MK 903: Last Meals Marathon (ft. Gordon Ramsay, Hank Green, Meghan Trainor, and more)

Hey, welcome to Mythical Kitchen. We are going on an extended holiday break, so we thought we would give you a lovely holiday gift to remember us by. We got an extra, extra long episode today. It is the Last Meals Marathon. Last Meals is my absolute favorite thing I’ve ever done in life, except for procure my four large adult sons, Ham, Shem, And we love that you love Last Meals too, and maybe you even love Connor like I do. Uh, we ponder existential questions, we eat good food. It’s been a really cathartic, awesome series for me, and it’s awesome to see how much y’all love it. So please, sit back, relax, grab your favorite snack, the one you’d eat right before you die, insofar as it’s Doritos 3D Jalapeno Cheddar. Oh, that’s a deep cut reference, Josh. I haven’t seen those in 20 years. And please enjoy the show. Right, so I’m Gordon Ramsay, and my last meal would be a full English breakfast. Butter chicken, chicken wings, and an In N Out burger. Beef Wellington with a delicious Monkey 47 gin and tonic. And then finally, a delicious sticky toffee pudding deep fried Mars bar. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all gotta eat and we’re all gonna die. Today we’re joined by world renowned chef, television icon, recipient of 17 Michelin stars, and YouTube’s most controversial grilled cheese maker, Gordon Ramsay. Welcome to the show. You had to get that one in the end, didn’t you? I, listen, you are one of the most successful chefs of all time, one of the most successful people of all time, and you still got punk kids like me taking the piss out of a single grilled cheese you made, and I applaud you for that. Yeah, you’re like a sort of 7th kid I didn’t know I had. Because you just come back and constantly irritate me. Um, and rightly so with that grilled cheese. I’m not gonna explain the issues, but I was in the [bleep] end of nowhere. Uh, I was up against the time. And those little moments, would you believe, we sort of We do in our downtime. But I will admit it live for the first time with you personally. It wasn’t good enough. Everybody, that’s emotional growth. Can we give it up for Gordon on that? Um, I’m going to blame Justin Mandel. Justin Mandel was supposed to be a sort of, uh, amazing social media, hot producing talent. And man, he said, looks good. It looks good. And then when those comments started coming, I’m saying just, he said, yeah, dive for cover. Hide quickly. Dammit, sometimes the dish just gotta go out. Also, if I’m your seventh kid, I didn’t receive a Christmas present this year, but that’s totally fine. We got next year. It’s coming. Alright, uh, we are eating your last meal today. Is that something you’ve thought about before? Um, Joe, not really. I’m not a good person to sort of start talking about morbid death and, um, every time I’ve gone to see grandparents, um, and, you know, uncles and aunts that are on there, sort of death bed, God forbid. This meal’s always served through a bloody tube. So, I get asked this question multiple times. You’re the first person I’ve actually sat down and spoken about. So, I would, I would like to celebrate my last meal a couple years before I die. That’s a much smarter option. Just to sort of, you know, have a look at what the party’s going to run like. Who’s getting inebriated? Who’s good? Who’s bad? Who’s slagging me off? Uh, who’s talking well? Um, and also I think, when it does finally happen, Um, it’s going to be a massive celebration. I hope I get an invite to that even though I didn’t get one to the Christmas party. It’s coming. Gordon, for your first course, we have a full English breakfast. We have your own soft scrambled eggs with some fresh white winter truffle. Tis the season. Roasted cherry, tomatoes, fried bread, a hash brown or potato rosti as you might call it, back bacon, Bangers, blood sausage, enjoy. Man, I’m like a pig in [bleep] right now. You and me both. I swear to God. Just two pigs swimming around in [bleep]. Man, first of all, my mum would kill me if she saw me putting white truffle on my scrambled eggs. She would kick my [bleep]. Let’s get that absolutely clear. I grew up in a council estate. I’m not too sure what the reference is in the US. Like government housing, yeah. Government housing. And scrambled eggs was a dream. And so, this reminiscence right back, you know, to sort of five, six years of age. And you just woke up with the smell of bacon. Mum would bake bread. Yeah. Yeah. The thought of, you know, 250 a kilo white truffles on a scrambled egg, man, she would kick my [bleep]. So I’m gonna tuck in. Your mom ain’t here right now, it’s just us, man. Yeah, uh, delicious. Thank you. Uh, that looks good. Um, this is the Scottish diet, by the way. This is, uh, this is something that, um, every time I go home to Scotland, I always, uh, get into a Grease Spoon little cafe. And it’s a sort of, it’s, it’s, it’s a sort of happy and a sad ending because it takes me back, but the last breakfast I had, um, in Scotland was with my father, um, and it was sadly the last time before he, uh, died, but we just sat there eating an amazing full English breakfast. You grew up in council estates, you grew up desperately poor, your dad for a large part of your life was abusive and a deadbeat, and your mom tried her best to provide, uh, you seem like you’ve found salvation through sports, through football. What lessons about mental toughness did you learn from that, that you took into the cooking world? Yeah, that’s a good question. I think that level of resilience. You know, when you know you just don’t have a choice to go back, you need to go forward. So that additional drive is self motivating. You dig deep and find gears that you felt you never had. I had the added pressure of having a younger brother, 15 months apart, that was sadly getting into drugs. So that was tough. A moment that I was reflecting. Here’s the flip side of this. Yeah, if you don’t get your [bleep] together, you could be, you know, like the father and turn out like your kid brother So you take that negativity and you use that you know Area a moment in your life to to springboard to get the [bleep] out of there and that sport connects driving the team Captaining the team being super on it self motivated um really plays well, especially when you’re running a business. Oh, absolutely. You’ve got to establish a leader. And I’ve always been a firm believer in dusting yourself down. So what is it that, you know, what, what’s the problem? And, you know, come back to, come back to me with a solution. I actually, one of the chefs that really took me under his wing, Chris Morningstar, I hope you’re watching this buddy, uh, but he refused to hire kids from culinary school, only hired athletes. I mean, his, his CDC was a fullback at UCLA, his sous chef. Now food and wine best new chef was a softball player because he was like athletes understand hierarchy They understand what it means to be uncomfortable and they understand how to get through those situations with solutions today You fast track, you know, 25 years later. Just the just just the power of a chef today both, you know, male and female They are built like athletes marketing tools Peak of their game physical fitness. And so I think chefs down the line will end up being like Sports players, they’ll be traded. They’ll be bought. They’ll be signed because that’s the way it’s going and that’s what they deserve No, absolutely. Um, I want to talk real quick about your brother. You mentioned that he was younger than you, ended up being a heroin addict living on the streets. You and him obviously grew up in roughly the same environment. Yeah. Do you think it’s nature, nurture, pure spirit of will that you ended up a titan of industry and he ended up on the streets? Um, combination of both. Yeah. I think when you favor, Uh, a child, uh, with, within a family. Uh, he was my father’s blue eyed boy. And then when that letdown takes place, the ramification on his shoulders was devastating. So dad and him fell out. Uh, he tried to get into the army. He got caught stealing. So he never progressed into those first rounds of that, uh, training. I think, when you favor someone, I always get asked, Oh, you got six kids, who’s your favorite? It depends who I’m with. Because we have our moments across that twelve month period where we get quality time together, one on one. But you should never single one out in a large family and saying, that’s my favorite, because it could come back to bite you on the [bleep]. Where do I rank in terms of your favorite children? Um, you, right now, uh, have just put one foot on the ladder because the truffles and the scrambled egg, this is delicious by the way, seriously. Thank you. I was gonna say, don’t, don’t critique our food like you did with the hot ones, thanks man, you, you tore them apart. Those wings were [bleep]. And that was like sucking on my granddad’s toenails. Uh, they were that bad. Sean knew they were bad. Okay, and when you got sauce like that, masking, uh, that dried chicken, I said, next time around, I’ll supply the wings. Well, hey, speaking of wings, we got course number two coming up. All right, Gordon, for course number two, we have butter chicken, we have garlic naan, we have basmati rice. We also have an In N Out Double Double Animal Style, of course. And then we have some Buffalo Chicken Wings. These have been wet brined overnight, a light flour dust, and then fried at 375 till crispy and juicy, and way better than hot ones. Bloody amazing. I mean, seriously, honestly, this is just a heaven. I mean, even though I didn’t want to talk about my sort of funeral, now you give me an idea of a perfect menu. But I want to be there. As opposed to being laid in a box, I can’t talk to anyone. So that’s why we should do a rehearsal a year before. I kind of feel like you’re never going to die though. I feel like you’ve been training your whole life to just one day meet death and tell him to go himself. I’ve been close. Yeah. Yeah. We’ve been, we’ve been knocking on death’s door a few times. Um, I, I get a little bit, uh, Narky with the shiny floor stuff. I got to get back to the reality of how I started and those firm reminders of what it’s like being back at the cold face. So. I, I, I need to go off piste and jumping out of a helicopter in the middle of the Amazon, Guyana, rappelling down a, a, a, a waterfall, 300 foot, and, you know, out hunting giant caiman at night to eat and sauce and diving with great white sharks. There’s always that moment that I just love that, that, that moment. But you do have that, uh, [bleep] moment as well at the same time. God. Yeah, this could have gone so horribly wrong. Hey, it’s a memento Mori Remind yourself that to remind yourself of life, please dig it. I’ll eat wherever you eat. I’m gonna start with the burger Because, um, these guys are incredible. The fact that everything’s sourced locally, um, they stay within California. It’s a perfect drive thru, you don’t get any hassle. I bring the window down, I give them a little 100 bill as a big thank you, and I pick up my double double. Uh, yeah. Heaven. Truly. It’s the best burger. I grew up eating this. Mmm. Oh God. Oh God. Bloody hell. I mean, this is like delivered to set. I mean, this is obviously 20 minutes, half an hour old, but like, it’s still so good. It’s amazing. And also I took them as an inspiration. We’re opening our first burger store in Vegas. Everyone said, you’ll never work. It will never work. And so how do we come up with the difference? How do we, how do we stand out from the crowd? So I used the bank in the suite downstairs for about nine months. I had all these little miniature barbecues. I started doing the blend with the chuck rib and then the secret and the turning point for me is when I started basing these burgers in Devonshire butter and our Devonshire cows are full of fat and the grass and what they graze. It’s just incredible. Is it that dark yellow butter? Yeah, really. But when it caramelizes, Josh, over those coals, the flavor was just Like this perfect beignoisette, and that was what set our burgers apart in Vegas. And so still to this day, they’re brushed with this beautiful demiature butter. Um, yeah, incredible. In and out, they’re brushing these with mustard on the animal style. God, that’s so good. Tell me about the fish head curry that you ate with the Indian dishwashers in your first restaurant job when you were a teen. That got me to where I am today. And those moments in life when I’m sat with a bunch of Amazing Pakistani men that were incredible kitchen porters night chef Failed to turn up. I was last in so I was first to be called. I was absolutely screwed half past three in the morning I was just coming to like the sort of 21st hour four hours to go set all the trays up for breakfast Um, when the two guys, you know, uh, grabbed me by the t shirt and said, Hey, you gotta come and eat. I can’t eat this time of the morning. I could smell this amazing curry coming from the South canteen. Went in there, lights were down, um, there was water in plastic beakers, uh, and these bright orange cups. Uh, and then they just handed me this, this incredible salmon head fish curry. I kid you not, it was a turning point, because I just could not believe I’m cooking in this five star hotel. The food is, and now with these kitchen porters, um, they’ve just given me one of the most flavoursome cures. It was that moment, I was respectful, uh, then wanted to start working more nights, uh, after that. But when I left that shift, um, I’d picked up a catering magazine, one of our trade mags and on the cover was Markiplier White. And still to this day, every time someone mentions curry, and even to understand how to make one properly, I had to respect for the guys that really took care of me. I went to India and whilst we were filming for the TV, but the real reason was to pay respect to those kitchen porters that made that salmon head fish curry, because that was a break that I never saw coming. And I seized the moment. Left at 8 o’clock in the morning, ran over to the train station, jumped on the shuttle, got to Marco about half past nine, and told him that, uh, I’d just finished an all nighter, and, uh, I want to work for you. Incredible, man. Well, please dig into our, uh, butter chicken curry a la Burbank. Oh, my God. Uh, amazing. And the secret about this is the butter, uh, chicken, is the tomato gravy. It’s fragrant, um, it’s got a nice sense of garam masala, and it’s not too rich. It’s delicious. Mm, oh my God. I love that you talk about actually learning Indian technique because so many especially fine dining chefs. who have all the Michelin stars. They talk about, I cook Thai flavors with French technique. Everything ends in with French technique, but to me, Indian technique, making the tarka, like scorching the spices with the hot oil, it’s so unique and so endemic to why the cuisine is so good. Yeah, but also, um, there’s part medicinal, in terms of how they grew up. After coming out of Rajasthan, I went down to Kerala. Yeah. And I spent 10 days in an ashram, and I thought I understood vegetarian cuisine, but oh my God. The local villages sent their kids to school there, and so the discipline with these 8, 9, 10 year old kids and the way they were cooking was incredible. That’s what I need to do, Josh. And even though everyone thinks, you’re at the top, why are you doing this? No, I need to continue adding chapters, and I can’t let go. Especially the learning technique. So there’s something quite nice about being schooled, but also you have to have the humility to be downbeaten because it’s easy at the top. Do you think you’re sort of, eat a chicken wing, eat a chicken wing. I’ll ask uncomfortable questions later. Do you think you’re sort of addicted to being downbeaten in that way? Cause I mean, you, you grew up, sports tends to be a pretty abusive world. Kitchens tend to be a pretty abusive world, I guess, depending on your definition of motivation versus abuse, but you had a line in your book, 2007 that said. With my dad, the abuse had no point, but with Marco Pierre White, the more he screwed you, the better you became. To you, what’s the difference between motivation and abuse in that way? Yeah, it really depends on how you are and how you perceive that individually. I think there’s always something incredibly positive to come out of something wrong. And so being on my ass in life and having that Uh, sort of daunting, you know, thought, can I get out of this council estate? Can I get away from, uh, my dad? Can I better my life? Can I, can I make a better life for my family? One day I didn’t even think about it because right, right then you’re, you’re selfish, you’re focused. And so you’re, you’re driven. And so whether you’re on a basketball court playing for the Lakers or in a Superbowl or in a top flight kitchen. The price to pay for that knowledge. It’s ruthless and the training ground before you get to those big moments It’s horrific and and so you have to prepare to take the consequences and with marco I took the consequences, but I never complained about that and all that [bleep] about he made me cry. Um We still laugh about it now in terms of and I told him on many occasions marco stopped dining out on that one, uh, and People Asked what was he really like the guy was a genius. The guy was an absolute freaking genius 19 years of age when I stood by his side. So he was only what 25 26 Six years older than me 25. Yeah, that’s like a horse walking a dog It’s incredible crazy. They are delicious Thank you. Um, you’ve also said that the restaurant industry has lost too many chefs to addiction suicide depression Those are all things that are called diseases of despair and one of your chefs david dempsey Also suffered that fate What is it about restaurants that uniquely foster those problems and also how do we fix it? Yeah, God, that’s a tough question. Um, first of all, you’re never gonna fix that overnight. I think the The frustrating part is a bit like sport everyone thinks it’s a cool image and it’s a rock and roll image, but it’s not it’s a trained mentally physically adapted You know mindset and so those that can’t get there think that some controlled substance will help you get there Um, if you turn around and said to me the night, you know, we had dinner at harvey nichols uh the night he died, I’d never believed you because this guy was just so hyped and energetic and excited and Um, I started to realize you know That he had issues but nowhere near of that magnitude and so It’s not a rock and roll lifestyle. It’s a complete, controlled, disciplined environment. And we spoke earlier about the discipline of chefs today. Uh, it’s on par with athletes. And so, um, A lot of individuals think that you need that substance because it’s rock and roll to stay at that level. It’s absolute bullshit. Yeah. It’s the worst. Um, and that’s the downside to the industry because when they’re not making it and they get depressed and they get mentally scarred because they haven’t achieved what they set out to, no one’s managing their expectations. Yeah. And so you can’t dream of playing in the Premier League unless you’re good enough to be in there. It’s the same as cooking. You can’t dream of cooking at three star unless you’re cut out for that. Yeah. And I think the sad thing is There’s no fast track Don’t get catapulted overnight. There’s no such thing, uh in any success and so um, it’s rife in the industry and that’s what led me to make that documentary and Going to honduras columbia and then making that [bleep], uh, and three star michelin cocaine was just Uh a real eye opener and and scary You I mean, literally, because it was, it was petrifying to how easy we made it and to how quick we got it and then to see 37. 5 tons of it entering the UK. Um, and I lose a chef because he’s taking a couple of grams, uh, after we had dinner. Uh, yeah. It was interesting. You said that one of the reasons people get depressed in kitchens and turn to substances like that is because simply they haven’t made it, they haven’t achieved. Do you have any regrets with the way that you have acted, say going back to the Boiling Point documentary, about the way that you’ve acted in high pressure situations? No, not at all. No regrets. Um, have I handled kitchens, uh, completely different? Yeah, of course I have. I, I got trained like that. Yeah. So, um, Certainly not playing the victim. Um, didn’t know any better. Certainly couldn’t ever run a business. Uh, but boy could I cook my [bleep] off. Um, and the biggest thing I ever did when I won my third Michigan Star was I stood back. Reflect, review, uh, divide and conquer, hand the reins over. You look at people like Alan Ducasse and sadly the late Joe Robuchon, they’ve got four three star restaurants. They haven’t been anywhere near them for the last 10 years. Yeah. And so I go back to those days in Robuchon’s kitchen and I thought Marco was tough. This guy was an absolute nut bag. And if it wasn’t copper pans, it was plates. And, um, the kitchen was a bit like this. We’re all behind this line. There was 12 of us stuck behind there. And then opposite the hot plate, it was this toilet. And, uh, I was bursting for a pee, uh, about half past nine. I hadn’t set the last table and there was a key on the pass. And so I grabbed the key, ran into the toilet and came out and, um, I got Absolutely pummeled, because it was the toilet for Misha Roboshon, and no staff were allowed to piss in there. And so I just couldn’t quite believe how, sort of, weird that was, that, that, that The cooks need to pee, but we had to go outside, uh, down the, uh, hallway. I thought I was just being super quick, but man, I got the biggest bollock in my entire life. And so, at the time, you didn’t think much of it, but it’s not until you reflect later on in life, you think, Jesus Christ, I’m getting screamed at because I pissed in his toilet. You know, I didn’t shit on the side, uh, and not wipe my [bleep]. I left him toilet paper, sprayed, uh, the aerosol can, and so I did everything right. But, um, yeah, and so are those kitchens. Changing dramatically is it the same in every three star? They’re all different. Yeah, and they have different ways to get the best out of you You know from from Marco to you down to people like Claire Smith Hopefully with each successive generation it gets easier for those below you. But I mean Studying the sort of methods of the CIA and just how these culinary schools work over here is that Depressing because these kids go into these culinary schools. They get Sandbagged with 50 60 sometimes 150 200 000 dollar loans that come out after two or three years They can’t take a job that they want to learn They have to take a job to pay and rid the debts and so their career is sandbagged and that’s frustrating So we have to turn that on its head and these kids should be coming out of that three, six month, nine training schemes into businesses for their career, not to down, uh, grade their loans because it’s, it’s detrimental. It’s counterintuitive to the future of the industry. I mean, for as many people as complain about your rough edges on TV, uh, yelling at, you know, [bleep] restaurant owners. Yeah. You seem like you care so, so, so deeply about one, the people in the industry succeeding them to the industry. As a whole, and I just, I deeply admire that. Yeah, it’s a tough one, isn’t it? Because Kitchen Nightmares, uh, is a tough love scenario. And I’m screwed either way. When they’re successful and you relaunch, you don’t get praise. When they close and fail, you get blamed. Yeah. But let’s not forget, they asked me in. And behind me, I’ve never been. Ignored it, but I’ve got an amazing culinary team. There’s a great art team There’s shit hot producers that really know their stuff and we’ve done our homework before we get there Uh, I get in there. Uh, I have to eat [bleep] foods Uh, i’m telling them truthfully and they’re looking at me like they’re a bit. Wow. How can you be so rude? No, that’s not rude. I’m being Honest with you. Get your [bleep] together. And you can’t save everyone. I try so hard. Yeah. I, I literally try so hard. I’ve been accused of carrying mice in my pocket to sticking a mouse in them. That’s what that was? I thought you were just happy to see me. No, no, no, no. But, and then, um, all sorts, uh, accused of, you know, um, fire alarms being set. I mean, the [bleep] we get from that show, I walk away and I’m like, get the Pepto Bismol out. Um, start, uh, start working on the, uh, on the, the stomach ulcers quickly. Ready for course number three? There’s more food? Oh, there’s so much more. Jesus Christ, this is not a funeral, this is a feast. Gordon, for course number three, we have your Beef Wellington. We cooked it exactly to your specifications. We have a tenderloin cooked to medium rare, surrounded by mushroom duxelles, wrapped in prosciutto, wrapped in a chive crepe, and then wrapped in glazed puff pastry, a little bit of flake salt and thyme on top, and of course a red wine demi on the side. Then we have your Monkey 47 made with