s just also like the loveliest person, she came with him, uh, is Canadian and he’s like, Oh, poutine, but also I want it to be like, can we do like an a five Wagyu poutine? I was like, yeah, can we do like a bone marrow gravy? And so we just diagrammed all this out in like a video call beforehand. And then he showed up and he was so, so cool and gracious. And that a five Wagyu poutine with roasted bone marrow gravy is still to this day. Maybe my favorite thing from the top chicken liver pate with grilled bread non alcoholic white wine spritzer that we made with Uh passion fruit and the non alcoholic wine. That was just delicious Grilled cheese with fries a5 wagyu poutine with roasted bone marrow a trio of curry jamaican curry oxtail musselman curry chicken makani Italian sausage on a bed of peppers with onions and tomato sauce pappardelle with my taki ragu and fresh truffle That’s right The white truffle rigatoni al vodka with whipped ricotta and basil oil raspberry sorbet with macerated blackberries and basil and key lime You Pie Corbin Bleu, you are my official number one last meal of all time, and that was such a special moment for me. And that is our official combined top ten ranking. I will throw in one wild card, Joseph Gordon Levitt. It was ten bowls of cereal. That was funny. That was awesome. Some people were like, that’s disrespectful, and I was like, nope, that is the best. That is the easiest last meal of all time. God bless you. JGL, you’re the man. JGL. That was good. Everyone, let me know what your favorite last meals were of the series. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We want to know your opinions about it. And I have fun doing it. It’s a good time. I am craving a big slice of pizza and an ice cold pepsi for lunch today. Nicole, what if I told you, you have the power to make that happen? I do? Yeah, and you know how I know that? Cause you’re real, real smart. That’s one of the reasons. The other reason is that I had the same dream That you had, except this was a couple days ago, we basically live parallel lives, but I was craving an ice cold Pepsi and a big ol slice of pizza, and I was at the airport, and I was coming back to L.A. and so I, like, really needed some food to get me through that last leg of the journey, and I was on the plane, and I opened my pizza, and the flight attendant came by, and I got the free chips, and I got an ice cold Pepsi Zero Sugar, and I will never forget this beautiful moment. borderline spiritual experience of eating that spicy from the pepperoni salty, chewy pizza going to the crispy chips and then resetting my palate with ice cold, refreshing Pepsi zero sugar, that perfect amount of acid to just cut through all that fat in your palate and then back to the chewy pizza, crispy chip, refreshing Pepsi, chewy pizza, crispy chip, refreshing Pepsi. And it made the flight so so much better. My lunch was absolutely Absolutely saved. I love story time with you Josh. It’s my favorite, but moral of the story is Pepsi makes your food taste better everybody knows that so grab a Pepsi zero sugar for your next meal as food deserves Pepsi This episode is sponsored by better help Nicole, you know, my favorite part of the holidays is lighting Shabbat candles That’s top eight at least but I’d say it’s curling up on the couch. It’s getting cozy It’s drinking a nice warm mug of peppermint tea. I’m a peppermint tea guy. Sue me But You know what sometimes the sads it starts creeping in Nicole and you know what I get the sad I really do that No, I have been going to therapy for it But a great way to get that little warm cozy feeling in your mind is to see a therapist and to talk to someone about It because the holiday specifically can also be really hard for some I know like people who have gone through certain family traumas You know, it always gets a little bit tougher this time of year, especially when you see other people celebrating like that. So I’ve always found it very helpful to talk to a professional about it. If you’re thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It’s entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge. Find comfort this December with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp. com/hotdog today to get 10 percent off your first month. That’s better help, H E L P. com / hotdog. All right, Nicole. Pretty good. I’d hug them. Now it’s time to find out what they behave to whack out of there in the universe. Is that Barry Keoghan? It’s time for this second week called opinions are like casseroles. Well, Nicole, it went too far over time. So we only have five minutes to take the last opinion. So I’ll just do it like one little opinion for you. I drank some bodily fluids from the bottom of a bathtub. Oh, you’re very. Hey, what’s going on, Josh? What’s going on, Nicole? Hey, he made his voice really after the last Becky Lynch podcast. I’m just curious. She had a much shorter list than most of the people that have come on the show. And I really want to know, is there a difference between quantity and quality? Would you ironically get some small bites of something versus a full meal if you really wanted to go out on your last dying breath? That’s interesting. Seth from California, Pomona. Have a great show, guys. Love the show. Have a good one. Shout out Pomona. I was going to go to Cal Poly Ponoma to go in hotel management. Yeah, Cal Poly Pomona does good work. I won the Pomona Pitzer Invitational shot put in 2012. So accomplished. Thank you. I won a t shirt. Um, I don’t know what this question is asking. It was so many words. I was flabbergasted. Well, so they’re, they were asking for your last meal, would you rather have like full portions of your favorite three foods or say quarter portions of your favorite? 