Mediterranean tonic water. And a fresh lime wheel. Mate, it looks majestic. Thank you so much. I mean, honestly, this thing lost its way, uh, back in the 90s, and so when we first opened Clarities, early 2000, I wanted to sort of be a little bit more, sort of, disruptive with the retro. And I’m fed up with that old fart mentality that nothing should change, our job was to change it. And so, this thing imploded. I remember the general manager turning around saying, you got a 21 pound lunch menu, you’re degrading the hotel, it’s too cheap. And I said, no, no, We’re filling the hotel. This place is a ghost town. We’re filling it and this was on the menu And it was absolutely flying out and now it’s a Wellington sensation I mean the amount of shit that I get on my phone with Wellingtons Some of them look like my granddad’s slippers Some of them look like the inside of my granddad’s underpants, but the other ones look beautiful And this I can tell you now looks stunning. I give all credit to Trevor. Trevor actually did this I just sat back and watched Shall I? Absolutely, please. Uh, beautiful. So, um, it’s funny because, uh, the chef’s cut is this cut, the first cut. Yeah. Okay, because that’s the bit with a little beef in there, and we can’t give that to the customer because that’s the bit that’s always sandwiched, but we used to save those bits for the end of service, um, and then just sit there at the end of the, uh, evening and eat the Wellington ends. This is beautiful. I mean, absolutely beautiful. Wow. Whoever made this, I swear to God, I mean, look at that baby. That is beautiful. Uh, one of my favorite restaurant memories is, served a, uh, private dinner and we had about 50 mason jars that were filled with, uh, foie gras torchon. And we took it all out and I was instructed to scrape it all out into a large bowl. Thank you so much. And then we just took leftover biscuits and we sat there drinking the dregs of bottles of wine and swiping biscuits in foie gras torchon. I see. Oh my god, we used to do a beautiful foie gras sauce with chicken wings. Um, and then for our dinner at Harvest with Marco. We used to eat the dregs of the sauce and the chicken wings and that’s why from an age of 19 I love chicken wings and then this looks beautiful. Dig in. Oh my goodness. Thank you. A bit of red wine demi on the side, of course. Amazing. Beef cooked beautifully. Um, it’s funny. I remember getting my mum up to the launch at The, uh, restaurant at Claridge’s and I made one of these for her and she sent it back. I’m sat there in the kitchen and there’s like 45 chefs and Mrs. Ramsey, table one. I said, what? What do you mean? She’s joking? She’s taking the piss? She said no, she wants it more cooked. I’m like, for [bleep] sake. I don’t want beef with blood in it, Gordon. I need beef with flavor. I’m like, Mom, you can’t overcook a Wellington. She said, well then don’t serve it to me. I’m like, oh my God. Michelin critics got nothing on Mrs. Ramsey, damn. Honestly, no. And she was staying, um, they very kindly put her up in the penthouse suite, and she got into the suite. And the butler was knocking on the door and said, Mrs. Ramsey, can I run your bath? And she said, certainly not, I can run my own. And so she had no idea that we were trying to look after her. But that’s what mums are like, right? Yeah, I love that. I mean, the working class roots, man. You can tell it in your blood. This is delicious. Seasoned beautifully. Oh my god. Man. I took too big of a bite. Cheers, man. Uh, Monkey 47. Um, uh, there’s, there’s a gin called Gordon’s that I’m not a big fan of, um, and so I went on that gin trail and 47 has got the, the sort of tannins and, and the spice and it’s just, it’s just an amazing way to sit and enjoy a gin and tonic. I want people to get absolutely paralytic at my funeral. I want to make sure there’s cars for them all, SUVs to take them home. Um, I don’t want anyone catching, uh, the bus or the train, and I want them carried out of my funeral wake. Gordon, that is one thing that I can absolutely guarantee you, I will bring to your funeral. I will bring the paralytic drunkenness. I once showed up to a Hanukkah party with a beer bong and six bottles of Manischewitz, and they were gone. And that funnel was stained purple. Believe me, you. I don’t think of dying. I’m 57, I’ve just turned 57. I feel better, stronger than I did at 37. But surely it’s gonna come for you one day. I mean, not in the near distant future, Josh. Do you know something I don’t? No, like, you know, I know that we all struggle with mortality, and I know that some people really bury themselves in work, and they bury themselves in the shit, the pain, the suffering, to distract themselves from death. I’m not saying you’ve been doing that. No, I find the balance. I find the balance and my escape is either doing triathlons and half marathons, uh, marathons, Ironman, and then the guilty pleasure is diving because then you are 30, 40 meters under. You’ve got great visibility and you’re answering to nobody and it’s the best feeling in the world. You’re just hearing your breath, nice and slow. Looking at the depth, checking the gauge, and then just looking for the next big shark. So you never meditate on the idea of death? I mean you are surrounded by it constantly with the sharks and the narcos and all that, but do you ever actually meditate on the idea of death? On what your legacy is going to be? On what the feeling of nothingness is? No, no. Do you have any idea how busy I am, Josh? I’m saying that’s by design, yeah, of course. Yeah, I know, but we find a balance. Sure, sure, sure. You have way too much time on your hands, young man. You’re right. You need to work harder and get some more wrinkles on your face. Sign me up to work as a commie in one of your restaurants, because I’m sick of thinking about death. I just want to grind at this point. Listen, we’re all going to die, somewhere down the line. I’d like it to be a quick, painless death. Um, but, um, I, I, uh, we’ve just extended the family, uh, you including, and so now two SUVs going out to, to dinner and the shops, um, so I think I call shotgun! Just, just, just, just finding that balance and eating properly, because chefs have the world’s worst eating habits, because we graze, and any chef that would tell you that we sit down and eat dinner before we go and cook dinner is absolute [bleep]. Trash raccoons. Yeah, but we just, just literally Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Trash raccoons. A trash raccoon. You’re a little raccoon roaming around the kitchen, grabbing things with your little claws, eating them over the trash. They stink raccoons. Chefs stink? Are you kidding me? But that’s, that’s B. O. That’s, that’s after a hard night’s sweat, right? Um, so we graze, we graze four or five times a day, tiny bowls. Um, and I’m a firm believer in going into service on your toes, like ballerinas, nimble, um, on it, fast moving and tasting everything. Then you’re perfect. You’d make a great chef. Yeah? Thank you. I’d, uh, honestly, I was choosing between going into the restaurant world and going into the media world. And had it not been for a relationship that I was in at the time, where I decided I wanted comfortability, I would have jumped into the restaurant world. And then I always wondered the alternate reality, what would have happened? What do you think would have happened if you would have been a footballer? Yeah, I mean that sadly got taken away from me at an early age. Um, and then of course, you know, in your early thirties, you’re sort of, you know, you’re out and the career’s done. You’ve got sort of 10 to 12 years at that level. So, uh, you got to make it, but I was more worried about a girl I was seeing at the age of 19 when, um, I just got to London and she said, I’ve got you a great job and it’s, uh, it’s working for one of the banks and it’s seven till three as the head chef. Like what? Corporate dining seven till three. You’ve got weekends off and seven nights a week. Don’t be a chef if you want to take that role. Don’t don’t don’t do that. Yeah, learn that craft. But um, I did think do you sacrifice the relationship that you’re in love with this amazing girl? For your career? So you sacrifice that moment in a relationship. Otherwise you could be running a three star mission restaurant today. And then all I got is this show. Thanks so much for stopping by. No, no. But one more question, but is that you pinned it on the, the, the personal relationship that you couldn’t sort of dedicate that time through the lens of that relationship, it was a different person that I thought I wanted to be. I tried to suppress those parts of me that loved being constantly under pressure, that loved the intensity. I tried to convince myself. That I was somebody who, no, I should, I should live with balance. And that is not for everybody. I dropped out of college. I could not, once my sports eligibility was up, I couldn’t bring myself to go to class. I’ve tried working a full desk job in two hours there, and it is literally physically torturous, my skin crawls. But when I’m working the line, when I’m in a weight room, when I’m doing conditioning, it’s the happiest I am. My mind goes blank and I can just. It’s almost like you’re in a fugue state. It feels natural. Yeah, that’s interesting. Because I absolutely adore pressure. Yeah. And whether it’s going live, whether it’s cooking, you know, an amazing event, or whether it’s behind the line at a three star Michelin, and you’re just, all of a sudden, you’re conducting this orchestra of pressure. utter perfection and there’s those moments that are sort of captivating that you know it doesn’t get any better than this um and that sacrifice is all coming into these last three or four minutes when it’s just all coming onto that plate and this canvas just Just takes on a whole new meaning. You need to be absolutely driven. And semi selfish. Uh, and that’s, that’s hard for people to accept. Selfish, yeah, cause you gotta get from A to B, and then B jumps very quickly to D. Yeah. F, G, if you get it right. Gordon, for your final course of the final meal of your life, we have sticky toffee pudding with a perfect vanilla ice cream cannel on top, a little bit of edible flour, and then the complete opposite, a deep fried Mars bar served on newspaper, a. k. a. fish wrap. Honestly, I want to find out, uh, which knobhead, uh, put together a deep fried Mars bar. Just when Scotland was breaking through and becoming a sort of pillar in European cuisine, Some idiot comes out with a deep fried Mars bar. Guaranteed they’ll piss as a fart. Got home one night, thought they were getting some fish fingers from the bloody fryer. It was frozen Mars bars and they decided to coat it in some batter and deep fried it. But this thing blew up in Scotland and became almost like a staple in the Scottish diet. Unreal. And so you put it on your menu for your last meal out of spite. Yeah, just to, uh, just to re re re realign the Scottishness in me. But. Uh, it’s a crazy idea, and it’s just, it’s sort of like a Snickers bar, but look at that. I mean, honestly. That is No. That, I mean Wow. No. No, no. Look at that. Gordon, cheers, buddy. Um, cheers, my man. Cheers. Ah. Disgusting. I want to find that little arsehole who put that thing together and give him a kick up the arse because Just when we’re breaking through with the beautiful venison, hand dived scallops from West Coast of Scotland, beautiful Dublin baked prawns Amazing whiskey. This [bleep] idiot puts a deep fried Mars bar together. Yeah, so watch your [bleep] Gordon’s coming for you, This, however, the sticky toffee pudding, this, uh, reminds me, uh, of mum, uh, a prolific, amazing, um, chef, um, it’s funny, isn’t it, when you grow up and you watch mum have three jobs and you think, mum, why are you working so hard, you’re not actually doing the same because it’s in your DNA, and, um, Christmas day morning, you know, we wake up, we want to open a couple of presents that we’ve got and mum’s not finished work. But this was the one go to dessert that she always did for her special birthday. It’s incredible. And it’s, it is, it is incredible. Beautiful. Yeah, we did a little bit of scotch in the caramel. As in, I have heard you like to reconnect with your Scottish roots through the fine delicacies. So we put some scotch in the, yeah, in the caramel. Delicious. I mean, it’s just absolute heaven. I think, I would like to put this dessert, inside that coffin. The ancient Egyptians used to do that, for good luck. Is that right? Mm hmm. There you go. Um, talking about your mom making this dish, um, you now, of course, are raising a very large family of your own. I think you can take a lot of good lessons from bad behaviors. What did you learn from your dad about how not to father? That dreadful word, when they turn around and say, I told you so. Mmm. And so, um, That’s the condescending, you know, bull You never want to tell your kids. Six amazing kids are incredibly lucky, and all I’ve taught our children is that, you know, find your passion, find your way, and do it with fame, fortune, money. They all work. Uh, Meg, our eldest, is, uh, an amazing police officer. Uh, Jack is in the Royal Marines, and so he’s, you know, Dedicating his life to, uh, the Marines. Uh, Tilly’s at university, Holly’s into fashion. Uh, Oscar’s playing Havoc in the Nativity play. He had, he had, he had two words to say in his play and he bulls them up cause he spotted, uh, he spotted his mum. Um, and then obviously Jesse’s, uh, months old, but. I always say the earlier you tell me the more I can do and so Unlike my father. Um, I didn’t have a close relationship with him. Um, he was always the condescending type I told you so kids want to hear What have we got? How do we salvage and what’s the comeback? And honestly that comeback for me has been my life because that journey upwards Has been one of the most exciting journeys because I still feel like i’m coming back from that moment And every time I teach these kids a lesson and we’re allowed Tiny mistakes, but just don’t repeat that mistake. That’s beautiful. It’s like, um, simultaneously having that empathy, but also that drive to push them. Because if you wanted to, you could have raised, uh, I think there’s a British saying toffee nosed toffee nose, little, uh, little kids. Yeah. No [bleep]. Yeah. No, it’s funny. Is it where we used to start traveling and, you know, sitting in an amazing business or first class. I’d always say to them, think what you could do with the money. When you get there, getting on together. Yeah. We’re all bloody getting off. And if you think we’re paying, you know, 10, 000 for a business class ticket because you’re a Ramsey, forget it. Get, turn right. Every time they got their allowance every month, a couple hundred dollars, if they saved that up across the 12 month period, I would match that at Christmas for them. And they’ve got to stay. True to the form by saving every dollar. Uh, and so when you start that practice at sort of 13, they got their part time jobs or a sudden their minds are focused about their career paths. And so, yeah, that was the opposite. The way that I grew up. And so, uh, they are super disciplined and they are on it, man. I’m also curious what you learned about the strength of your family from the death of your unborn son who passed at 20 weeks in the womb. Yeah, that was awful. Uh, that kind of, uh, Uh, situation, uh, was devastating. And it was, uh, incredibly moving to see the tightness. And then, you know, any, any woman having to experience that was just But what it did do, uh, it made us incredibly closer. And so, we’d never have Oscar had we not lost, you know, Rocky. And so, now with Jesse, and so, you know, there’s, there’s positivity coming out there. But it’s just amazing how you, you know, You bond, that room were closed. It was no interruptions. And we just had that moment together as a family. And those moments are powerful because it unites and it’s, it was a touching moment. And every time someone meets our kids, they will say, my God, I can’t believe they’re so normal. Yeah, they are beyond normal, uh, humble and, uh, I suppose the only worry I’ve got is that no one wants to cook for a living. I think I’ve scared the [bleep] out of them all. Wait, wait, hold on, hold on, hold on. What if you had another son who say just expressed regret about maybe not cooking for a living? So there you go. So there you go. Tilly’s sort of How does your hair go like that? Tilly’s, Tilly’s, Tilly’s getting there. But, um They have an amazing appreciation for life, and, and, and, and respect, but when they go to the restaurants without us, uh, they are super polite. And I was desperate to realign myself with a family that was the opposite to what I grew up with. As everything I saw and witnessed, I did the opposite with my family. I’d say when death finally does come knocking on your door, know that all seven of your children Stand on their own two feet. Gordon, you ready to get in the lightning round? Uh, yes. What is that lightning round? What is that? I’d just like to ask you a couple questions. It’ll go fast. It’ll go fast. Uh, other than me, who’s the one person dead or alive you’d share your actual last meal with? Oh, God, that’s a tough one. Uh, it’s gotta be my wife. What song do you want played at your funeral? Um, it’s gotta be Adele, Set Fire to the Rain, cause that’s, that’s, that’s been my life. It’s, it’s hot, Uh, uh, boisterous, Uh, and bloody exciting. And I’m there, rip shit off gin. Who’s the one footballer you wish you could have slide tackled? I did it once in the back garden, uh, on New Year’s Eve, uh, one night, uh, with David. Uh, yeah, I, I would say David Beckham. Love that. Uh, what’s your biggest fear? My biggest fear is getting old. How many Jamie Olivers could you beat in a fight? If you need clarifying, uh, answers on that, I can tell you. But how many Jamie Olivers could you beat in a fight? Oh, I’d give him a nine round head start and tie both hands behind my back. I’m not worried about him. Jesus. What’s your greatest regret in life? I don’t know. My greatest regret in life, uh, not doing a sub 10 hour Ironman. Are you still time? Mate, there is. There is. Which Burbank parking lot would you want to wrestle me in? Who wrote that question? Who wrote that question? That wasn’t me. You get your choice. Bob’s Big Boy 7 Eleven, Pinocchio’s Italian Deli, you choose, I’m there. Uh, I would do it on the count of In N Out Burger. Yeah, with a double double each side. Gordon, thank you so much, man. Incredible conversation. I was. Thanks, Bob. Of course, and everybody, make sure to check out Gordon’s YouTube channel. Check out this new show, Idiot Sandwich. I’m on there. Cooking sandwiches with Rhett and Link, and what a hell of a time that was. Before then, Gordon, if you want to say your last words to that camera right there. Uh, my god, my last words. Uh, you know, I’ve eaten so much food. Honestly, right now, I need a big [bleep]. The man, the chef, the poet, the TV icon, Gordon Ramsay, everybody. Thank you again so much, man. This is incredible. Everybody, thank you so much for stopping by. Thanks guys, the crew, and really well done, everybody, honestly. I’m Kelly Rowland, and my last meal. Caviar with potato chips, cheeseburger with french fries, and tacos with a pineapple margarita. A5 Wagyu and mashed potatoes. Then, a peach cobbler, chocolate cake, and chocolate peanut butter pie for dessert. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all gotta eat and we’re all gonna die. Today we’re joined by Grammy Award winner, multi platinum recording artist, star and producer of Mia Culpa on Netflix, And the only person in history to successfully send a text message via Microsoft Excel. Kelly Rowland, welcome to the show. I’m sorry, I had to do it. Oh my god. I had to do it. Do you know how much flack I get from that? I’m sorry to be one of the people adding to that. Oh, it’s alright. I’m so used to it now. Do you remember in the Dilemma music video shoot, did anybody address that at the time? No. And I’m, I’m actually mad at them that they didn’t because they made me look nuts for just now’s period. Well, you seem so mad that he wasn’t returning the text and it was like, well, What did you expect? Because it’s just a draft, my dear. It turns out though, there actually is a way to put a hyperlink to an email underneath an Excel spreadsheet. So now you can tell people that that’s exactly what you’re doing and that they just didn’t know the tech at the time. What he said. If you need a freelance publicist, I’m here. No, but uh, one, thank you so much for being here, I’m incredibly excited. Thank you for having me, I’m so excited. Of course, have you thought about your last meal before? I think every time someone asks, sometimes it changes, but one thing that stays the same is a cheeseburger, tacos, and what else? Oh, anything with chocolate and peanut butter just makes me so happy. I love that. Um, you, I think it was off camera, said. pompous ass about yourself with the A5 Wagyu and the caviar. I’m curious about that because you the cheeseburger and the tacos like that’s some like good home cooked food. Yeah, uh, but no you’re like fully in your bougie era and you’re cool with that. This particular situation Absolutely. Uh, how often do you think about death? I don’t. You don’t? I don’t. I don’t. I’m so busy being content and full of joy with life and watching life in my children’s eyes like starting it all over again and learning about my own and um, you know, navigating my way through it to be thinking about the end of it. I just want to enjoy it. Well, that sounds so reasonable. That makes me, cause most people are like, yeah, I get that anxiety, but like the, that, those dark thoughts never come in of like, man, this is all going to end. Like, you’re just busy actually enjoying it. Well, you know what’s funny? When I see a snake, that thought comes like, I don’t like snakes. I just, I always think about that. What if it’s poisonous? What if I have so many what ifs in my head and yeah, with life, I just think about gratitude. And even if I did, I think about. Man, what a great life. Like how blessed I am. Like I, I chose wisely on my husband. You know what I mean? And have two beautiful, wonderful boys. And the people who are in my life right now, I value and treasure so greatly, so much. So I just enjoy that. Enjoy them. Enjoy moments. And I’m grateful for every single one. But when I see a snake, it’s definitely him. You know, yeah. Well, I am excited to enjoy some of those blessings of your life with you today. You ready to eat? Yes, I am. Let’s do it. Let’s do it. Alright, Bougiera Kelly, for your first course, we have the full caviar service with potato chips. We have salmon roe, we have beluga caviar that’s coming from the sturgeon, then we have golden osetra, lovely kettle cooked potato chips, and then for accoutrement, We have some sieves, egg white and egg yolk, chives, creme fraiche, and diced shallots. Uh, please dig in. I am so excited. I’m going to move the chips closer to you. You were looking at them like, you know, you really needed them, and Oh my gosh, the best ones are kettle cooked. When’s the first time you had caviar? Um, it was a Destiny’s Child commercial set, funny enough. Um, it was Michelle Williams mom who knew about caviar. And so they bring the caviar over, we don’t Didn’t know what it was, you know, very southern girls and we said, uh, nah, we we don’t know what that is It looks crazy. And next thing I knew we finished it Cheers Hmm That’s a little I’m just I’m gonna do what I do in the club. Yeah, you got a damn dancer and I’m here Hmm, I’m saying in my lane Mm hmm Then you gotta go for another one. And then I’m gonna let you shine, and then I’m just here. I’m just here. I’m almost keeping the rhythm. You got it. Yeah. You got it. I do wanna talk about your new movie that you’re starring in, and producing, Mia Coppola on Netflix. You play an ambitious lawyer, who takes a case with a cagey yet sultry client. This is probably the biggest project you’ve produced on so far, right? It is, absolutely. And the interesting thing is, is taking something like this on, I knew, you know, that it would be. Such an, a journey. You know what I mean? And I was so grateful to Tyler who, when I asked him, he’s like, yeah, but he said it like it was no thing. You know what I, what I mean? I was like, but I promise you, I’m going to be really involved. He said, I know you are. He’s like, and I’m off. Like, let’s go. I support you. I started making decisions. He probably looked at me like, You just came in and started swinging. You’re like, I did, and it was so awesome. And, and, um, I’m forever so grateful to him for that, but it was fun. What did you learn about your own ambitions in the film industry from working as a producer with somebody as experienced as Tyler? It’s a lot of work because you’re overseeing so many people. You know, you don’t look at a film and think it takes so many people to make all of this come to life. You know what I mean? But it’s not just the production. There it’s the distribution, you know what I mean? And all the powers that be behind that and people who are excited. You want people who are passionate about, you know, what they do. Whether that’s, um, the director to, uh, the person who’s gonna push the movie. You know what I mean? Everyone that’s involved in the movie making process is so incredibly important. I was gonna say, I feel so guilty asking you questions because then you can’t eat while you’re directly answering. I almost want to pretend to like look for my phone. What is going on so you can enjoy the caviar? It’s okay. I’ll make the next question longer and rambly so you can get as many chips and caviar as possible. Okay. Um, even if you haven’t thought a lot about your own death, I have thought a lot about your death. Since your on screen debut, that was way creepier than I intended, I want you to know that, okay? But, but, but, your first, your on screen debut, your feature film debut, 2003’s Freddy vs. Jason, Yes? Was the last horror movie that I ever saw in theaters, because there is a scene, Spoiler alert, if you haven’t seen it now, when were you gonna get to it? Sorry. Where Freddy Krueger rips out your nose, Yep. And I was so traumatized by that as an 11 year old that I never went back. Um, so you saved me a lot of money. Oh, she says, got your nose! Got your nose! Mm hmm. Then you eventually get clipped by Jason Voorhees. Yup. What do you remember about your first, uh, big screen death? I just remember on that set, it was actually really scary at night. Like in real life. Like in real life scary. I remember it was very cold and sitting there and having to look like it was just like my last breath. And I was like, oh, shit. It’s really cold. Is happening. It was, it was kind of like that. It was so strange. But I had, I had a really great time on that set. They did scare me though. Everybody just, cause they knew I was just on pins and needles. Cause Freddie, I remember in my, like, house, my brother wasn’t supposed to be watching it. But as a kid. So, yeah, all of that. Trauma just came back to haunt me on that set for sure. You’re watching the Curse of Bridge Hollow with your son Titan who’s nine now. And he saw you in danger and thought you were going to die on screen. Yeah. Tell me about that moment. He cried. Oh. I mean, it was, it was, Oh, I’m so sad. I feel so bad. I didn’t mean to break. No, this is no, no, no, no, no. It’s a happy moment because it’s actually, it’s funny to me, but I remember I was so excited to show him this movie. I was like, it’s not that bad as like at all. I was like, I should have thought about the, that before it’s anyway. So we’re watching it and I’m like, and this part is not, it’s not, you know, real baby. It’s just pretend I’m, I’m right here. And he watches it. He’s like, Mommy, no! It’s, it’s the whole moment I was like, I’m, I’m fine, I’m right here, I’m right here, he’s mommy! It was a whole thing and so I was like, yeah, that was a very bad parenting moment for me. Really bad call. How do you handle larger, more adult questions with a small child like that? Because it seems like you take very many, um, you’re very intentional about the way that you parent. I mean, you’ve written a book on parenting, but how do you deal with when Titan comes up to you and says, What happens when you die? How do you explain that? Oh, oh, this one day I remember. I can’t think of what we were doing and what made him come around to that thought. But sure enough, he says, um, I’m not ready to go yet. I can’t think of like what fully happened. The parts that I do remember, he’s like, I’m not, I don’t want to go yet or something like that. But I, I tried to comfort him, you know, and just saying how, you know, I think that, I was like, what do you think happens, you know, and then to give him the space to use his imagination. And so I said, I’ll tell you what I think happens. I think there’s a big bright light and the light comes and you’re kind of in this really cool bubble. I was like, and all you can do is smile. Yeah. Because it’s light all around you and you have this really, really fun, happy feeling in your tummy and all you can do is just laugh. And you just, it feels like somebody’s giving you a hug. And he goes, Okay. You know what I mean? But I think in those moments, like, I try to use an imagination. He’s like, you know, sometimes if I leave, he’s like, I don’t want you to go. And I remember this one time, I remember these moments now. Wow, this is so strange. Um, but I said, why? He was like, you know, I said, don’t I always come back? And I think that sometimes he, Is wanting to express the fear of, you know, me not coming back, but I was like, I always come back. That was maybe the most beautiful explanation of death that I’ve ever heard. And I think we need to start explaining things to adults the way that we would explain them to a kid, frankly. Because I haven’t felt that good about mortality in a long time. Oh, well, I mean, well, you think about what we living around, you know what I mean? It’s like sometimes you, sometimes that, that dark thought or. The heaviness or weight of the world sometimes kind of taints the light. Yeah. You know what I mean? And I think that sometimes we forget about the light, but the light is the thing that keeps us going. Some days you get caviar and some days you’re fishtailing your car in the rain. Ugh, ugh, L. A. in this rain. But we have caviar. But we have caviar! Kelly, for course number two, I’m going to try and get through this fast so you can start eating as soon as possible. We have a hamburger, we have a quarter pound patty, 70 30 ground chuck, griddled super hard, all the fixings. Thousand Island, ketchup, mustard, lettuce, tomato. Pickles, onions, all that on a brioche bun. We have a beef taco sampler. We want to show you all of the facets of tacos. So we have a carne asada street taco. We have a good old fashioned ground beef hard shell taco. And then we have a braised beef with serranos and pickled onion taco and flour tortilla. We have some fresh cut fries, double fried twice, served along with ketchup. Gotta have the newspaper in there. And then a pineapple margarita with Don Julio 1942, shaken up fresh pineapple juice, some lime, simple, little bit of tahini on the rim. I know. I know. This is you. You did this for me too. You know, just us. I’m just so happy right now. I am too. Okay. I mean, tell me about it. Tell, tell me about the pineapple margarita. So, the pineapple margarita actually started in Atlanta. I’ll never forget. I was there with my cousins and they muddled the pineapple and, uh, just put all this love into it. And I tasted it and asked for another one immediately. It was so good. We can get your refills too here. Yes. So, um, then I remember, um, trying it at home recently and it was really, really good. It’s, it’s, it’s my thing. French fries. Who doesn’t love french fries? Like, but this is actually like a nod to my husband because he loves french fries so much. And so that’s something that like we’ll literally sit up there and he’ll talk and we talk and we sit up there and we laugh And we so we share french fries in that way together. Um tacos just takes me back to my Time in Texas and when I fell in love with Texas, one of the many things you fall in love with Texas is the cuisine. So you get so many different varieties of food, but the Tex Mex is on another level. So when you just started to go through that just now, I think my heart. Skip to beat to be honest because one of my first memories of a taco was the heart taco and you pickled the onions. I’m just so happy. Kelly, you deserve it. Okay. You deserve it. Pickle the onion. It’s a big deal. So. Then you have burgers. Like, you know, anything between two pieces of bread is great to me. I don’t care what it is. And a hot dog is considered A sandwich. A sandwich, thank you. Yes. A woman of reason. A hot dog is between two pieces of bread. Uh, but cheers. Oh, cheers. Cheers. Gotta flip to the Tahin side. Who did this? I think it was V. She came in, she came in with the margarita and was real proud of it. She should be. That is unreal. All right, which one are we gonna start with? I’m looking to you for cues. I say the street. Uh, should we bust out the, the tapatio for it? Yes, we should. So we also have a little bit of avocado sauce on there. Oh, really? Oh yeah, it’s tucked in there. We wanted to load it up with steak though. I’m always like, do I want both tortillas or just one? I’m a big fan of taking off the outside tortilla. Nobody actually knows how the two tortilla things started. I would like to know. They think it’s just because the quality of tortillas is so bad, like at stores? Mm, mm, mm, mm, mm. Mm, mm, really? Mm. Kelly. Now we sink deeper into the booth. You don’t have to. My fabric won’t let me. Ha ha. This is so good. Mm. Ooh. What are we doing? What are we doing? What do you mean, what are we doing? I mean, I’m What are we doing? Kelly, I’ve squeezed a lot more than you. I’m doing it, I’m doing it, I’m doing it. Sorry, this is my home. I forget that I eat in front of white people, you know what I mean? Mm. I have questions I’m supposed to ask and I don’t want to ask them because I’m just enjoying basking in your joy of the food. And I just want to let this wash over me for a second. But, it was the line. Well you two, I’m going to ask you a question. So, you spent a lot of your childhood in Houston. You were performing from such a young age. You started singing in churches. You actually switched churches because you were singing secular music and some people didn’t agree with that. What was that experience like? Wow. No one’s ever asked me that blunt, but you were exactly right. Blunt questions are easier to ask when there’s tacos and margaritas involved. You’re right. You know, it was a space and place that my mom really, really loved. And around that time, I was becoming a woman. And when it came to making decisions by myself and faith and, you know, where I wanted to decide to worship, that really meant a lot to me. And this particular church did that for me. And it gave me a sense of home every single time I came home. It was, uh, bread of life. Um, in Houston, Texas, and it was just this, I remember like, ah, just, I can feel it. You know, I can feel what it felt like. It felt like home. And if you’re like out and moving into the world, and the world is moving so fast, and you’re moving with the world so fast, it was nice to be still. You said, the music industry would have chewed me up and spit me out had it not been for God. Mm hmm. And looking at everything from when you started performing, 11, 12 years old, from Girls Time on Star Search, through like, the tabloid era of Destiny’s Child, to now come out on the other end as, you know, not only a veritable superstar, but somebody who has a beautiful family, somebody who’s producing movies hmm. Um, tell me what God meant to you as having that sort of safe haven. Oh, it’s my safe space. I think like the older I get, the more I’m learning about the walk, you know what I mean? Cause when I was a kid, you’re like, Oh, thank God I’m a Christian now. It’s going to be great. You know what I mean? And when you, um, Have faith. I don’t care what background you are. When you have a faith, I feel like in some sort of way when you want to make the right decision, there is struggle. But yeah, so I just think that God is my everything. I’m so grateful to my mother and my grandmother and my aunts for introducing me to faith at such a young age. I’m curious what you’ve learned about Your self worth through your music career, and also through Faith, was there a single moment where you realized that like, I am Kelly Rowland, and I am a superstar, and I am deserving? Motherhood has blessed me in ways you can’t even imagine. I mean, I say that because when I’m sitting up there talking to him, My son, my oldest son, Titan, I’m realizing there’s a message in there that I actually need. So your children are like going boom, boom, like, cause you know what I mean? It’s something in you that needs to be ignited and reminded. So I’m, I always like to be humble to those moments and be able to understand them because while he’s nine, here I am at 40 some years old and I’m still learning this lesson, whatever it might be in it. You know what I mean? And sometimes you have those moments and, and sometimes you don’t, but I think that motherhood is just. He has blessed me tremendously, for sure. And I realize that if I’m telling him something, I have to like, talk the talk and walk the walk. But yeah. Dig into the burger, it’s getting cold, it’s getting cold. Oh wait, wait, what about the hard shell taco? Go, go, go. I’m going where you’re going. Okay. Mmm. Oh my God. Oh my God. When’s the last time you had one of these? I drank a night at Taco Bell. When was that? Give us a date. No. Mmm. Do you still eat Taco Bell? Do you still have a penchant for fast food? Yes. Same. Same. We didn’t even try a fry. We didn’t try a fry, Kelly. I was eating fries the whole time. We haven’t tried the burger yet. Should we do it? We should do it. Let’s do it. I’m going to give this a little smashy, smash, smash. A little, or do you fully compress? I fully compress. Same, same, same, same. I was made trash compacting the burger. What’s that? You sound like a bear cat. What’s that? How’s a bear cat? A bear cat. It’s like, uh, they’re from, like, Canada. They, like, what are they called? I don’t know what a bear cat is. Oh, you made a perfect bear cat sound. Oh, well. It’s a compliment, by the way. You’re welcome. I think they’re really cute animals. A lot of people think they’re not. Okay. This whole hand is just gonna be covered in sauce. Mm hmm. All right, ready? Who did this? This is Lily. This is Lily Reginald. Lily, I don’t know if you’re in a relationship right now, but what I will say, I am married, but a side piece for food is something I will definitely be able to talk to my husband about. Uh, Lily has a fiance. His name is Alex. He’s very lovely, but if him and Tim can play video games together while you and Lily are cooking, I get it. Anyways. Kelly, I wanted to ask you a little bit about, about music. You have been inspired by so many genres. Your first album, simply Deep, you had a lot of alt rock inspiration in there, and then of course you had your collab with David gta that went. Platinum in like nine different countries. Top 10 in 50. 22, but who’s counting? What are you currently inspired by right now, and when are we going to see new music? Okay. As far as music is concerned, like what I’m listening to? It would have to be the likes of like, Victoria Monet. Of course. Um, it would also be Snow Allegra, Anita Baker. I mean, it’s always Anita Baker. Always shut A. My, my, um, playlist is kind of old school right now. It’s like old school and jazz and R& B. Because I remember dancing in college to When Love Takes Over. And, you know, we’re out there, glow sticks, everything. But are there any, like, cross genres? Genre collabs that you would want to do in the future like a whole new genre out there that you’re like a whole new genre I mean, I have so much fun with dance. I really do I it’s just so alive You know what? I mean, it’s so live and when you’re actually doing the record you can I know it sounds crazy But I can actually like see People’s memories sometimes like the way like they look when they sing It’s like everything’s attached to a memory when you see someone live, at least for me it is. And I can’t help but to feel like everyone feels that way. So as I am, um, performing the song, sometimes I just put the mic down and just start skipping around the damn stage. I just get so excited. But I think that that’s what music does. It should create this, like, really beautiful, euphoric space that just makes everybody feel like, just for the moment, you don’t have to worry about anything. And someone actually, like, connects with you and other people around you connect with you on this space and level that, you know, Can only be defined in this moment. It’s pretty dope. Kelly, for course number three, we have the infinitely refillable pineapple margarita. We don’t know where it comes from, but the glass stays full. Yes, we love that. And then we have the A5 Wagyu. So this is a, uh, olive fed Wagyu that we got imported from the Kagoshima Prefecture of Japan. Sliced it thin, seared it as hot as possible, should be cooked about medium, medium well, get that intramuscular fat render down and then some pump puree, good old fancy mashed potatoes, tons of butter. Please dig in and tell me all about the eight year olds that you’re eating A5 Wagyu with. I’m sorry, I don’t know why that was so funny. It’s hilarious. It’s so funny. So we um, take the kids to um, Have like a weekend in New York City for Christmas. Like Christmas is always so magical. They also love home alone too. So in the spirit of that, we basically take them there. And so we take them to one of these restaurants. It’s one of my favorite Korean, like barbecue spots called Kote. So we go there and they have all of their food. all these different, you know, styles of, uh, and cuts of beef that you can order. So we decide to like have the kids try everything. We didn’t know, I didn’t know that an eight year old would be able to school me on what an A5 Wagyu steak is. And all of a sudden, you know, sure enough, I’m like, Oh, this one is still, Oh, this one’s Oh, this one is even better than the last one. And Connor jumps up and goes, that’s the A5 Ms. Kelly. I was like. What? So he’s like, A5! And I was, such one of the other moms that was with me, I was like, A5? She was like, it’s a cut of steak. I was like, oh, wow, he knew way more than me in this moment. If that little kid needs an internship, tell him to come on down, because I’m impressed. Connor, I’m impressed. I recognize your game out there. Ooh, ooh, ooh. My God. That is so good. So A5 is like the highest grade, not to school Connor, but A5 is the highest grade, and there tend to be like. You can get A4, it’s priced differently, it all has to do with the intramuscular fat and marbling. But the actual Wagyu cow, I’m literally just rambling so she can eat, because this is how the show goes. The actual Wagyu breed of cow, they stopped importing into America in the 1980s so they could protect the Japanese industry. So if you ever see a ground Wagyu burger for 12 bucks, you’re getting scammed. No, one more time, one more time, one more time, one more time, one more time. I’m just so happy. I am so happy! This is so good. No, I feel bad if I’m about to ask depressing questions. No. That’s how the show goes. No, you know, go ahead, ask away. The food is bringing me joy. So your mom, growing up, she nannied for other families. Mm hmm. And you would talk about, you didn’t grow up with much, and you would see all the things that other people had. I believe the first perfume that you bought with your own money is a perfume from somebody else’s house that you saw. Mm hmm. Has the shine of luxury, Worn out at all? Or do you still really enjoy the finer things? Um, you know, you, you have to, I like to know what I’m getting or know what I’m buying. Like a finer thing to me is investing in art. I love art. It’s like a part of, you know, the thread of who I am, to be honest. You know what I mean? When you walk into my house, all you see is art. I’m so grateful to Tina Knowles and, and Swiss Beats for showing me this beautiful space to be able to express yourself and be creative. And it’s, you know, in your home. It’s like there’s this beautiful, um, Robert Pruitt, uh, piece on my stairwell. And it’s, uh, actually a gift from my mama T. And there’s a beautiful woman in a grass skirt, and she’s holding this grenade in the back of her back. I was like, and I said, I’m gonna put it down the stairwell. I said, because if somebody come at me wrong today, they ain’t gonna get this grenade. But it’s like, like all of my art speaks to me in such different ways. You know what I mean? And that’s a finer thing in life and, and I appreciate that. And, um, it was also something that I work hard to get. I think that’s another thing, you know, everything looks so quick, you know, on social media and everything. And I think that when you actually work hard for it and you appreciate it, you know, it’s, um, that moment is the most important moment. Like that’s your hard work hanging on the wall. How do you prevent your children from sort of growing up with that amount of privilege and taking things for granted? You know, we make it a point to like, Definitely talk to Titan because, um, you know, it was, it was so funny. Like, I think at one point in time, everything, it’s good. You had to do a dance. You got me dancing. This can’t be the TikTok. I know you’re going to try and clip this out of TikTok of me looking like Shaq. You know, Shaq and the cat meme when he’s just doing this. But it was so cute because you took your body. You said, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. It was like a whole moment. So cute. Oh. But um, it is, it is, the thing is, is that it’s uh, it’s, it’s work to do that. You know what I mean? And it’s not hard work because I always remind Titan of my beginnings. And when I remind him of my beginning, I don’t like to do it like too much because I remember somebody said don’t do that Did you don’t want to make him feel bad? Yes, exactly. And um, I do Have these moments where I’m you know allowing him to express himself and then he has to like tone if his tone gets too like That’s, that’s on the verge of disrespect and I have to check it. Yeah. I think everything is up for a discussion. You know what I mean? And I like to be able to create this space of communication with my son. I think when I was growing up, that was a luxury. I didn’t realize how a luxury is communicating with your kid. I didn’t have a space to like, really like, have this moment with my mom. Is there an element of, you know, healing the past you in your own parenting now? Yes, that’s a beautiful question. Absolutely. I said that because you know when the, I remember one of the things I was so nervous about in being a parent was um, my patience because I ain’t have none. And I mean it just like that. I ain’t have none. Um, I was really scared because my mom is as great as she blessed me with her space in motherhood. I would like to think. That my experience was one where it was definitely different than how it is now. So, um, yeah, I think that, like, I just wanted to make things so different for my kids. Like, do you ever have moments where you’re like, I’m trying to make things so different deliberately that I’m swinging to the other side? Yes. And I realize it and I have to check it quickly because I realize how much, How much I’ve kind of messed this part up, so I need to fix it. Do you know what I mean? Of course. And I remember, like, I told him I used to get spankings. He was like, Oh, so your mom, this is how he broke it down. I promise. He says, so your mom gave you spanking. So do you think it’s okay to spank me? Correct. And I said, Oh, Shit. It’s like, this one is way too emotionally intelligent. Like, this school is so much money, and I’m paying for them to have my child check me at home. I don’t know how I feel about this right now. But, he is emotionally intelligent. He knows when he goes too far. Um, he comes back and we talk about it beautifully. Do you still find yourself? Repeating certain things and immediately clock it like oh, no that was from my mom. Yes Um, like I remember somebody told me about set Self regulation actually my therapist told me about self regulation. It’s trying to figure out how to communicate with this younger person whose brain isn’t fully, you know what I mean? Developed. And when she told it to me like that, I understood because we kind of expect when we’re growing up, like, I think that it’s just natural to think, like, you should just understand what I’m saying, but they don’t. They’re nine, you know, they’re in a nine. A nine year old body. They’re, they’re, they deserve a, a very self regulated and able to communicate with them. And even when they lose it, I’m still calm to meet them so that they can come back to where I am. And it has been working like a charm, so I’m happy. Hell yeah. Got a little Wagyu eating babies out here. Uh, I’m gonna start, when I have kids, I’m gonna start calling you for parenting advice. You can. You can. I’m learning as I go. You know, I’m still learning, so. You ready to get dessert? Yes. Let’s do it. Yes! Kelly, for your final course of your last meal, we have the peach cobbler, this is made proper southern style, with the cobbler batter underneath, peaches on top, then baked. We have the chocolate peanut butter pie, a little bit of flaky Maldon salt, fully homemade, with a chocolate crumb crust, and then of course, a chocolate layer cake in, it is your birthday in, Two days from when we are filming now, so we gave you a little candle. Thank you. And this is kind of ironic, but who sings happy birthday to a professional singer? Should we, should we all? I think we should all do