12 foods. I’m not, I’m not good at math. What is, what is the question? I feel like I explained it very clearly. So, little bits of it? Yeah, somebody, somebody once told me that their last meal would be a single bite of their top 100 favorite foods. Oh no. I feel like a single bite doesn’t work for me, but I do get it like three bites. No, I want a full panoply. I want the whole shabang. I want it all. I’m trying to think of what foods I would really need like a Like, I get steak fatigue so hard. If you give me like a perfect, uh, uh, prime rib or whatever, just like five bites of it and I’m done. But once I get to the seventh, the jaw locks up, it starts getting cold. Oh, get out of town. I’m the opposite. But like a Mexican, like a combo plate. Where you have, I was recently at a taqueria and just had like beans, rice, tortillas, and a bunch of stewed meats. Mm hmm. And I could just swipe and eat that for forever, right? And did it with like any like hummus, you know, and various sauce. You got the schoog, you know, you got like bunch of, you got the amba. You’re just dipping and swiping and eating like that kind of thing. I need a full portion. Yeah Um, I when I die And I have if god will give me a last meal I would like for it all to be a huge panoply and eating it with my whole family You know who’s another honorable and friend not only family, but friends i’m family at this point, you know Uh, who’s another honorable mention Emma Chamberlain. Oh, I love Emma’s, Emma was her in the last meal Emma’s last meal was her and she is her last meal and I loved it. And the best part of that last meal was, quote, a bunch of tater tots with, like, seven different aiolis. With, like, seven was verbatim in the email. Yeah, and we made, like, seven aiolis. And just sitting there, just gabbing and eating. Tater tots in seven different sauces and wine. You guys had a whole bottle of wine. Yeah, we were drinking wine out of her tumbler with a straw. I think you guys drank a full bottle of wine each. Let’s rate the last meals by how drunk I’ve gotten on them. Kelly Rowland’s number one. We have, we literally had a meeting afterwards and we’re like, we can’t let Josh drink like that anymore. I don’t understand why. But I think you’re awesome when you drink. I like you when you drink. I said one time that I get cloudier and can’t think when I drink on last meals. And now that’s since then. Because there was a time when I was more nervous, like Tom Hanks was the most nervous I’d ever been for Last Meal, because that was a big turning point. More than Gordon? More than Gordon, because by the time Gordon came around, I’d already met him, I competed on his show. Right. And also, I really knew what the show was, right? And I felt a lot more dialed in, in my research, the way that the storytelling goes within the story, I put so, so, so much work into that. We were more practiced at that point. And we knew what the reception was gonna be. With Tom Hanks, I literally had to, like, slap myself in the face in the mirror. And go, you can do this, Josh! I, no, this is more embarrassing. What I said, I said, You are that guy. Oh, sweetie! You are that guy! Oh, sweet boy! Why not you, buddy? Oh, sweet boy! Yeah, that’s like verbatim. Um, anyway, so. Sweet. I’m proud of you. Thanks, I’m proud of us. I’m proud of us. What a heck of a year it’s been. And I’m proud of all you for sticking around with us about five years of podcasting. That’s also pretty crazy. You’re tired of our voices? Like God, we’ve seen a considerable churn. Uh, yeah, some people decided they were tired of it, but we still have a really strong and on that note, thank you for listening to A Hot Dog Is A Sandwich. It was an industry wide churn down people were stuck inside all the uh, we got new audio on the episodes every wednesday and a video version advertising rates are still strong and a video version here on YouTube every Sunday. If you want to be featured on opinions on our casseroles, give us a ring and leave a quick message at 833 DOG POD 1. Yeah, like Call Her Daddy’s really popular. And there’s still demand for advertising on the podcast. Joe Rogan, very popular. Go Drogan. Go Drogan. Go Drogan. And for more Mythical Kitchen, Cal Drogo. Check out our other videos. We launch new episodes every week, like Last Meals. And our new series, Cheat meals and our former series that we might do again First Meals. Gosh, you’re really milkin’ it huh?