it. Yes. Everyone? All right. Happy birthday to you. Me. Happy birthday to you. Me. Happy birthday dear Kelly. Thank you. Happy birthday to you. Can we auto? Thank you. Can we auto tune that or, yeah. No, you know, I think it’s great. Very authentic. It’s great. Thank you all. I got my wish though. I’m eating and I’m happy. I’m full of joy and gratitude. Tell me about the desserts. I know you love chocolate and peanut butter. I’ve seen you make a chocolate peanut butter martini on Instagram. My love for chocolate and peanut butter actually started with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. And I remember looking at the recipe on foodnetwork. com like years ago. And I tried it at home and I remember taking it to the studio and everybody killed it. I actually recently took it to a studio session and the producer loved it for sure. It Um, and then Peach Cobbler just reminds me of home. Peaches, Atlanta. I think about, um, you know, my, my time and my, the city that borned me, you know, Atlanta, Georgia borned me and I’m just the only other person I know that makes Peach Cobbler and it feels like it’s giving me a hug. Her name is Angela Beyonce. She is a sister of mine and also an actress and just a brilliant person overall. And then Chocolate Cake, I think. I’m chocolate. I’m sorry. But I’m chocolate and I love cake. Yeah, I just, I, these are my favorite desserts. I love chocolate. I do. Where the hell did these come from? Oh my god, what happened? Who knows, well. We must have forgotten to drink the last round. Maybe. This is really, I mean this is proper. Oh my god. There’s not even a song that sums this up right now. Kelly, I think you and I gotta write the duet. Right now. Right now. No matter, no. I can just do the, Ah! I’ll just, I’ll be that. I’ll be the backing vocals. Ah! But I’m gonna do that every time. I wanna ask you about the concept of chosen family. Because your family obviously means a lot to you, and you’re very close with Noel’s family. I mean, Tina walked you down the aisle Yes. But you also reconnected with your father after you hadn’t seen him for 30 years because you said having that legacy and that connection is really important. Why is that as opposed to like the chosen family? Your family serves you in so many ways. You know what I mean? I’m so grateful to Tina and her girls. You know, I’m, I’m speaking of, uh, B and Solange and Angie in particular and the way they’ve given me a sense of sisterhood Is one that I’ve learned through and they’ve loved me through that and Learning and life like how crazy that we’ve all known each other. You know what I mean? The public always goes to of course Um phoebe, but like for salange and angie like, you know, we Have grown up together and live life together and and had children together become aunts together and moms together Like that’s a real blessing and to be able to Have them as my as my family even though the only thing that separates us is blood It’s just a blessing and Tina being right there by my side my mama T During both of my childbirth and walking down the aisle, some of the most pivotal moments of my life, even when I had to lay my mother to rest, that was, like, I can’t imagine life without them, and I’m so grateful to them for that, because whether it was joy or sadness, we experienced it together, and it makes the relationship so much richer. Yeah. And I’m grateful for that. And my father, I mean, this is so new as it’s so funny because I remember calling a friend of mine who was a therapist and it was my fifth day of knowing my dad and I’ll never forget. I was like, before he calls, I have like strange butterflies. And I was like, like when you’re dating someone, he was like, well, that’s the actual feeling that you’re supposed to feel when you’re three. You know what I mean? Yeah. So he broke it down for me in a psychological space and how, what, how, and what I was supposed to be thinking and feeling and experiencing if he were there. And I’m experiencing all these things now. And I, it’s just a blessing. I love my dad. And he’s just. Really great, sweet man. And I’m sure being a parent now, being able to forgive your father is now giving you that grace that, Oh, no matter what I do, my child can forgive. When I actually broke it down for my son, because I had to explain it to him, You know what I mean? It was Yeah, who’s this new guy? Right! This guy just showed up to my birthday party. Who is he? That’s actually what happened. Really? I’m not joking. I’m not joking at all. So I told him, I said, I was like, so I had to talk with him. I said, you’re going to meet your granddad. I was like, I’m just meeting my dad. He’s like, how are you just meeting your dad? And so he’s sitting there and I said, but you’ll see him today. So I am, I’m having this whole moment of Titan. This is your granddad. And I’m looking at my dad. He goes, hi. He goes back to play with his buddies. You know what I mean? And it was so, I was like, Oh, I should actually treat it like that. You know what I mean? And just take it like one step at a time. I’m still so grateful to, um, My big brother, um, who said, you got to jump, you know what I mean? If, if you want this and he’s, he’s showing you that he wants the relationship, you got to jump. And my husband has been so supportive. And he’s always asking like, you know, how’s your dad? You check on your dad. Like it’s, it’s, I’m just, my whole circle was just so like, let’s do it. Yeah. That is a beautiful story and a beautiful pie. This chocolate peanut butter pie. It’s so delightful. Mm hmm. This has been a beautiful meal overall. Kelly, you ready to get in the lightning round? Let’s do the lightning round. You can keep it with a salt on that. All right. Who’s the one person dead or alive you’d want to share your actual last meal with? Oh, my husband. What song do you want to be played at your funeral? Uh, it can’t be yours. It can’t be mine? I don’t know. Well, it can’t be yours. Now I’m interested. Are you ready for this one? Sure am. Back that thing up, I do not. Yes! And Kelly, I’m gonna be there backing that thing up. Because I want them to laugh. Like we, like, you know what I mean? I know that my moments with people were like fun and joyful. So I’m like, I want them to be like, now why does Heffa decide to play back that up? You know what I mean? I want them to laugh. You said if you didn’t become a singer, you would have been a psychoanalyst. Who’s the one person you’d want to sit down with and psychoanalyze? Mmm. One would be. Stevie Wonder. Mm hmm. The other one would be my son. The only reason why is because, like, I think, but I’m talking about the little one. Cause he can’t, like, really, like, voice everything right now. And he’s the closest thing you have to, like, being super, super small. So, like, a baby. Wow. You know what I mean? Like, I wonder what the, the innocence and, like, everything about that is just, like, wow. You don’t know what’s gonna happen. And you don’t pay not one bill. So just like the whole freedom. But the freedom of being a baby is just like, I bet you that’s like floating. Who would win in an arm wrestling match? You or Beyonce? I have to say me. I’ll say if you want to test it out. You don’t have to. I’m just like, if you want to like, if you want to lock up. You know, hold on, hold on. Try it. I’ll ask the next one. I’ll ask the next one. Alright, somebody give us a count. I’ll Three, two, one. What’s your greatest regret in life? I’m sorry, are you there? Kelly, greatest regret, what you got? Don’t take it light on me! Oh god! Wait, no, you’re okay. No, you got it though, you got it though. He was being nice. I don’t appreciate that. I could’ve taken you. I gotta, I gotta rotate a cup in here. I could’ve got you. It’s okay. We’ll, we’ll deal with it at the end of it. Okay. Oh, what’s your greatest regret in life? My greatest regret in life? I feel like I should’ve trusted him. That’s the one regret I have. I wish I would’ve trusted myself a lot more in my 20s. So I encourage all of you 20 year olds, with greatness and dreams and goals inside of you, write them all down, plan it out, and And tell everyone who doesn’t believe in it to go f k themselves. Hell yes. F k I’m talking about. Kelly Rowland, everybody. Finally, are you happy? Yes! Goddamn right you are. Yes, I am. I’m so grateful. I’m so happy. Gratitude. Gratitude. Every day. I’m incredibly grateful. Everybody, check out Mia Coppa on Netflix. Kelly Rowland producing and starring. Kelly, if you want to deliver your last words to that camera right there. Oh my gosh. Please go check out Mia Coppa. It is such. A fly, sexy, erotic thriller you don’t want to miss. You should have your girlfriends come up and y’all should post up and y’all should have the same meal. I’m just saying. The official cross collab vehicle for last meal. And have pineapple margaritas. The unofficial drink of vehicle with Kelly for real. This is an incredible conversation, incredible meal. Thank you so much for coming. You too, thank you so much. And thank you so much for stopping by Mythical Kitchen. We got new videos every week. You know the deal. See y’all next time. All right, now for real. Now for real. Now for real, we’re clearing it out. We’re clearing it out. Get the salt out, cause I was slipping on the salt. You weren’t slipping on the salt, you were taking it easy for me. I was slipping on the salt. You weren’t Okay. Three. Oh, I got hair in my mouth. I’m not going to be able to fight. I thought you were taking off your earrings. I was like, oh shit. Two. One. Go. He’s got to turn the wrist. Oh my god. I’m so sorry. I thought I hurt you. I thought I hurt you. I’m so sorry. Okay. Me and my pride will leave stage. I’m Hank Green, and my last meal would be avocado boba tea in a sweet bean bun, a catfished po’boy in a Sazerac, a fancy corndog with chipotle mayo, Lasagna, black tea, candied salmon, a warm chocolate chip cookie, and a coffee peanut butter milkshake for dessert. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all got to eat and we’re all gonna die. Today we’re joined by science communicator, novelist, sock connoisseur, and prolific pisser of cancer, Hank Green, welcome to the show. It’s a pleasure to be here. Thank you very much. I’m very excited about food right now. I am excited that you’re excited. You’re like co star to the food. I hope you know. Not even co star, I’m like merely the usher just shoveling the food towards you and getting the scraps as I can. Food usher, yes. Um, I feel like there’s an elephant in the room that we have to address, which is the title of the video. Uh huh. That many people are going to think that you are dying. I’m not. No, I assume they get the format, but I don’t know. Um, but you’re currently only dying about as much as I’m dying. Theoretically. That’s the idea. Which one of us do you think is currently dying more? Me, for sure. I assume your body. The insides are rotten, the outside of the apple is great and you take a bite and it is just completely molded. Okay, I believe you. Yeah, no, I mean, the, where I’m at right now is, uh, I’ve been in remission for about this long. Uh, and that’s great, and basically they call you cured at five years, so I got a while before I can, like, have the big, biggest celebration, but it’s pretty unlikely that it will come back. Have you ever thought about your last meal before? You don’t know. Not until, I mean, not until I thought, Oh, I could probably, maybe I could be on that show. And then I was thinking a lot about it. Um, this is a stupid question. How much have you thought about death? Oh, a bunch now. Yeah, I’ve thought about, you know, through, I’ve thought about it very abstractly for a long time, and I was like, here’s probably what it’s gonna feel like if I have to confront that, and I was totally wrong. Uh, if you have a chance to confront your mortality, I suggest don’t do it if you can’t avoid it. It’s just, yeah, it’s like, it’s a whole set of things. But I definitely learned stuff about myself that I didn’t know and that are definitely true. And that’s good to know true things, but I don’t know. I feel like I could’ve learned them a little later. Okay. It’s a lot, yeah. There were, early on in the process, before we knew what kind of cancer I had, there were some times when I, I, It was like, you know, there’s like a shocking number of practicalities to it. Um, so it was sort of thinking about that stuff, and then also like, Finding out what I actually feel like I’m gonna miss out on, which I was at the, you know, I’m like a science guy. Before I was sick, I was like, I’m gonna, like, it’d suck if I died before there were people on Mars. Like, I won’t get to see what AI does, you know, see our weird robot apocalypse future, whatever it is. But that didn’t bother me at all when I was actually thinking about maybe dying. I was, it was all family and friend stuff. You ready to eat? Oh yeah! Let’s do it, let’s get into it! This is gonna be a big sign curve here. But I will absolutely eat food. All right Hank, for the first course of your last meal, we have sweet red bean buns. Uh, these are actually from a spot called IXLB Dim Sum Eats. Fantastic. They make them better than we could at home. And then we have made our own avocado milk tea boba. Uh, tell me about it. How’d this end up on your last meal? The first time I ever had boba tea, I was on tour. It was like the first time I ever like performed music on tour with a band. And like, that’s such a weird thing to get to do in your life. People in my band, like the folks who, uh, and they’d been touring musicians for a long time, and so they’d been all over America, and they’d done, like, like, when you’re touring, you, like, just, like, it’s very good to get a moment where you stop and enjoy something, and so they knew all these weird places to go eat, and we stopped at this, literally, Like, you could say hole in the wall, but it wasn’t like a crappy place, but it was a hole in the wall. Like, it was like you walked up to a counter that was downtown, and like, you could not go inside. So you, uh, and they like had banh mi sandwiches and boba tea, and I was like, I want to get a weird, like, what’s the weirdest boba flavor I could get? And it was avocado. That’s incredible. Please, dig in. Okay! Yes, and I also have a bean paste story. Well, what is that called? Have some decorum, Hank. Oh my gosh. That’s better than Chicago, oh and the guac. And you get that little, if you think about it, you’re like, ooh, is that guac on the back of my palate? Uh, tell me about your red bean story. Well, I grew up in Orlando, Florida, uh, where there’s a lot of, uh, Just a large Asian population and and me and my friends would go to like weird Little restaurants and and order things that we wouldn’t normally eat because it was like let’s try to be different in the world Let’s try it. Let’s see what the world is like when you’re not just eating, you know, meatloaf and mashed potatoes and Bean, bean isn’t dessert is the thought, you know, and you’re like, okay I’ll try bean dessert and and I was making my own choices and I was like seeing the world and Having control over it and agency and like being able to explore You That’s incredible. Please, uh, dig in. I love that I just get to eat food. They’re so soft. Where does that innate sense of curiosity come from? I don’t think I was born that way, man. I think we all are. What do you think quashes it within people? I think that that’s the big thing. People often ask me, like, how do you, like, help a kid get into science? And I’m like, you listen when they ask. And instead of saying, I don’t know, you say, like, let’s find out. You know, like, let’s go through the process together, because I don’t know either. Or, if, even if you do think you know, like, to like, show the child the process of like, exploring. Even if it’s just like, on Wikipedia, you know? You know, I’m at the age where I’m like, thinking about having kids, and I’m incredibly scared of having kids, because I think that anything I try and model for them, they’re going to completely rebel against. You don’t know. And here’s the thing, my dad was so good at this. Um, That like, whatever I was up to, he was like, That’s probably interesting, so I should check it out too. Especially even if he’d never been exposed to it. You know, like suddenly my dad’s a Nine Inch Nails fan, you know? And he’s like, this is actually some really interesting music. I’m like, that’s not what it’s about, dad! You’re not supposed to be into this! I’m supposed to be not like, I mean, you’re supposed to hate it so I can like it! Trent Reznor’s mine, dad! He’s my best friend, you can’t have him! What’s the best part of having cancer? Um, people do stuff for you. That sounds rad. Uh, and they have to or they’re a bad person. When I think of Hank Green, I think of weaponizing guilt, so this is very much on brand for you. No, it’s like, it’s not It’s good. Like it, I think that people want to do stuff for, for you when you need help. Mm-hmm . And so it’s good to like have a moment where you know you need help. We don’t need to be seriously ill to ask for a favor from a friend. Right? Like, let’s have that be our world. Like, if you ask for a favor from somebody, they come over and bring you a latte that you can’t go get yourself, then you just have a latte with a friend. It’s not like, it’s not like they’re like, oh boy, I had to do that. It’s like, oh, we’re like, I’m having a pleasant time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just, like, put them on the calendar, even if they don’t know it. Just, like, four days from now, just say, like, Oh, I’m gonna text this person this day, or I’m gonna, like, be in their neighborhood and text and say, Hey, I’m nearby. Do you want anything? Or Because if you don’t put it on the calendar, there’s, uh, you know, there’s a million things you have to figure out how to decide. You have to figure out how to prioritize the things that really matter. But, like, when the world is sort of, like, bombarding you with distractions, you end up forgetting to. I imagine a lot of people, um, have given you praise for, quote, remaining positive in the face of your diagnosis. Oh, wow. Uh, and one of my favorite art pieces, this is going somewhere, but you gotta sit for a second, is René Magritte’s Treachery of Images. C’est si né pas un peep. It’s a picture of a pipe, but he’s saying You can’t smoke it, you can’t stuff it, there’s nothing in common with the pipe, it’s merely an image. It’s kind of the way that I have digested a lot of YouTubers specifically. This is a representation of a person that’s curated and it can’t possibly see the whole picture of that. Um, and of course I recognize the paradox of all of these cameras. Thank you Cam Ops. They’re cameras? Dylan, you’re the best. You’re my number one Cam Op in the whole group. Taylor, watch your ass. Uh, anyways, I recognize the paradox, but like, Behind the scenes after you turn the camera off. What were your real emotions? Were they similar to on camera? I’ve always had comfort in the feeling that like what I show people is me, but it’s not all of me Sure, so like yeah, I was like that sometimes and sometimes it wasn’t you know being sick like is bad, because it hurts. Like, it is physically uncomfortable. And the not knowing when it’s gonna end, or not knowing if it’s normal, so there’s like a fear component to it. Whereas like, the existential stuff, like, I was completely unpredictable, and I didn’t know when it was gonna hit and not hit. And like, there were absolutely times where I was just like, living my life, having a good time, and I felt, but I like, felt bad. And that made it kind of hard. But then there were times when I was feeling okay, but like, the, brain parts were making it so that I couldn’t have a good time. And so, like, even in the times when I felt, uh, physically really horrible, there were times when There were laughs, you know. I, uh, I remember during your initial video that I have cancer, uh, you made a joke that actually made me tear up, that was, watching the medical system move so quickly was disconcerting. It was like seeing a horse with hands and Hank a single tear drop down my hardened little cheek on that moment. So the positivity, um, it was genuinely inspirational. Yeah, and it was weird. It was like, wait, it’s been three days and I’ve had, like, twelve doctor’s appointments. Twilight Zone episode. Something is amiss. Something is wrong. There’s something on the plane. On the way to the plane. Everybody’s saying that it might not be cancer, but they’re acting like it is. You ready for course number two? I’m ready for course number two. Let’s do it. Alright. Hank, for course number two. We have a fried catfish po’boy. Catfish has been marinated in buttermilk, a little bit of hot sauce, Tony Chachere’s seasoning. Overnight, a little bit of remoulade spread on the po’boy roll. This is taken from a New Orleans bakery called Orleans, New York. They do great work. A little bit of shredded tomato on there. And then we have a classic. Sazerac cocktail. This is made with Sazerac rye whiskey, a rinse of Pernod absinthe, a lemon twist, and then some Peychaud’s bitters to round it all out. Yeah. Yeah, this is exciting. I love this stuff, man. Yeah, I mean, I don’t feel like it’s super traditional. Like, they’re both New Orleans dishes, but I don’t know if they generally go together. But hell, I mean, I will do it. I found everything goes together in New Orleans, which is great. Yeah, yeah. I don’t drink a lot, uh, at all, and I drink less now. But like, it’s the closest thing you have to like a magic potion. Like somebody making a, like a real weird cocktail. I love that. And I love liquids. I I expected more words sometimes more words come after a word but not that time. I like I love I love I like I love juice. I love Coca Cola. I love Boba tea. I love tea. I love coffee like I don’t know if we think about it. But like this it’s kind of a it’s kind of a weird things most of those things don’t have a lot of nutrition in them or any nutrition. They have Food, like there’s sugar. It just seems very human to me. And I feel similarly about sauces, which is a big deal with a po boy. And a sauce is kind of like, uh, it’s kind of like a drink you put on food. What did I say right when the cameras turned off? I said if I have a liquid next to a solid, I need to see if they interact. I just want to put them in the thing. I want to French dip that catfish po boy into that Sazerac. Cheers. Let’s not do it. I think this is where I draw the line. Oh, hell yeah. Mm hmm. It does taste like magic. It does taste like magic. Uh, take it to the phone, it’s getting cold. It’s getting cold. Oh, oh, God. That bread is so crunchy. Mm hmm. Where’s that from? Orleans, New York bakery. So it’s a proper, like, New Orleans style French loaf? It’s perfect. That’s really nice. You made a video making elf spaghetti and talking about death, which, for me, is kind of the full circle of the You want to explain what elf spaghetti is? Oh, please. Elf spaghetti, uh, Will Ferrell in the movie Elf, This is ideal spaghetti, which I believe is just a pile of noodles not finished in the sauce Which is my only problem with it covered in I believe it was like marshmallows M& Ms chocolate sauce caramel sauce and then finished with maple syrup on top as if it were a fine pecorino romano And you made that and then you were amusing on death you said a quote that meant a lot to me You said, I realized I very much wanted to be alive for as long as possible, if only because things are interesting and I wanted to keep seeing them. Is that about as close as we can get to finding a meaning of life? And then he goes for more po boy. He’s just like, what’s the meaning of life, Hank? Oh, it helps, it helps the, it helps the existentialism go down. Did you taste the Creole mustard in the remoulade? I do. I do also want a little hot sauce though. Wait, there’s some hot sauce, not yet. Just like the simplest cayenne if you can find it. Wait a couple, we have Tony Sashary’s hot sauce, we got, um, Red Rooster, no, bottom drawer. Oh wow, that’s too much. Yeah, Hank, you can also go pick your own. Yeah, big, big. The red cap on the far left, uh, right in the front. Wait, oh, there’s Crystal, Crystal. Yeah. No, not though. Oh, this one’s fun though. This is, no, bring it, bring it, bring it. Thank you. Um, but also, wait, go back, go back. Have you had this? No, I haven’t. So this is, uh, made from the datil pepper, which they say is the oldest pepper grown in the Americas. No, no, no, yeah, can you, can you go back? No, no, no, can you, can you open the fridge again? There’s a bottle of Crystal. It’s actually on the second drawer next to the pickles. Yeah, it’s the second one up. I think it might be unopened. We get a virgin bottle of Crystal, which is great. That’s tasty, very sweet. Yeah, right? So you know what I’m saying, is that far from Orlando? It’s Florida. Like, it’s like, I don’t know. It’s a drive. Yeah, it’s like in this. This. This. Mm hmm. This. Wait, can you pass me the other one though? Yeah. Thank you. So, I think you and I have a very similar relationship to sauce. Yeah, that’s exactly. Wait, no, come on, come on. Stop over arting the sauce. You were saying, uh, no, no, eat, eat, eat. Manja, manja, manja. Right? Yeah. Yeah, there it is. Um, what did I say about life? Oh, it’s just me. It’s just, it’s just me. Like, I Like what I, when I was sick and I was trying to like, you know, just do something, you’re bored because you feel so bad that like, I, I felt like I was still good at my job, which was like telling people about how the world is weird. And then I was still good at the part where it was like trying to figure out why the world is weird. And you can look too hard, I think sometimes, but if you look too hard, it can become a problem. Uh, and so like to just like listen to your brain being like, yeah, I like that and it’s like what’s unhealthy about this? Like if it’s, you know, having six Sazeracs a day, like that’s not good. Uh, but if it’s like just being super interested in like how, how like Red Panda’s work? I’m, uh, there’s nothing bad about that. Like, I’m, like, only good is happening as I’m figuring that out or consuming that content. When you got diagnosed, one of your fears was cancer taking over your identity. You were now going to be known as Anxiety Sickness Guy as opposed to Fun Goofy Science Guy. Do you still think there’s time to pivot your identity to Number one Dave Matthews hater. How do you know how I feel about Dave Matthews? What’s the worst thing you’ve ever said about Dave Matthews? Dave deserves to know. Probably not something, probably pretty mean. When I was in high school, the people that didn’t like me liked Dave Matthews. So it didn’t have anything to do with Dave. You know, high school’s tough. And we all find our identities. Those people found their identity in Dave Matthews and hating me. So I found my identity in hating Dave Matthews and them. Uh, no, the reason I know that, do you know the reason I know that? Do you know the piece of media? It was the first piece of media that I ever heard you on. Oh, wow. It was a podcast, uh, called Conversations with People Who Hate Me. Oh, yeah! Dylan Maron, where there was a, uh, person who had commented, I hate Hank Green, and then they got them on the line with you to explain why. Yeah, absolutely wild. That meant a lot to me. I had just started out on YouTube, and I had just started receiving abuse. Sure. Sure. Um, and so, your interaction there, showing your empathy and general goodness and also showing empathy for the person who said that they hate you, Yeah. meant a lot to me. It really helps. Like, they’re, like, we just need to engage in activities that turn the temperature down. Mm. They don’t think I’m gonna see it, but you see it. You see it. You see a lot more. Dave Matthews never saw it. Like, what we said about Dave Matthews and the privacy of my friend’s home, did not, had no chance of escaping. to reach Dave. And now, easy peasy, just make it a TikTok and it’s gonna hit him. It would hit him faster than the 800 pounds of human feces coming out of his tour bus hit those people in that Chicago River cruise, am I right? Yeah, I remember that. That’s, that’s a thing that happened. I didn’t have that planned to say, I just remembered that that was the thing that happened. And now we’re here. Now we’re here. I think Dave Matthews is great. Dave, if you’re watching, you should come on the show. It’s not my show. Hank is going to host the next episode and cook. You have a lovely soup. Yeah, whatever it is, I bet Dave Matthews would love this. I know Dave Matthews would love this. But that’s not what the question was. Oh, before I even mentioned Dave Matthews. You’re right. Your identity as, uh, Cancer guy as opposed to fun, goofy science guy. Yeah, what I realized really quick is I was like, actually I do want to be the cancer guy. I like, like, but I could be the fun, goofy science cancer guy, whereas like, what’s cancer? And how does cancer treatment work? And what’s happened? Like, I’m the story now. It’s cancer, like, science is happening in me right now. And then cancer treatment was a, uh, like, science happening in my body. And, and like, being, you know, Me, I was able to like, look at the history of the treatments I was taking, understand where they came from, how, like, why, you know, like, Why I was doing the treatments I was doing as opposed to what I would do if my treatments weren’t working or if I was Having adverse effects to them like understanding the different paths that people who have my particular cancer take Understanding that cancers are all very different from each other Understanding how chemotherapy works how radiation works Like how do they decide how much chemo to give you? And in some ways I’m like a great patient, in some ways I’m a nightmare patient, because I’m like, Doctor, I don’t know if I feel good about the statistical analysis in the German Hopkins study group study, uh, because they There’s no statistical difference between this and this, or this and this, but they didn’t test whether there’s a statistical difference between this and this. And he’s like, yeah, no, that’s true. Deal with it or not. Um, when I first found out about your diagnosis, my first little intrusive thought was just, Oh, this is the best guy to get cancer for that exact reason that I know your curiosity and your ability to communicate Being curious like it’s I don’t think it’s for everybody but being curious about it was actually really helpful to me Yeah, and I have some other friends. I have a friend who is also does science YouTube videos who? Went through his own cancer journey a few years ago. So it was very nice to have him and as a friend He said the same thing. He was like just like getting a chance to You know, have a really good reason to do really in depth research on a really interesting topic. It’s cool. And I’m like, okay, I mean, I guess. It’s kind of terrifying, but I’m glad it’s also cool. Hank, for your next course, we have quote unquote fancy corndog. Yeah. This is a Wagyu beef hot dog from Snake River Farms. My favorite hot dog on the planet. And then, we have wrapped that in a cornmeal batter with a little bit of truffle honey and a little bit of saffron in there. Uh, and then double fried it, served with a chipotle mayo from scratch, of course. And then we have Double fried is how hot corndogs work! It yeah! It’s how you gotta do it! That’s how you gotta do it! You gotta set it, and then it rests, and then you get that extra, uh, crispy coating on top, a little bit of moisture seeps out of there. Yeah. Gotta do it. And then we have lasagna with, quote, lots of layers. Yeah! Uh, we fit eleven in there, which I hope constitutes a lot. That’s more than eleven. I’m looking at it. That’s, like, I don’t know, count, boy. One, two, three! No, I think you’re seeing fractures of noodles. Uh, you know what’s funny? Lily told me it was 11. Lily made this lasagna, and it looks great. She told me it was 11, and then I said, I’m gonna forget that, and I’m just gonna tell Hank a random number, and surely he’s not gonna count. And here we are. I’m at 11, and I’m halfway down. I’m counting pastas. Counting pastkas in a vertical pasticles in a vertical slice. This is Hank, this is 11. What are you seeing? What are you seeing? Look at mine. Look over here. No, that’s noodle fracture. You’re seeing noodle fracture. You gotta look at the corners. This is One, two 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Oh, wait, hold on. Can we pause here? Can we pause at layer 7 and 8 right there? So what this actually is, is just a little bit of sli It’s like a, um, What’s it called when tectonic plates slide over each other? Uh, s subduction? Subduction. These are two noodles that have Subducted, because if you think about it, you layer lasagna with the noodles flush against each other, they absorb water. One’s gonna subduct onto the other. So if you look at the corners, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 noodles, and then one is hiding under the sauce. 8, 9, 10. You’re right. Alright, cool. Well, hey, dig in. Science happened, though. Science happened to the lasagna. First time I ever had a meal that I was like, Oh. Like, this is what, this is what it’s all about. I was in Italy, I had lasagna at this little trattoria that you had to like walk downstairs to get into and it had like six tables. And I was like, oh. What have I been doing my whole life? Did it have a lot of layers? Did it have 11 or 12? It didn’t actually have a lot of layers, but I love a lot of layers. Same. This is the Americanization of it. It’s like, build it bigger! God, this is my ideal. Uh, what’s behind the corn dog? Oh, I just love corn dogs. I think that, like, you hear it, first of all, amazing brand, right? Corn dog? Corn dog! It just rolls right off the mallet, you know what I mean? We have a thing in Missoula, I don’t know where, Have you ever heard of a viking? No! It’s like a Beep ball corn dog? Like a long meatball, stick, corndog. I’ve never heard of this. Yeah. They deep fry the meat, the, wow. The cornbread, yeah. Eat the corndog, eat the corndog. I want to talk about more depressing things, but eat the corndog. Do you smell the saffron? That’s a ridiculous hot dog. And I just think that, ooh, it’s spicy. This is a food I’ve never experienced before. And then the hot dog is very special. This is just a special hot dog. It’s a special hot dog. I think in life we need special hot dogs. Oh, that batter is so good. You made a video about an essay that you wrote in 1990 for predicting what would happen in 2020. You made some ish good guesses. And you also thought that all diseases would be cured. We’d have alien technology et al. What are your predictions for 2050? Good question. Um, I think that you’ll, on any day of the year, you will be able to see as far as every other day in the year in Los Angeles. So if you’re in like a nice spot with a nice view, there won’t be smog here anymore. The vast majority of power will be generated by solar, wind, geothermal, with maybe a pretty big slice coming from nuclear of some sort, hopefully even some fusion maybe. I think in 2050, We will, they will definitely be back to the moon. I think people will still die of cancer, but I think way more people will die with cancer than die of cancer. Mm-hmm. One of the things about curing diseases is that every, everything you make better in terms of health, increases the rate of cancer. The main risk factor for cancer is age. Yep. So every time you, like, every time you create a new cancer treatment, you don’t. Like, decrease the number, the amount of cancer in the world. You probably increase the amount of cancer in the world. Because it means 40 year olds aren’t dying, and they’re living long enough to get cancer later. And You just, like, if you ever see somebody brag, I follow a lot of nutrition stuff, and people always say, Well, During this period where they didn’t eat meat, uh, nobody died of cancer, and then you look at tuberculosis rates, uh, in that, and it’s like, Well, that was clipping them pretty quick. Yeah. Um, so yeah. Yeah, they weren’t, weren’t getting up there. They didn’t have a chance to get cancer. Everybody should have a chance to get cancer. Yeah. You know? It’s, absolutely, like, I, yeah. Now there’s lots of problems to still solve, and like, the speed at which we do that is pretty slow. All very important, but, um, I am surprisingly optimistic about the, the like, like the future when you talk in that scale. Uh, it seems like people right now are maybe more scared than certainly that I’ve ever seen them in my lifetime, but it seems like even compared to previous generations, do you think that fear is warranted? I know that’s a loaded question. I think we know a lot. And I think we’re asked to care about everything sometimes, which I don’t think we should. Like, that’s a weird thing to say, like, you shouldn’t care about stuff, but you should care about stuff. But you should kind of pick. Yeah, yeah. Like, it’s like, the world’s very complicated and big, and to be like, I just don’t know what to do about the garbage patch. And the, and the ocean. I gotta know what to do with all these plastics in the ocean. I don’t know what that is and I’m not gonna. I mean, you can know what it is, but also know that if it’s a big deal, there are people working hard on it. Yeah. And if you want, you can figure out who those people are and you can learn about them and you can learn about that topic and get deeper. But if you just start out with the bad news and then you move straight from that to the other bad news and then the other bad news and then the other bad news, and you never look at the people who are working really hard to try and actually solve those problems, then all you’re doing is. Like being in a boxing ring with an unbeatable opponent. Yeah. And that, that sounds awful, right? It sounds awful to like be getting in a boxing ring with a professional boxer and being like, are you going to take it easy on me? And he’s like, no. Yeah. That’s what it feels like when my social media feed is like, would you like to see every single problem in a row? I don’t know if I’ve ever explained this to our audience, but I had a really powerful moment when I started working here. We were talking earlier, I used to work in journalism, and I wrote about a lot of the problems in agriculture and the food industry, of which there are many. I would write about the superbugs that could potentially take out our increasingly homogenized pig supply. They’re all Yorkshires! Bring on the Berkshires! But anyways, I would write about all this stuff constantly, and then I started working here. Which was, you know, mostly silly, silly joke jokes. And, um, I had a terrible mustache. And all the fans said, Your mustache is the worst thing in the world. And I said, Well, raise 5, 000 for No Kid Hungry and I’ll shave it live. And they raised that within 10 minutes. And we said, Ah, we already told No Kid Hungry it was a two week campaign. So we raised the We raised it to 10, 000. They did that in an hour. I said, 30, 000, I will get a lower back tattoo designed by Rhett and Link for No Kid I can pull it up. We got a mic back up. I’ll show you during the break. We’ll keep the cameras rolling. Um, but I raised 300, 000 meals through No Kid Hungry for underserved kids and that was more objectively than I ever did of five years of doom and gloom writing that only made people mad and I love journalists and it’s very, very important but. Never underestimate the simple joy of making people happy. The thing that holds the people, like, the world together is people, like, caring what they, like, other people think about them. And caring and being thoughtful and caring about what happens to other people and also themselves, like, we have to protect ourselves as well. And it’s eight billion people on a pretty big planet, but like, not that big. And we, it like, kinda works. Real estate agents would call it cozy. Quaint. It’s a fixer upper. A starter upper. And for your dessert course, we have a coffee peanut butter milkshake, a little bit of fresh cocoa nibs on top, we have old fashioned chocolate chip cookies, a little bit of malt on salt on the top, we have some Darjeeling black tea, Right here, and then we have salmon candy, and you said, I love a meat dessert. I do love a meat dessert. You’re implying that there is something called a meat dessert that is recognized by everybody, uh, in the general population. Well, you know what I mean. It’s dessert that’s made out of meat. No, it’s a meaningful term, but uh, it implies that there’s a prior knowledge of lots of meat desserts. Have you ever had orange chicken? Like, that’s meat dessert. Hank, have you been eating that after your entree? Yeah, you should! Like, it’s like a little donut with meat in the inside. Yeah, you’re not wrong, though, is the thing. Uh, but that’s a lot of the Panda Express menu. Half that’s dessert, though. Yeah, yeah. One of the first, like, fancy, fancy restaurants I ever went to was with my Like, uh, my mom’s side of the family. I don’t know why or where we even were, but we went out to this and it was like, uh, they got like a special room for us because there were so many of us and they put us all in there and then we ate food and at the end of the meal this fish came out for dessert. What? Yeah, and I like I was like that doesn’t make any sense and I put my fork in and I ate it and I was like that’s dessert. Like, I don’t know it’s not what I like if you don’t think it’s made out of protein but like it tastes like dessert. It was like flaky and soft and like extraordinarily candy. That’s incredible. Yeah, so I want to try some candied fish. Can I pour you some tea? Yes, please. Do you take sugar? I do. All right. Tell me about the tea. This is just your, your I just love tea. I drink, yeah, so I don’t drink coffee. I, I can’t handle the caffeine. I feel like tea has been a thing for so long there has been time to perfect it. That was one of the things, two things that were on my list that I cut were sweet tea and fresh squeezed orange juice. We could do the director’s cut later. Come back in a year, we’ll do the full. Yeah. Man, my last meal should have just been drinks! Um, cookies are a self explanatory. Can you take a cookie? This is maybe one of the my god, it’s so soft! It is soft and warm. My finger went through the bottom! Mmm. That’s what I’m talking about. We haven’t done anything better than that yet. Not like at the table, but as a species. I agree. This is where we peak. We should just cut off humanity now. We will get no better. Oh, that’s a lot of cookie, though. We have proof of the concept of the smaller cookies outside, and then it was Nicole’s executive decision, shout out to Nicole, that said four ounces. So these are quarter pound cookies. Oh my god. Mm hmm. That’s how you get the wet in the middle. So wet. Mm hmm. You asked people specifically when you were diagnosed to not send you Let’s call them alternative remedies and let you handle the care with your doctor. Yeah. Why do you think people are so distrustful of institutional knowledge? Oh, um, well, I know not everybody is, um, but like, I think, I think there’s a bunch to it. So, like, one, uh, there’s, like, it’s a mess out there, like, the healthcare system is not great all the time. Yeah. Um, also a lot of treatments are unpleasant. And, you know, I think that, uh, people are looking to their instincts sometimes, where it’s like, this can’t, this can’t, this doesn’t seem right. Like, this can’t be the way that things are supposed to go. There has to be something wrong. Weird going on. Ultimately, like, the body is just very complicated and things go wrong. Have you ever, like, even looked at a diagram of your knee? Because, like, I’m 43 years old and my knees still work. That’s wild. Yeah, they’ve been knees for 43 years. You trying to imagine, like, a car? 43 year old car with knees? Still working. Like a wheel. I can see that. You know, it’s just spinning, but like a whole knee. Like, we’ll get a diagram of a knee sometime. Put a diagram of a knee. Look at that! Now bring back some layers. There’s more knee under there. There’s so much knee. And that’s the knee, it’s not even the complicated part. There’s too much knee per knee, I’d say. We need about 30 percent less knee. Yeah, sometimes I think that might be good. But like it can do all these things, like it can twist, it can bend, it can go like, it’s wild. Like all this, the things that my mouth is doing right now, absolutely insane. When we asked you what you wanted to promote on this show, um, you had Study Hall. Yeah, yeah. Uh, and then you also just said chemotherapy in general, which that’s a first for guests. Yeah, nobody has, nobody’s like shouting out, I want to, I want to promote a really unpleasant treatment for a disease. Yeah. But yeah, no, I mean, I definitely had some people in, in my life and certainly on the internet who were like, you know, are you sure you want to go that route? And I’m like, yes. So specifically with my cancer. Yeah. Um, absolutely. Um, it’s really the only treatment and I, without it, I would be, uh, on a very different path right now. I think if you went down that very different path. And you did die. Where do you go? Oh, what is consciousness? Did you figure it out? I was hoping that you had just figured it out in the car before you came here. Um, yeah, no, thanks for asking. No problem. I think I, you know, to some extent I think it is for each of us to figure out on our own. I think that there’s a piece of that. I think that there’s a piece where it’s like okay to not know things. And like some, maybe some things aren’t meant to be super known. You know, the way I see things is gonna be different than the way other people see things. But like, what was it Keanu Reeves said? Like, what happens when, when you’re gone? He says, I think that the people who love you will miss you. Um, and I think that that, I think that that like, that’s clever and that’s fun, but I think it’s also really true. Yeah, like I think that that’s even the people that we don’t remember from our of our ancestors Even people we aren’t like closely related to Like all those people are in us in one way like every word that I’m saying was made up by a person Every idea that we have like is is a combination of ideas that have come before and those ideas happened in people We don’t know and like we’re like we’re all made up of each other And that’s what that’s like a thing that matters to me. I don’t know you as cancer guy I know you as meat dessert guy now Hank I haven’t had any of my meat dessert yet. Eat the meat dessert. I’m going for the salmon belly. You can tell this is the belly from the striations. He can tell it’s the belly from the striations. I sure can. Oh yeah. I could use a little more sugar on that. Yeah, I could. Wow, you’re so strong. That’s all that french fries said. It destroyed my body Hank, it destroyed it. Oh no. You ready to get in the lightning round? Oh yeah, let’s do that. Let’s do it. Other than me, who’s the one person, dead or alive, you’d want to share your actual last meal with? Oh, my wife. Oh, you act like they’re, like, John? You know? Oh no. I mean, he’s great. Oren? Like, yeah, no one? I, um, I mean at the moment, I think that if Oren was like 21 years old or something, like I’d really like that, but like, Not a great dinner guest. No, I mean, we’d be watching Minecraft YouTube. Oh god. That’s not the way that I want to go about this. No, I think, like, we just got a lot more to say to each other, me and my wife. What song do you want playing at your funeral? All Star by Smash Mouth. Oh, man. God, that’s good. Uh, as a peace offering, what’s your favorite Dave Matthews song? Um Pfft! Name a Dave Matthews song is the actual question I’ve just been asked. That’s more of a command. Uh, there’s something about, no, because now it’s a challenge for me. Um, there’s something about ants, right? It’s like red ant or like ant farm? No. Alien ant farm? Alien ant farm is definitely a band. Definitely a band. Oh my god, just listening to that cover today. Um, anybody, Dave Matthews song, one. Crap. Crash. Thank you. That seems like a, that seems like a real strawberry pop tart answer. What’s your biggest fear? Uh, that the cancer will come back, like the most present one. Do you have any, like, deeper ones? I’m worried that people don’t like me. Yeah, that’s fair. Well, I like, I can’t give you any guarantees on the cancer. I really like you. I really enjoy your company. Uh, your general oeuvre is, is great. Uh, is butt legs? Uh, butt is legs. Hmm. What’s your greatest regret in life? Do you agree? I actually do for a very specific reason. I knew it. And, uh, wait, why’d you know it? Do you know the reason? No, well, just, you know, like, you, like, think a lot about, uh, uh, food, so maybe there’s, like, a food reason. No, it’s a fitness reason. Oh, it’s a fitness reason. It’s a fitness reason. Okay. Because you have leg day, and you have not leg day. Oh. Butt is included in leg day. Yeah, yeah. But then, from a food perspective, butt is shoulder. Yeah, but if you look, like, imagine a horse’s ass. I am. Uh, where does the leg stop? At the end of the ham. It stops at the top of the horse. No, but I think if you feel back the skin, if you flay it. Except we’re talking about horses very commonly. Now imagine a horse’s ass that’s been played. Correct! This is called butchery. I had to butcher a whole goat for a GMM episode. They gave it to me in a trash bag. I put it in the trunk of my Civic and I went home and I, what’s your greatest regret in life? Ha ha ha! Uh, what’s my greatest regret in life? Pretty easy one actually. I mean there was a time when I thought I told a girl that she was having a nosebleed. But it was a mole. Yeah. So I’d like to take that one back. That’s actually really great. Yeah. Really great answer. I hope she’s not watching. We’re still friends! Finally, Hank, are you happy? Oh, yes. I feel so lucky. I have such a weird, fun life. I have such good people around me. I have, my son is so cool. Uh, my job is so cool. Uh, yeah, I’m very happy. Well, I’m happy to have enjoyed this meal with you, and to have finally been introduced to you. It’s gonna change my entire paradigm, Hank. Among all the paradigms you’ve already changed for me. But for real, thank you so much for coming on the show. Oh, I’m gonna tell you to ask me the last question. Hank, I’m sorry, man. It’s Friday. I know how this show works and you don’t know how this show works. We’re going to the TV bar after this. You’re so drunk. If you’re gonna deliver your last words to that camera right there. That was fun. Thank you all so much for stopping by the Mythical Kitchen. We’ve got new episodes out. Uh, Hank, uh, you are bringing back Study Hall. Yeah! Uh, Study Hall is a program that lets you go from watching YouTube videos to getting actual transferable college credit. Like, there’s a path to do that. Just to lower the barriers to maybe going back and getting some education or starting your transition into higher ed with You can find out more about it at GoStudyHall. com Should I find, can I use it to finally graduate college? No, it’s more of a start out. That’s okay. Unless you need like, unless you need like some early credits that you don’t have. No, it’s a couple late ones. Can you just tutor me to help me finish college? If you want, I think you’re doing alright. I don’t know. We’ll figure it out. Uh, anyways, I’ll see y’all next time. This is very fun. This, this is strange. Wait, wait, can you see it on camera? Oh my god, I love it! What does it say? No kid hungry, okay. Yeah, the sweat’s kinda running down, but um, that’s fine. And also it’s a goat, cause a baby goat’s called a kid. Hi everyone, I’m Meghan Trainor and this is my last meal. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all gotta eat and we’re all gonna die. Today we’re joined by author, podcaster, and multi platinum recording artist, whose new album, Timeless, comes out on June 7th. Megan Trainor, welcome to the show. How did you memorize that? I got a weird brain. Sometimes it works good and sometimes it doesn’t. Um, you have written some of the biggest hits of the 21st century. But more importantly, I think you’ve written the greatest pick up line in history. Are you Spy Kids? Now Megan, were you born Were you born with that level of genius or was that created through hard work? Oh, you’re good. You study and you memorize. You don’t even slip up. Wow. Yeah, I had some liquid courage that night and I had I get so starstruck from everyone, you know? Especially back then I was like a baby songwriter out here in LA like trying to make it And Spy Kids crashed one of the parties we were having like no one invited him and him and his friend showed up and I was like Like I knew, but I was like, are you spy kids? And it worked, and we’re married and we have two kids, so. Uh, have you thought about your last meal before? Um, I think about my death a lot, yeah. Yeah, good, I think it’s healthy and normal. I watch a lot of those like, death row meals too. Um, and now I have kids and I’m like, well I have to live till I’m like, at least 150. Um, so I’m trying to biohack my body. Um, except the food I chose today is not gonna help me live longer. And I’ve been recently watching every episode you’ve done, and I realize, like, that nobody sits on this side. So I was like, let me be the first. Also, this is my good side, you know? This is my better side. This is my better side, that’s right. I have two good sides, but the, this one, my good God. Kind of set up this little dichotomy where you’re talking about biohacking. I imagine that means eating ultra healthily. Yeah, like in life I don’t get to eat any of these foods that we’re about to have today But isn’t that a bit of a paradox though where it’s like you want to live longer But in doing so you’re making your life less comfortable. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep That’s why if I’m like, okay if I get to know that I’m about to die I’m gonna have all of this laid out in front of me. So you would want to know your exact date of death, if you could. I want to go out like the notebook, but I want to know more. I want them to be like, hey, you have until tonight. And I want to be a hundred and twenty, uh, laying next to my husband and my kids all surround, surrounding the bed with their grandkids. And we’re all hugging. And then I’m like, you know, I get to say goodbye and look at them all. And then. Me and my husband go three, two, one, you know, I think you’ve done hold on you’ve done. That’s the goal You’ve done so much manifesting through your music. You need to write that into that’s what my entire album is about Thank you so much for asking This is about how I wish I was timeless. I wish I could live forever and love forever and And have my family forever and ever. And I hope you do. You ready to eat? Thanks for bringing in my album. June 7th, it comes out tomorrow. Okay. Megan, for your first course, you know, we’ve had people request A5 Wagyu and caviar, but no, no, no, we have No, no, no. The BBQ Twisted Fritos, the Snyder’s Hard Sourdough Pretzels, Movie Theater Popcorn, If you know, you know. With extra butter. Please dig into the bounty and the feast here. Okay. Oh, I’m so proud of myself. Oh God, these, yeah, this was my entire childhood. And to me, that was a good snack, you know, it is a good snack and it wouldn’t be one, it’d be four easily. Um, and yeah, one time I ate like the first time I had these, I was driving with my older brother and we stopped at a gas station and got these and I was like, this is the best thing I’ve ever eaten. And then he was driving and looked over and was like. Did you just eat that whole bag? And I was like, yeah. And he was like, don’t do that. And I was like, but I just did. They’re scientifically designed for you to not be able to stop eating them. Yeah. And I remember when these came out, we, you and I would have been kids. Like these were a relatively new product on the market. Oh yeah. Hot in the streets. And my stomach hurt so bad. Um, and then this is my favorite snack of all time. Is this like you’re cozy on the couch or you’re eating this in the theater? This has become a problem at nighttime with me and my husband, where we, we make our little tiny bowls of popcorn in bed while we’re watching our favorite show. Um, I’ve never, ever, ever, ever, ever ate late snacks in bed ever. Uh, until I met Love My Life. And, and, and it wasn’t until we had kids. We never ate in bed. Why is that just like the one dig in dig in please I can’t I can’t see this I was waiting for you No, no, no, no, no, it’s your last night Oh, so much butter. Thank you, chef. Wow. This is legit. Our chefs really worked hard here. They, they drizzled the butter by hand. I know, was this like a hard move? Individually popped each corn kernel with a hair straightener. They sure did. You seem like somebody who really values the idea of closeness and comfort. One of my favorite songs off of timeless is called I hate it here That is going to be running through my head at every party that I don’t want to be at Was there one incident that inspired that song all of the LA parties? I was ever invited to in my whole career My I sent my older brother and I was like you represent the trainers and go ahead That’s very medieval king of you. You like sent an emissary Megan sent her regards But it got to a point where when people would see me, they’re like, Oh, where’s your fun bro? I was like, I got mine. Mine’s at home right now. Thank you. But that was like so great for me to have him. But then he became an alcoholic and now he’s sober for three years. Congratulations. The whole circle of life happened in you not wanting to go to a party and all of that. Oh my god. This is why I gotta dig into these. Yeah, and these. This right here. When people were like, I like pretzels, if they showed me a skinny pretzel, I was like, that’s not a pretzel, babe. This is a pretzel. I just wanna say, one of the things that I most admire about you is how cavalierly you talk about poop. Oh yeah. Because it’s hard for me, obviously. Fair, but no, you, You talk about poop a lot in your book, Dear Future Mama, um, and you tend to talk about a lot of gross things. You talk about a lot of things that people have a lot of shame about, despite being incredibly normal and common, whether that’s taking antidepressants while pregnant, uh, whether that’s having OCD as a kid and peeling all the skin off of your thumb, um, things that everybody, well, It really affected me because I grew up with that sense of shame too. I had a lot of physical tics growing up, still do. I always thought it was weird. And apparently other people don’t notice it. Similarly with a lot of things about shame. Why do you think it’s so important to talk about poop? Because I feel like I was poop shamed on accident. Megan, I’m so sorry. Thank you. You didn’t deserve that. I didn’t. I, I like never pooped in school ever cause I would have died. I felt like my body, I felt like I would have died if I did that. But I, yeah, I, and like going in public and like being I was 19, traveling the world. I remember crying because I had I, like, was so backed up because I was, like, living in an airport and living in hotels and living in public and I was like, I can’t poop here. But then, I’m not even This is not an ad. Poopery saved my life. Spike the camera! Poopery saved my life! And they know. They know. They sent me some stuff. But I wanna be more open about it and tell my body. I also learned that my body holds in really bad. Mm-hmm. I can, I can hold it for like four days. And now my 3-year-old is holding in his generational trauma. Generational trauma. Megan, you can’t pass that on. I, I’m like, let it go babe. Everyone poops, you know, um, that’s a new hit right there. It’s literally, where’s tpa? Can we get a T-Pain feature? Okay. On everybody poops how it go. Heavy money bumps. Yeah. That’d be really good. Um, I have a, a pitch for you. I think you and I can go in together on this. I’ve had this. Thought for a long time. You get Poopery, you get Sunsweet Prunes, you get the Squatty Potty, all on board for one big campaign. We call ourselves Shitfluencers. Try and de stigmatize pooping. What do you say? 50 50. I’m in. 50 50. I’m in. Wow. I 85 50. Yeah, they’re like, that’s cute. I wanna talk more about Oh my god, I haven’t had these in like 17 Eat, eat, eat. I’m just gonna stuff my face. No, you keep talking. This is the loudest snack though. I’m so sorry to the mic guy. Wait, can I Crikey. Oh my god. These are I don’t know how the I sound like a goat. It’s messy, like Get me out of here. How much of your music for you is a form of self therapy? And you got a song called Bestie, that’s like very much this ode to not just self love, but also like, hey that toxicity is in there. Yeah. And we gotta rewire it. She’s a bully. Um, it’s just alarming that you like know so much. It’s so crazy. No one does their research. Oh my god, do you know Bestie? Um, yeah, well, I, I like accidentally did it with all about that bass. I, I like laughed writing that song. ’cause I was like, no one will put this on radio. No one will play this. No one thinks like this. And when it blew up and everyone learned the song, I was like, I’m not alone. Like, people feel like that too. And, and I was like, duh. And then, then I saw years later, I’d be doing meet and greets and parents would come to me and say, Hey, you’re about to meet my daughter or my son. They wouldn’t leave the house until you put your song out. And I was like my three minute song that took me 45 minutes got it Like I have a superpower and I have a job to do My my best friend told me one day. You’re so good at like saying how we all feel but Something that we’re not so good at admitting out loud, you know, so one day I’ll be like ain’t no official, you know But yeah, these pretzels are too hard they’re too hard to eat they’re all up in my teeth how do you do this How has Timeless helped you rationalize your fear of death? I feel like everyone nowadays has been close to or watched someone like even be told in one year like you have cancer and then you’re gone. And I’ve just watched like one of my best friends lose their parent in like less than a year and it was rattling. And I wrote this song right after because I knew this was The album would be called timeless because of my fear and that was happening all at the same time And but I also I didn’t want to write a sad song. I wanted to write like the wedding song, you know Um, I try to never just be like here’s a pure sad song. I try to Related to as many people as I can or flip it and be like no, it’s actually a love song, you know I think that is something that’s so incredible Especially on timeless is that so many of them are just flat out bops, right? And even the ones where you actually listen to the lyrics and it’s like oh god This is uh confronting me with a bit of an uncomfortable truth that I didn’t know about but like let’s groove to it Yeah, when I played it for my label, they were like that one’s doing what it’s supposed to do I was like, thank you Um, you said that you haven’t dealt with a lot of loss in your own life You But you did have, uh, a fan named Jalisa that you posted about. What are you doing? I don’t know, we’re trying to make you know everything? But I know that you only laugh in uncomfortable situations, you don’t cry. Um. My therapist says that too. How do you know about Jalisa? Uh, you, you posted about her. Well, that’s fair. Yeah. Um, but no, did that give you any clues into your own grieving process? It was horrific because I’m gonna, I’m eating pretzels. Okay. Eat popcorn, eat popcorn, it helps. She showed up everywhere. Uh, she was in the UK and she showed up everywhere with full glam all the time and was the nicest person to me. Um, and we got to a place where, We were friends and I was like seeing her everywhere and it was like the only real big loss I’ve had in my life and it was devastating and it’s just like I’m sorry It’s okay. We were just supposed to eat burritos. No one said anything about her. Oh, no, but um, um, I got Read by the Long Island Medium. And she was like, There’s someone with, like, blue eye shadow. And I was like, My team was like, Jaleesa. Like, she would always come with full makeup on. And I, I didn’t know that she was suffering like that, but then it, like, woke me up that, like, I don’t know what any of my fans are going through. Like, as close as we can be with social media, like, we’re all struggling, and just trying to make it, and that’s Like, what’s so cool about my songs is that it can bring us together, but that was like, um, the most horrific thing, and I reached out to her family and tried, because I couldn’t make it to the funeral, but I, I tried to like, at least pay for it and make it a little easier for them, but they were like, we’re not gonna get to pay for a lot of things, so we would like to do this, and it was, it made me cry way more, and yeah. Thanks, Josh. No, thank you. No, that was beautiful. Well, So death doesn’t make sense to me. And, um. Yeah. And when I, I haven’t gone to the UK, um, in a long time, but I’m going soon. And it’s going to be different now, because usually she’d be there. Do you sort of find yourself getting Very emotionally attached to things in ways that you kind of wish you didn’t or do you want to let all of that emotion wash over you? No, I’m an empath. Um, I, I, I feel all, and Auntie Flo is here, so we’ve been, we’ve been crying for days. Um, yeah. Eat the Fritos Megan, the Fritos make it better, the Fritos make it better. You ready to get into the second course? What else do you know about me? Megan, for course number two of your final meal, we have a Dodger dog. This is actually from Dodger Stadium. Shout out to KG who went and grabbed it last night at the game. A large cheese pizza from Lucky’s. And then we, we have a flight of ranch dressing here. We have your classic buttermilk. We have a basil pesto. Uh, we have a little bit of yuzu miso with chili oil. And then we have a tahini and cucumber ranch. My god. Dude, Tom Hanks was so, like, fancy with his, his, his and Mine is dogs. Tell me about the hot dogs. Um, it’s the only reason why I go to sport games. Um, I love a hot dog. Pizza has been in, yeah, my family, we’re pizza eaters. Like that’s, we also have this weird thing in my family where me and my younger brother, we look at the pizza and we’re like, I get first dibs. And we study it and we go, this is the best piece and I’ll tell you why. You know? If you could study this pizza right now and tell me which one is the best pizza, this is my version of the Long Island Medium. Okay. I got it. I think. I also have mine. Point to it on three? On three, two, one, go. Uh, it’s either a good sign or a bad sign. Are we diving in? I think we should. Oh, Jesus. Before he This is a perfect piece and I’ll explain. You get a little, a little crunch down here. There’s not too much sauce in the way. There’s not too many things bugging you. Um, and then up here you get clean cheese. It’s a moment of clean cheese, clean peace. You know? Which will lead you to The delicious, uh, see, um, breakaway where you get to more sauce into a perfect crust. That is a perfect portion of crust and cheese together. This is like a topographical map. You’re like, you’re coming up the ravine. Minus, cause of this. Reach the oasis and then here’s your ridgeline and then you get to climb the mountain. Yep. Beautiful. That’s it. You are in the past. Are you dipping in the ranch immediately? No, I always take a clean bite first to appreciate it and to be like, How is she alone? Oh my. That was . My period is so happy. So is mine. Yeah, . We’re cycled up. We’re seeing So you cycled up . We did it girl. We did it. Because that’s pretty Fanta. Mm-hmm . I need the farm. I’ll switch Still the normal ranch. Yeah. Yeah. I ain’t sick too. Okay. And then usually I will sprinkle Parmesan cheese across it if it needs it. This one’s pretty, uh, pretty far. And a little ranch dip. Mm-hmm . Oh, yeah. I didn’t know about the ranch chip. Whoa, that’s ranch. Mm hmm. I told you, that’s a Colby ranch. I dance when it’s good. That is good. Um, I didn’t know about ranch with pizza until I was like 19. You just went multi platinum. You just found out about ranch on pizza. Yeah. Incredible. The night I won a Grammy, we all came home and ate pizza with ranch. Get out of here. Everyone else was out partying and I was like, I will be. In Not to my pizza. No. In you were in partying, making one for pizza. Mm-hmm . I’m gonna ask you obviously love your husband, Darrel very much. Um, does it not bother you that Yeah, I do. He is a serial killer because he doesn’t use tips. Darrell, if you, if you can shout and answer I know, I know you’re listening. Darrell, what’s wrong with you? I’m a plain guy. He’s a plain guy. Doesn’t like any sauce. Any, nothing. I’m tell let me tell you what he eats at sushi. It’s so disturbing. Darryl. You’re valid. By the way, this is all for laughs. Thank you. No, yeah, your feelings matter. Um, You’re perfect, and your choices are perfect. Uh, he eats, uh, he gets avocado roll. So it’s rice avocado. Dry. That ain’t even bad, cause the avocado could be mushy. But one time at a restaurant, I was like, dip it. Touch the soy sauce, dip it in. It might be better. And he was like, no. And I was like, just try it. And we got heated. And the waitress was like, you guys good? And I was like, no, we’re not good. He won’t try soy sauce. Yeah, I learned that quick. That was alarming for me. But, this is when I got upset, is when he had a salad with no dressing. Just grass. That’s heavy. I said leaves. It works for cows. Cows are large and live a long time. And, you know. He’s an animal. I was like, please let me pour oil on it. Like, get something on it so it’s a little damp. And he was like, I like it like this. Makes no sense, but love him so much. It is very evident. And you have to, eat the hot dog, eat the hot dog. I gotta stop yapping and we gotta dipper though, so I make a pile of ketchup. Oh yeah. Oh the ketchup farts, oh my god. Yeah, I’m a dipper, like this is good. Gorge, but every bite has to have the perfect amount of ketchup. Is this my OCD? What is this? No, my brothers are like, what do you mean dip? I was like every bite should have that much ketchup on it Oh my god. There’s nothing better. There’s nothing better than a tube of meat. Oh my god. I’m gonna barf. This is gonna hurt my face. We’ve never had that happen on the show. We’re very excited for it. Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright, one more bite. Um, do you think differences in your and Daryl’s relationships makes you Ultimately stronger because you talked about getting into parenthood from sort of different directions, whereas you grew up with a mother who you said was so loving and made parenthood sound so fun. Darryl grew up without a father in his life and initially didn’t want kids until he met you. Does that ultimately make you stronger as parents or do you find friction within that? We talked about a lot ’cause I was like, you nervous? You know, like he never had an example of what a dad is like. Since that baby existed, he has been like super dad. Super dad, super mom when I can’t be there. Super parent. His therapist told him, you’re the parent that you always wanted and never had. Yeah. And he was like, Um, his dad, uh, left them when he was like around one. And, His anxiety was creeping up crazy when Riley was turning one, and he didn’t know why yeah, and his anger and everything And I was like what’s going on like let’s find the deeper meaning and one day. He he never cries. He finally broke down Like a real cry where I was like you good like yoga. Hey like rubbing his back like what’s up? And he was like, Oh, this is the age that, that my dad left us. And I just couldn’t, I couldn’t fathom leaving Riley ever. You know? A lot of stuff comes up for you if you have like, um, you know, a tough childhood and you’ll be okay. You, and you have kids that are that age. Yeah. I have always, um, similarly didn’t have a lot of good modeling for parents in my life. And I’ve always known that I wanted kids. But I’ve always thought it was a bit of a selfish reason to try and right those wrongs So it’s interesting in your book dear future mama and like hearing you talk about how much you love your mother and how much You realized she struggled with a lot more than you knew that she did. I thought she was super mama I thought she had everything put together and like was crushing, you know? But I didn’t know how hard it was. And so I, I never felt like my mom wasn’t there or like that she was struggling ever. So my mom was super mom and made it seem so fun and effortless and easy that I was like, oh, I’m going to be just like her. I’m going to be the most fun mom, hopefully. Do you ever see yourself having a little bit more anxiety because you put that pressure on yourself to be just like her? My mom guilt is real. And. Was there the moment he came out, um, or the moment I was pregnant too, because I was on my antidepressants and was like, am I already messing up, you know? Um, and I had gestational diabetes, so I was like, oh, I must have failed at something. Because I told the doctors, I was like, I had a pop tart and I’m so sorry. Like, I did this to myself. And they were like, no babes, it’s genetics. Yeah. And then I found out Mike’s. Grandparent, my grandma had it and my mom had it. I was like, Oh, before my second pregnancy, I learned how to work out for the first time ever. That was incredible. And I learned how to eat healthier and enjoy eating healthier. And so I beat my genetics and didn’t have gestational diabetes on the second pregnancy. Hell yeah. But immediately I was like, women are superheroes and being pregnant is hard. So I wrote that book to be like, you’re not alone. Megan, for course number three, we got the California chicken cafe, chicken Caesar wrap with extra Caesar dressing on the side. And then of course, the soup dumplings all get the facial in there. Wow. From Din Tai Fung. I was wondering if they’d be hot. With all of the chili oil, the black garlic, the soy, the ginger. My belly hurts. I did take a mystery pill from your mom. We got Ibogard. If you don’t know about Ibogard, I’m not sponsored. They, it’s a great pill that helps any tummy aches. It’s magic. Tell me about the chicken Caesar wrap. This is like a fantastic classic. Like I love it. Have you seen, they be doing this now online? I saw this on the line, on the line, the internet, the world wide web showed people are making pizza. With a chicken Caesar salad in the middle of it. They’re baking in the middle or they’re folding? Like, pizza, Caesar salad, pizza. I love that. And it looks like that should have been here. You put a brownie in there and a boneless buffalo wing and you got all four courses. The brownie’s out of place, but yes. I have to eat this, okay. You get to eat it. This is your last meal. Never get to come back to it again. This is, I am not eating anymore today. It’s a wrap. Oh my god. I have like so many interviews after this. I know, I know. Deep breath. Sort of a metaphor for, um, overindulgence leading to lack of gratification. You read so many books. You sound so smart. Speaking of books, in Dear Future Mama, Okay. Um, no, you talked about the overwhelming joy of getting pregnant. You always knew that you wanted to. You cried in a diaper aisle in Target when you were 22. You cried But then you also said, Megan, there was an overwhelming sense of fear that you had. 10 to 25 percent of known pregnancies end in miscarriage. How do you balance that immense joy with that immense fear? How do you not let the fear dominate and take over? Every single night, I rubbed my belly and said, Please stay with us. I was like, Hey! Stick around! We love you! You know, it’s like, It’s really tough, and my second pregnancy, I had friends that were pregnant at the same time as me. Like, go through a miscarriage at eight weeks, you know? Like, right with me, and I was like, Oh, no, you know? And then, but no, that 12 week wait is the worst thing ever, and then when you get through it, it’s the greatest thing ever, and they’re like, you shouldn’t tell a lot of people you’re pregnant. I told everyone. Yeah, the second I was pregnant, but my second pregnancy, I got, um, like a, uh, a COVID vaccine and I felt so ill. Like I had the flu and I was like, Oh, it must be that vaccine. But I was trying to get pregnant and I got my period again and I performed on Fallon. I performed made you look on Fallon. And I did a tick tock like, Oh, when you get your period during soundcheck. But in fact, turns out that I was conceiving a child. You conceived your child on Fallon? Yeah, I told David. Daryl, where’d you guys do it? Nope. It was, that was like, it takes like days. Oh, sorry. It’s science. So it was, it was like a week before. Oh God. I was like, on the couch? Or? I thought it was a full period though. So then a month later, I felt horrible and I was like, dude, I must have the flu and I took a pregnancy test and I was like Like it lit up so fast. I was like, it’s twin girls I know it like it is I am so pregnant and then I that morning I was like stoked beaming a joy I videotaped it. I did interviews and they’re like, how are you? And I said i’m thriving like every I was so happy and then Right before my last interview. I look down and i’m You Gushing blood. How’s that for the food? Gushing blood. Like, like this. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. I ruined a chair. I go, oh no, you know? And they’re like, okay, Ryan Seacrest is on, go! And I go, oh my god, hey Ryan! And he’s like, how you doing? And I was like, thriving, you know? Like, never been so happy. And then, Did that whole interview, like, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, and then got through it. Shut the computer and was like, hey team, I think I’m miscarrying right now. Like, in that moment. And I went to the bathroom and just, like, saw what was happening and I was like, alright. I had a baby this morning and now they’re gone. I was like, I’m just gonna keep testing. And the pregnancy stick still said positive. And I was like, well, that’s mean, you know, like she’s like keep testing it It’ll say negative soon and then I got a blood test done and it it’s like the number is zero if you’re not pregnant my number was 90, 000 and I was like It’s twins and they have implanted so aggressively in me that that’s what the bleeding was. They’re like beta fish. Yeah I’ve never told anyone this story. Um first looks I don’t and and then The baby’s gonna be too small to seize, so at six weeks, we’ll, we’ll wait for six weeks. At six weeks, I went in. She went in and goes, Whoa! That’s a ten week old baby! And I was like, I’ve been pregnant this whole time?! You know? So I was pregnant ever since the Fallon performance. And I was like, We skipped a whole month?! You know? But, What a nightmare that was! What an incredible nightmare! What an incredible nightmare! A beautiful miracle! A rollercoaster! Like, I told everyone in the household, I’m pregnant! And then later I was like, I lost it, you know, and it was horrific and then amazing. So Barry, my sweet number two, my, my second sweet boy, who’s a boy. I was like, are you not twin girls? He is incredible and amazing. And every time I look at him, I’m like, how are you here? You know, what a little miracle. And what a nightmare you were in the beginning. I feel like that story is what like a new modern religion or cult would use as their national holiday. I think if you want to start that right now, and again, 50 50. 50 50. We’re going in. 20 20. Eat a dumpling, eat a dumpling. Okay, well you gotta do it right. Okay. Wasn’t that wild? That’s a wild, that’s an incredible story. for uh, for telling me that. Heads up, when you get knocked out with your wifey, bleeding is maybe okay. Okay, so you gotta do this particularly in a certain way. I don’t know what I said. Do you bite the, do you bite the nip? So, you put, you dip this, you get this, you gotta splash the vinaigrette on top first. Sorry everyone who hates that. Okay, now, That we have our vinegar. We may, like, bite a little. You bite a little? Bite a little and suck the soup. Uh uh, uh uh, uh uh. I said bite a little, dawg. Oh, you like bite a hole. You’re breaking the seal. I bite a hole. Okay, well, let me swallow this whole, like, an oyster and I’ll start another one. It’s down there now. Okay, you bite a widdle. Did you put the vinegar on? I didn’t put the vinegar on, I’m so sorry. I’m over here trying to memorize your life. It’s crazy, that baby survived. Okay, wait, just a little bite. Oh, you like kind of get a little, okay, well. On the edge, yeah. This is what I do, this is just my method. Yep, yep, and you get some vinegar with the soup. That is nice. There’s gotta be MSG. There’s gotta be MSG in there, MSG’s good. Speaking of good, I’m gonna be performing good. That’s crazy, I’m gonna be there with a pocket full of MSG and I’m gonna lick my fingers stick it in and snack on it all night That’s incredible. You and I, MSG and MSG. How long has it been since you’ve gone on a full tour? Over seven years. And you’re bringing the whole fam, obviously. Yeah, I’m bringing my boys, my babies I have a rule that I don’t go like a week without seeing them. I think they’ll have so much fun on tour Especially my three year old like he loves trucks and buses and cars and he’s been telling everyone like I’m going on a tour bus But last literally last night. I was trying to explain to him like do you know what tour means? He’s like what tour means and then I was like Remember the bus I showed you he’s like yeah cool bus. I was like, we’re gonna sleep on that. He’s like No. I was like, no, they’re cool. They’re like bunks. And then we’ll, I’ll put stars on your ceiling and I’ll have an astronaut shooting stars up on your ceiling. Cause there’s a ceiling, right? And he was like, yeah. No, no, I was like and there’s a curtain and you could see everyone. He’s like see everyone Who’s everyone and I was like, well, there’s gonna be me dad. Uh, mama, I like Kelly Leslie and I’m named everyone on the bus and he was like, I don’t want to see everyone and I was like It’s like a sleepover. He’s like, oh Sleepover and he’s like, I don’t sleep on bus. I sleep on chair and I was like chair. He’s like You I wanna, I wanna go home. And I was like, we’re not even there. So then I got, I was like, I’m gonna cry soon. You’re gonna love Tor. I might have explained it wrong, so. But I tried to explain to him too, like, Then you’ll go to bed and, and mama will go sing and dance on stage. And he, that’s what I tell him my job is. And he’s like, and everyone say yay to you. And I was like, everyone’s going to say yay to me, like so loud. And he’s like, they know, say yay to me. And I was like, oh, they could. And he was like, no, your, your child either speaks like an alien or like an old. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He does, he does his sentences. He’s putting them together, but they’re a little weird. They’re so cute though. At night. He’s like, can you tell me about my day? But no, the end, I’m like, know the end. It’s so sweet and sad. I’m like, exactly dude, know the end. This will never the end. And I was like, that’s what Timeless is about. Brought it back. Hit that plug. You ready for dessert? Yeah. One more, Megan, one more. Megan, for the final course of your final meal, we have the bowl of mini Charleston chews and then a simple peanut butter and jelly sandwich. What’s more homey than that? I killed it. Good god, this is my favorite candy of all times and it’s hard to find. Which is a good thing for me because that is dangerous. And um, there’s nothing better than a good PB& J. Yeah. I don’t know what to say. You don’t have to say anything. No, this is, I mean, this is like the ultimate, like, What do you eat on your last meal? Has anyone done it to you yet? I actually, this whole thing started because I cooked, I cooked my own just as a funny one off episode and I couldn’t stop talking about death while I was doing it. Like a carne asada burrito, shrimp cocktail because it’s the fanciest food I ever heard of when I was a kid, and then a whole loaf of garlic bread with ranch on the side, so ranch queens together. Whoa, you’re going out burping. Going out, oh god yeah. This was made with love, thank you whoever made this. Look at this fluffy white bread, I haven’t had bread like this in so long. Oh, uh. What’s he rippin it for? I have a weird tactile thing where I Sorry. I love just rippin things, you know what I mean? That was aggressive, I’m sorry. No, I love that you’re comfortable enough to be aggressive now. Oh no, you go. No, I’ve spent this whole time interviewing you. You go. Please clip that. Dude, we are the same person. We’re gonna be great friends. I think we are gonna be great friends. Uh, Where do you think people go when they die? I don’t think we go anywhere. It’s incredibly bleak. I believe that consciousness is a evolutionary sleight of hand. A trick to make us believe that we’re more good. Wait, wait, stop being so smart. Consciousness is like an incredible coincidence that, um, we evolved so far past, maybe not even that far past like octopuses and dolphins. Um, But enough to get us to fear our own death, which has made us build cathedrals, and make Charleston choose, and sing songs thinking that they’re meaningful, but ultimately we’re all just like, animals braying at the moon until one day it goes night night, like it has for every other creature the trillions upon trillions that has on Earth. I don’t think humans are inherently special, and I think everything just goes black. What do you think happens? Have you looked into it at all, or are you like, it’s black? I’ve looked into it a little bit, uh, some fascinating things about the rush of dimethyltryptamine. Oh, you’re smart. DMT, DMT, uh, ayahuasca. That’s what, that’s why people do it. Did you do it? I’ve never done it. I’m too scared. I’ll never do it. You wanna do it? No. No, dude. I can’t take tonal PM, I’m scared. 50 50, let’s do it. What? I don’t know what that means. 50 50. No, I promise I won’t go with you. I can’t. I took too many edibles one time, and my brain was like, never again! Uh, me taking Too many edibles is also another reason for the show, because it’s the first time that I got a death anxiety attack! I started crying and I couldn’t move! I had panic disorder. Oh my, was that, you noticed that from edibles? To a doctor, I was like, it’s right here, I took 50 milligrams of edibles, I messed up. Um, and uh, I can’t un close it, I can’t make it stop, and now I’m just Having panic every day all the time and they were like your chemicals are literally messed up right now We’re gonna bring it back. And that’s why I started antidepressants and I’ve never looked back. Damn, wait But you think like the the pot actually well, like my first one ever was when I yeah accidentally, I literally had like a Lollipop and was doing a puzzle forgot I ate the 25 milligrams of lollipop ate another one. Mm hmm. Oh, I’m not breathing anymore You know What happened? And Daryl’s like, well you’re on your second. I was like, second? That’s simply too much. I usually would have like five milligrams. On a day off. Just to do a little puzzle. That was a fun thing for me. Sad. And, um, went too far and never looked back. Do you remember the specific feeling or the specific fear when you were on those edibles that freaked you out about death? Like, can you, do you ever access that or do you try not to? I never ever wanted to die, ever. Yeah. I’m so scared of getting, having life cut too short. I watch a lot of Dateline. Love Dateline. Every night. Stop it. you. I can’t go to bed without listening to it. It’s so bizarre. It’s like lullabies, you know? And they’re like, they found her in the kitchen. Um, but I, I, well my dream, dream, dreams. This is why I went on a ghost hunt. I really want to see a ghost in person. Everyone’s claiming they’re happening because then I could be a ghost and I could stick around and haunt my kids. Yeah. Um. Then I know it’s real. I went to like a haunted mansion, I did the whole thing, I didn’t see anything. I stayed up till 4am, I was like, come get me big boy, and nothing. Nobody got me, I was like, scratch me! Ghosts hate being called big boys. Yeah, I think I wasn’t afraid enough or something, or I wasn’t, I was like, why am I not open enough? Maybe they were nervous, they were like, oh shit, is that all about that bass girl? Yeah, they were like, love yourself. No, I, I don’t, I would love that so that I can have some proof or something. I need proof, that’s my problem. I need like scientific proof and there is nothing and that’s the worst feeling ever. I was gonna ask you if you think fear and love are inherently coupled because you’ve said to Daryl, I believe, if you die before me, I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you. Oh, yeah. If I say that to him. How do you know that? I am the Long Island media. Wow! How do you know? I say that to him like every day. Yeah. Do you think that fear gets in the way of love, or do you think it’s a necessary part of it? Because if you love something, obviously It gets in the way of my love sometimes. That’s why I was like, I want to live timeless. I want to like, live like it’s not scary, and be here forever. I always say like, if someone had a potion, and they were like, Drink this, and live forever. I would Uh, instantly, no prob. Kind of how I watched my own grandma pass, and this is the first time a family member has died that I’ve actually felt real closure and grief. It was, she was surrounded by every single person that she loved. That’s what I want. She shed a single tear. Stop it. Said I love you, and then her heart. Stop it! No, what I’m saying, that’s That’s great. That’s great. That’s not great, I’m sorry, but like No, it is great, it’s 100 percent great. That’s the way it would go. That’s what I did right when she died, I went mwah! Good job, Grandma! I am so sorry for your loss, but like, yeah, that’s my, that’s my dream now. Um, what do you think happens after you die, if you had to like really put money on it right now? This just sucks. It’s the worst, I hate it more than you do, I host it. Oh, there’s gonna be olives in my teeth. Um, what do I think when I die? I really hope it’s not all black lights out. Yeah, I just hope I can somehow communicate with my kids forever. I hope I haunt them forever. You’re already getting lightning rounds? A lightning round. Yeah, did I answer everything? Uh, who’s the one person dead or alive you’d want to share your actual last meal with? Whoa, I’m not good at lightning rounds, let me think. That I would share my last meal with? My family. Is that an answer? Hubby, my kids. You have to pick one. Next one. That question sucked. What’s your desert island condiment? Ha ha ha. Uh, condiment? Um. I get one chipotle. Mayo. Who would want to dance off you or T Pain? T Pain. He’s so good. He does this thing. Oh, I would love to not do this thing. I was about to try and then I was like, No, don’t. No, no, no, no, no, no. I can do like the Shaq cat meme. You know, that’s it, where it’s the cat. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s all I can do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, what song do you want to be played at your funeral? I never thought about that. I guess, yeah, I do want to party. I don’t want a funeral. I don’t want to be buried. I want ashes and I want them spread out into art pieces on my kids walls. Sick yeah, you know when they’re they can put them in resin and make it look like an ocean Yeah, but I don’t like the beach so it might not be that it might be like a sunset That’s the plan. People call you Bubblegum, that’s metal as hell. That’s so rock and roll. That’s so metal, dude. Um, uh, the, I want party. I want a full party. Um, all the hits, all the upbeats. Play all of my songs I’ve ever written. But speed them up to two times. All right. What’s the hardest goodbye you’ve ever had to say? To my kids this morning. Yeah? Yeah. Every time I say it. My, my Riley boy is getting to that age where he’s like, Nah! Like full meltdown. And Daryl’s like, why do we say goodbye? And I was like, well just in case. You know? I’m like, we don’t know if we’ll come back today. You know? That’s how I live. So it’s bad. She choked on a Charleston Jew on a YouTube a long one. Uh, what’s your biggest regret in life? I have like, a person or two. Goodbye. Goodbye. Barrette. Name. Hooking up with, you know? Name. No, I won’t tell anybody. No! Yeah. Finally, are you happy? Oh, I’m so happy. I’m too happy, that’s why I’m upset. I’m so happy that I’m afraid. Like, it’s too good. What’s going on? I get it, everything’s gonna be fine. I didn’t mean to cause the panic attack. There’s no pot, it can’t hurt you. No, I live like this, it’s not even you. Uh, Megan, thank you so much. Thanks for the bellyache. Thanks for the Ibogard. And thanks for the most intense conversation I’ve had in a long time. No, that means a lot to me. Thank you for being so complimentary, and, uh, thank you for letting me eat six soup dumplings, even though they were supposed to be yours. Uh, Megan, if you want to deliver your last words to that camera right there! We’ll be with my family, and I’ll be like, I love you! Cause I’ll be 120. I like that your accent kind of changed. A little Forrest Gump y. I love you. It’ll be dust. It’ll be just dust coming out. Single tears. Brought to you by Mendemeusel. Megan, thank you so much. You are truly awesome. Let it go. I want poop. Shitfluencers for life. Shitfluencers. Shitfluencers for life. Uh, that was an incredible one. Thank you all so much. Everybody check out Megan’s new album, Timeless, out on June 7th. And then you got a whole tour coming up. How do you know? September, October, everyone come. The Timeless Tour. It’s gonna be great. We got Natasha Benningfield, Chris Olsen, Paul Russell, and my older brother Ryan. He’s a DJ. Hell yeah. I’ll be there. I’ll be at MSG. Eatin MSG. I’ll be at the forum eating I’m not gonna lie, probably like a nachos. Oh my god. There’s nothing right to form. I can’t stop burping. Okay. See y’all next time. Bye! Hi, I’m Serge Duncan and this is my last meal. Every person has exactly two things in common. We all gotta eat and we’re all gonna die. Today’s guest is musician, activist, visual artist, author of Down to the System and inventor of the world’s greatest pizza combination, pepperoni and green peppers, mushrooms, olives, chives. Serge Tonkin, welcome to the show. Thanks bro, it’s good to be here. Thanks for having me on. Of course, of course. Your music has had so many profound effects on me, but maybe the stupidest effect is thinking that chives would be a much more common pizza topping than they actually are. So thank you for that. I would go to pizzerias when I was a kid and be like, he must know something that I don’t. I see chives nowhere. Right. Yeah, I have no idea why tribes came into the lyrics there. I think it was just trying to put something with one syllable. Yeah, yeah. Mushrooms didn’t work. Yep, scallions. So yeah, it was just a little, yeah, so. You have an incredible cafe called Kavak Cafe in Eagle Rock. It is right next to one of LA’s oldest pizzerias. I’m just saying if you did a pop up called What a Splendid Pie with Casablanca, I think it would be really cool and I would be the first person. That’s a fantastic idea. I’m gonna walk over and see. Yeah, that’s, that’s a great idea. How much does food play a role in your life? Like, has food always been something important for you? Yes, because it’s what you put in your body. So it’s very important in that sense. Um, but I didn’t really come to that kind of awareness until later in life. And, um, Went through different kind of, uh, fair, uh, selections over the years. Um, I was telling you earlier in 1997 when we first started touring, I stopped eating meat altogether. And, uh, cause I just, my body rejected it. Um, and on tour, you know, you, you don’t, you don’t necessarily get the best of food, especially when you’re a young band going in a band and all that. So, and then I was vegetarian for 10 years. Then I became pescatarian for another 10, 15 years. And then I just started eating meat about a year ago. And it was a crazy kind of, you know, thing where you actually look at a menu and you, you’re like, I can order anything. It’s opening. Like, yeah, it’s like opening. It’s very interesting. You also have the very, uh, unique experience of having Anthony Bourdain give you crap for being pescatarian. Totally. Which, how did that feel? Um, that was awesome. That was awesome. Yeah, I’ll tell you the Bourdain story. So in, uh, in 2016, I want to say, uh, we were in New Zealand, uh, with my wife and we were watching his show. And, and I, you know, she’s like, he hasn’t been to Armenia. He’s gone to Georgia. He’s gone to Russia. He’s gone to all these countries. And she goes, why don’t you email him and ask him why he’s not going to Armenia? I’m like, Oh yeah, yeah. Why don’t I just email him and ask him why he’s not going on? And she goes, why don’t you? She’s like, she’s like, he likes rock music. He might respond. And I’m like, All right, I’ll give it a try. So I reached out to a friend of mine at William Morris, uh, my, my friend, Dave Worshefter, and I’m like, is there any way you can get, get me Anthony Bourdain’s email? Cause he’s got to go to army yet. Like, yeah, he goes, let me see what I can do. And he sends me an email. I’m thinking this is bunk, right? So I write an email saying, Hey, my name is Serge Duncan. I have this band called system of a down. I don’t know if you’ve heard us, but I love the fact that. that you are a talking head, but you’re a no bullshit talking head, like when you don’t like something, you say it, whether it’s food or politics or whatever, you’re the real thing. And I appreciate it. I said, but you’ve only made one mistake. You haven’t been to Armenia. If you go, I got your back. Guy responds in 10 minutes. And I’m thinking this is a joke. Like this can’t be him. I’m like, this can’t be him. But he, he, he literally said, you’re on, I’ll have my producers reach out to you soon. And I’m like, damn. Yeah. And he did. And we kind of planned the whole trip to Armenia. And it was an incredible, incredible journey for me. We sit down like this. And, and the first question he asked is, so you’re born in Lebanon, raised in Los Angeles, lived part of the year in New Zealand. How, what percent Armenian are you? Like, where is home? And I’m like, five percent. Oh, I did it again. Um, that’s like the hardest question. Yeah. But we had, we had a really, really great time, you know, going through the country. And he was incredibly astute, as I thought he would be, regarding geopolitics, regarding the importance of the awareness of the Armenian Genocide, food as well, of course. But I love the fact that food, was a gateway to more, uh, bigger things. Yeah. Yeah, it’s never about food. It’s about the hands that made the food. It’s about the region where the food was made. And I think so many of us in food and storytelling are like really living in Bourdain’s shadow. And it’s a shadow I’m very happy to be in because what a hell of a shadow that was. Yeah, absolutely. Serge, for the first course of your final meal, we have, uh, I believe this also goes by the name Kibbeh Naya. In different cultures, very popular around the region. We have the Armenian version. This is, uh, chopped raw beef in the tartar style, mixed with bulgur wheat, a bunch of spices and herbs. We got the lavash bread and some pita. Man, nothing wakes you up in the morning like a big ol pile of raw meat. That’s right. My mom used to make this every Saturday. Thank you. Uh, when we were kids in Lebanon, and it reminds me of that it was a special treat. You know, it’s not something you have every day, obviously. So it, it is reminiscent of that for me and my dad loved it so that she, she would make it on Saturdays. That’s beautiful. Uh, can I, can I serve you up? Sure. Yeah, please. Uh, so did she make this like in the Armenian? Uh, it’s actually Lebanese. It’s, it’s a, you know, it’s a Lebanese dish, not so much an Armenian dish, but yeah, thank you. She would make it the flat way, mostly. No, actually she would do it that way. Yeah. Um, the, uh, little grenades. Mmm. Meat grenades. I think meat grenades is a much better name for it. Um, it’s funny because Oh, that’s good. Really good. Let me dig in. Does it taste like your mom’s? Mmm, it does. Compliments to the chef. Mmm. You see so many very similar dishes around that general region. The Middle East, the Levant. Through North Africa, you’ve traveled the world. Have you noticed that like the idea of country borders don’t necessarily reflect anything about the actual cultures they’re in? Most borders are actually created post major wars, right? Um, based on conquest or based on defense. It’s not a universal thing. If it was animals would respect it. Sure. Trees would respect it. You know, I’m, I’m an Irish tree or, you know, like, um, it’s a, it’s definitely human construct. And, um, I’m not a giant fan of borders, although unless someone’s trying to kill you and, you know, invading you in that sense, and you have to protect yourself, in that sense, I’m a fan of borders. Yeah. The current sovereign borders of Armenia are a very precarious position, sandwiched between Turkey and Azerbaijan, which both have very antagonistic, uh, A lot of your life, and also your book and your work, are devoted to telling the story of the Armenian Genocide. Uh, in your book, you do it with a very loving tribute to your grandfather Stepan, who survived against all odds a death march to the Syrian desert. You said that his story is inextricably woven into the fabric of yours. Does that manifest as a sense of duty for you to tell it? Good question. Um, no, I don’t think, I mean, I did, I did promise him before he died that I would help spread awareness about the genocide and what he went through. And, you know, millions of people went through in terms of the horrors that they witnessed. But I think it’s just, More in understanding your own story by going backwards to your ancestors and seeing what they went through and why you do the things you’re doing. How? Because, you know, my mom was his daughter, my grandfather’s daughter. So the way she was raised has a lot to do with what he went through and she raised us and the way we’re raised. So there’s the connection, right? It’s understanding that, it’s understanding yourself as a part of that beautiful puzzle. Uh, speaking of survivors, you quoted Holocaust survivor Primo Levi in, uh, The Drowned and the Saved in your book, where he says that the one signifier of whether or not somebody survives is simply luck. There’s no use in trying to find commonalities between people’s fates. Does that give you solace? Does that frighten you or do you simply not dwell on it? The aspect of luck in avoiding a calamity is, is really scary, right? You know, you hear about people that don’t get on this one particular flight cause they were running late or they had an inkling of some type and, or they felt sick to their stomach. Something happens and you’re just like, well, is that luck or was it intuition? You know, was something holding them back? Yeah. I mean, there is randomness in the universe, obviously, but that idea that luck. Can be a determinant of a calamity or bad luck can be a determinant of such. It is a scary thought. Is there anything in your life that has made you make sense of that luck? Or made you make sense of the universe in terms of there actually being an order, there actually being some sort of rhyme and riddle to all this? I think the more you’re aware of your own vision of what you’re meant to do, um, every morning, kind of focus on it, the universe conspires with you to make that happen. The less you are aware of it and you walk a path of I’m just kind of walking, kind of thing, then life becomes haphazard. I really believe in that. You describe this in the book, the tension in System of a Down, that you were an activist first and a rockstar second, in a band with rockstars first and activists second. Do you ever regret that? back or were you always walking the one true path that you were always supposed to? I don’t regret any relationship, honestly. I feel very charmed and grateful to be where I am in life. And I mean, everything happens for a reason, right? So, you know, the The yin and yang of that pull between the priority of music versus activism is a beautiful thing for a band. Because what it does is it creates this tension, and that tension is within the music. It’s within the songs, you know, the start and stop. The, you know, is this too political? Is this not too political? You know, and, uh, You know, for a band to just have everyone agreeing on everything, it makes the music kind of vapid. Yeah. Do you think we’re at an all time high point of vapidness in music? Because if you look at the history of rock and roll in terms of protests and activism, right, you can go back to Vietnam and all the great bands that came out of that era. You can talk about the punk explosion during Reagan, then you had people like System and Rage Against the Machine during the Bush era. What does that sound look like in 2020? Am I simply too old to understand what it is right now? I don’t know, man. You might be more plugged in than I am. No, I’m not sure I am. But my friend Tom Morello always says, uh, bad presidents make for good music. Truly. Good rock music, so. We’ve had no shortage. No shortage, indeed. Yeah. It’s funny because I, You know, I was first exposed to, not only System of a Down, but it was one of the first times I was exposed to, like, radical politics. I grew up in, you know, a deep red area in Orange County, and it was listening to 106. 7 KROQ, uh, and I heard the lyrics, Why don’t presidents fight the war? Why do they always send the poor? And I’m, you know, probably 14 years old in the car and going, huh, my dad was poor and he had to go fight in Vietnam. Oh. And so it was kind of this big awakening. And a lot of that was simply because it was on the radio. I don’t know that I ever would have been exposed to it. Right. Do you think we lose something when we don’t have heavy music that’s so intrinsically tied? to activism and protest in mainstream sources like that? I think the idea of curation is something that we are losing because of the whole streaming world of music. And, you know, whether it’s through radio or other means, um, even just walking into a record store and talking to someone about, you know, if you’re a fan of punk music or, and you walk in and you hear a punk song, you’re like, Oh, I’ve never heard this. Who is this? And they tell you about it cause they’re fans of it and whatever they’re playing it. I think that we’re missing that now, you know, and I don’t know if streamers are going to be able to digi curate, um, their way through it, to be honest. Yeah, you end up with a lot more niches, which is awesome for the people who fall into those, and I’ve certainly fallen into my own, but, It seems like the days when a band as heavy as System of a Down would play on SNL, I mean, what a distant memory that feels like. And I, I also don’t know if you did fellow heavy bands any favors by getting banned from SNL, uh, that maybe didn’t, uh, help going forward. That didn’t help. Well, that was Darren. That was Darren. That was Darren as well. And he just gave it a loud, uh And, and, and yeah, but you know, it’s just, you know, when you’re an artist and you do what you do and then they change your environment and say, do what you do with cameras on and all of that, you’re still going to do what you do. Like when you’re feeling it, you’re feeling it, you know? Um, I want to talk about, uh, you know, your activism and system of down, uh, there’s the issue of potentially alienating fans, all of that, but then there’s the actual issue of you putting yourself in physical danger. Yeah. You played a show in 2005 after going to protest at Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert’s office for once again blocking a bill, um, uh, to recognize the Armenian Genocide and you learned that Turkish intelligence had been tracking your movements. What were your emotions like on stage thinking there may have been a sniper trained on you? I was scared as shit. I bet, man. Yeah. Yeah, for a good part of that tour. Um, you know, and the reason that we knew that is because, um, I, my head of security detail had friends in the FBI who had kind of given him a flag saying that this is happening just so you know, because of that action, because FBI. visited, um, at the time he was the Speaker of the House at U. S. Congress, Dennis Hastert. Uh, he was later indicted for, you know, um, he used to be a wrestling coach, so he was later indicted for touching young men, let’s say. Um, yeah, but not for the bribes that he allegedly took, um, from various sources for kind of blocking the vote for recognition of the Armenian Genocide because they thought it would come through at that time. Um, so yeah, I mean the politics gets in the way of music and life sometimes and there are many times that I’ve been on stage playing a show And there is so much other, you know, not personal stuff, but like, you know, security issues or whatever issues that you have to kind of work through. And it is really difficult. Um, it does add something to the music though. You’re not playing folk music. You’re playing a much higher tempo You’re playing a faster tempo. You’re just like f ing enraged, right? You’re just like, So if something’s gonna get me, I’m gonna, you know, run around like I was going left and right like a ping pong. People must have thought you were on drugs at that point. Probably, probably. But, um, but it does add something to the music, this tension, this thing. But, yeah. It seems like you almost talk about your commitment to the truth as being A little bit of a curse, in essence. You use the phrase naive a lot to describe your commitment to the truth. Do you still think it’s naive, or do you think it’s almost an inevitability? Like, as an artist, you must tell the truth no matter what. My drummer was also my brother in law in the band. Not my brother in law in the band, but brother in law in real life. It’s like having a work wife, you have a band brother in law. Kind of, kind of, yeah. So, uh, my drummer in law, that’s what I call him, John, he always, he always says, man, you’re just stubborn, you know, and maybe that’s what it is that, that I won’t give up the truth, you know, it’s one thing I am stubborn about, but I think it is inevitable, you know, um, when you’re dealing with, you know, you can’t, I can’t imagine myself ever saying publicly something that I don’t believe in. Like that to me is death. Yeah. Not physical death, but just reputational death or just, that’s not me. Right? Like, so it’s gotta be truthful, you know? Um, but that doesn’t mean it has to be critical, truthful. It doesn’t mean it has to be painful, truthful, or antagonistic, truthful, you know? So that’s That took me half a lifetime, if not more. So for course number two, we have the tabbouleh, lovely herb, and bulgur wheat salad. We have each, uh, just another bulgur wheat salad, all the more Armenian bent with some tomato in there. And then we have manti, uh, delightful dumplings stuffed with beef, a little bit of yogurt, and Aleppo pepper on there, and, uh, a tomato sauce. Can I dish you up? Yes, please. Uh, please, tell me about the food. Where does it come from? I mean, tabbouleh is pretty, you know, it’s, everyone knows it, it’s Middle Eastern, Mediterranean. Each is, I think, uh, uniquely Armenian, um, and I’ve had it since I was a kid. And manti, I think, is also Armenian. Um, manti takes a lot of time to make. Yeah. I remember, um, my, uh, Grandmother and my mom would work together making manti and in the last few years my mom’s, uh, hands, you know, through arthritis and stuff She hasn’t been able to do it And so she hasn’t been making manti but she used to make really good manti and she even used to make me Vegetarian manti at one point when when I was in eating meat. Yeah, she’d put in like, you know Soy meat or like, you know, you know, as long as you put enough spices, I’ve realized like enough onions and spices, like you can make anything taste really good. I think that’s the ultimate, uh, first generation, uh, immigrant story to America is be successful enough so your son decides to disgrace your cooking by becoming a vegetarian. That’s beautiful that you’re giving her that gift, Serge. That’s beautiful. I love that. I love that. Uh, please, dig in, man. Thank you. Uh, we got the Monty from Monty Factory because we figured. They’re a whole factory devoted to it. They make it a lot better than we would. Right. Mm. Amazing each. Mm mm. You guys made that in house? Mm hmm. We sure did. My compliments. We do actually have one more surprise dish for you, if we could, if we could bring it out. Um, it’s something you didn’t ask for, but it’s something that I would have been remiss. Do you know what this is? No. Uh, do you know what this material is called? Pot? Uh, someone called it terracotta. It’s a banana terracotta pie with Nilla wafers. It is indeed a banana terracotta pie. You talked about how much tension there is. See, it doesn’t look like terracotta because every time I see terracotta it’s like multiple colors. You know, but that is a te we have, I’ve never had a banana terracotta pie and now you can we’ll have it. No, we’ll have it for dessert. We can save it for dessert. Oh my god, this is amazing. If you wanna use this as like appropriation for your next visual arts piece, you absolutely can I’D to. How many people have asked you about that lyric or thought that it had something very deep entwined with it? A lot of people actually ask me, they’re like, what? The bananas are a metaphor and the terracotta you see is the, the globe around, but no, it’s, it’s just whatever. I mean, you know, I, it’s Dadaesque basically. I like creating relationships between things that don’t have a preexisting one. I was thinking of banana. I don’t know how it even came up in my head, but banana terracotta pie. Like I’m thinking, okay, so this is a banana, but what the, where’s the terracotta? Like, what does that have to do with the price of beans? Right. So it’s kinda, what I do remember is our producer, Rick Rubin at first, he was just like, when we were playing it in rehearsals, it was just the song. I can’t even say he. Like he didn’t like it at all like he was just like like we’d play it and he’d just be like what is that? Like he would just be like by the time that we actually went through recording it and he had heard it enough times He said it’s one of my favorite songs on the record. I can’t imagine putting out this record without this song It’s one of those that just kind of Hassle you into loving it, you know, it’s funny because you have Dada esque lyrics like banana terracotta pie, and then you have Incredibly literal lyrics where you are quoting peer reviewed studies on the efficacy of drug policy Do you think within that tension juxtaposition that like the silly makes the heavy heavier in a way? Yes, it makes it more palatable Because if you just preach, no one’s going to listen, but if you’re laughing, if you’re doing, you know, like you gave the prison song is a great example, you know, and then Darren comes in with this kind of funny Obama, crack my smack, my bitch, whatever. And he’s just like funny, you know, it’s like, and then, so it takes suddenly there’s a light mood and then boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, serious, serious light mood, you know, it’s like same with the music fast, slow, slow, fast, you know, or heavy and mellow, whatever. When faced with the question of, can music change the world, I thought you said something really insightful, that music changes your emotions, and your emotions can override logic, or your feelings can override logic, and that logic is what can change the world. It was funny, because I had just heard you talk about, Music changing your feelings, feelings changing logic, and I was, um, looking at one of your paintings called The Tortoise, recently, which you score all your own paintings, and it’s really sick, you guys gotta trust me, it’s really sick, you scan it with an app, it starts playing, it’s incredible, but I’m staring at this abstract painting, and, um, The score starts out, you know, kind of folky stringed instrument and kind of chanting in the background. It feels very, very reverent, very calming. And then it slowly sort of ramps up with a baseline. When the baseline kicks in, you physically feel your brain chemistry changing as you’re staring at this picture. And then a little bit of electric guitar, it’s kind of chopped and screwed a little glitch hoppy. And you can like physically feel your eyes move around the painting in a different way, but it was such an incredible microcosm of feeling the way that your emotions, your feelings change. in digesting art. Yeah. I mean, for years, before I started painting for years, I always wondered how it would be to score paintings like other people’s paintings. And one day I just decided to just paint myself. And my first painting, which is called disarming time, uh, basically had the first measure of the music painted on the canvas, you know, like with musical clef and And I, and the notes, I used clocks without arms to denote the notes on the actual canvas. Like we had a musical sheet, like huge painting and I loved it. It was, I loved the experience, but I also liked the painting itself. Like had the output been bad, I would have never continued. I now have over 120, 130 paintings that I’ve done all musically scored. And it’s really fun because you see people walking into a gallery, uh, either with headphones or not. And they, you know, we use this app called our looper, which is made by a tech company in Armenia, actually. And it’s an optical recognition app that recognizes the painting and just starts playing the music. And you just see people really getting deep into it because, you know, the more you interact with multiple senses through art, the more, uh, Of a stronger influence, a potent influence you can have. Um, so, you know, my goal is one day to do, to interact with all the senses, with a work of art. So you walk into a room, and you get this unique feeling, this unique, uh, existence, and then you walk into another room and it’s a completely different feeling. Um, I like that. I like that. If you need a consulting chef on the taste portion, Sarah, just come find me. My rates are incredibly affordable. Awesome, awesome. I would love that. I’ll pay you to do it. I would love that. They gotta eat the painting, though. Yeah. Yeah. I’ll be the first taste tester to see if it works out. Cool. Um, one of your earliest songs that ended up on the titular album System of a Down, but was actually written for a precursor of a band called Soil, was about your friend Paul, who had taken his own life. Yeah. And you’ve had a couple other people in your life, Anthony Bourdain, Chris Cornell, Um, you said there’s a line that sort of haunts you, it’s, uh, for reasons unknown, I believe. Undefined. Or for reasons undefined. Um, have you defined any of those reasons? How do you make sense of the senseless through art in that way? I don’t think I’ve been able to define it. Um, I mean, a lot of people say that, you know, um, depression is a disease, obviously, and that, you know, once you cross a threshold, then, then it’s a disease. Don’t expect logic to play, to interplay, you know, with anything like that. Um, yeah, Paul was my first friend, uh, who, uh, had passed away through suicide at a young age, and it really, really hurt me. And, uh, you know, it was a whole gang of friends that we had and it really, really like just threw us all off because we were all, you know, young and partying and having a good time, and then that happened and it just like, You know, it changed our lives. You told a story about him doing donuts in a friend’s car that he borrowed, and that took me back to almost an exact moment that I had with a similar friend. Oh, interesting. Did, did your friend pass away? Yeah, yeah. Suicide? Yep, suicide. Yeah, when I was, uh, you know, I’d lost touch with him, but it was when I was probably 25, but we all found out, and it was just funny how similar he seemed to Paul, that kind of You know, it was It started funny, some extroverted, some light drug use turned heavier turned darker. And none of us knew what to do watching that slide, but we could all sort of see it happen. Um, do you think there is any sort of prevention? Like could you have looked back at your relationship with Paul and said, here’s something I could have done or is that a pointless route to go down? You know it was after high school and stuff and we hadn’t seen each other in a while. So he wasn’t, You know, in our lives, my life. Um, but I wish that I did know, and I don’t know if it would have made a difference or not, but I think it’s always worth a try with a friend, especially, you know, a close friend. I think when you feel hopeless, the most dangerous thing for a human being is hopelessness, I think, you know, and when you feel hopeless, then, then you see those doors closing, you don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. That’s the most dangerous thing as far as what we’re talking about. And, you know, um, experiencing it with Chris Cornell, who’s also a, a dear friend, and I, I had just seen him months before, and he had a lot of dreams, I, you know, talked to him about, you know, uh, his work, and he wanted to, you know, he, he was touring with, Um, you know, Soundgarden, his own stuff, the, you know, solo material, the acoustic material. And I said, man, you got to do something with an orchestra. You got to sing with, I’ll, I’ll help you do the string arrangements or whatever you want. I’d help, I’d love to help you. Cause I want to hear your voice with an orchestra. We talked about that. He had a, a covers album in mind. Like he had a lot of plans, like, which is why I can’t understand, right? When you have a lot of plans, you don’t just shut them down in one day. Right? Like, it doesn’t make sense. Still, still undefined for me. It sucks that we almost view it as a necessary, or at least inevitable, tax to pay, both in music and in food. I mean, it seems like there’s, watching you and Bourdain together, it was like you were kissing cousins, right? You seemed like, like brothers who had known each other for so long. But, uh, Suicide and Depression seemed like this thing that we just sort of assume is like, Oh, well, they made great art together. Because they were depressed, or at least they were inextricably linked, um, Bourdain was the first person, the first celebrity death that really hit me hard because that was all the stuff that I was chasing, right? I had him as a North Star that was like, if I could achieve that life, travel the world, tell stories, meet interesting people, eat the best food, then I would be happy, and I think it broke a lot of illusions for people in the food industry. Do you think that it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy when we view those things as linked? Emotional strife and great art. I mean, I’ve always, you know, it’s kind of funny because Darren in my band, he’s always been the guy that says, Oh, you know, he, he has breakthroughs through, you know, difficult times like for him, you know, there are people, I have other friends, you know, amazing artists that, that, that, that live in, uh, That world where they think that there’s got to be struggle to create great art and there’s there’s a lot of truth to that as well But in my case and in my life that hasn’t been the case, you know, I think creativity is something that you do Cooking is something that you do. Yeah, you know, it’s and if you do it enough you become Badass at it. You just do it because you’re meant to do it and it’s your art and it’s beautiful, you know, and, and you don’t have to cry over it. You know, sometimes certain things you do have to cry over and, and maybe that, that’s your way of getting through that tunnel, right? Which is also beautiful, but not everything has to be gloomy and doomy. Search for the final course of your final meal. We have knefeh jibneh. This is a soft, stretchy cheese. Topped with a shredded pastry dough, a ton of sugar syrup, and then crushed pistachios. This is one of the world’s greatest desserts, man. I’m so happy. Yum. And then we have the Armenian coffee from Kabat, your own coffee company, along with, if one coffee wasn’t enough, we have the iced oat milk latte over here. I’m gonna drink both. On camera. This is the official pledge that I’m gonna drink both these coffees with you. We’re riding the lightning today. Uh, you’re in the coffee business now. Tell me. I am. I am, uh, we started Cavat Coffee in 2018, mostly as an online business with, um, and then we just opened up the cafe a couple of months ago in Eagle Rock. I wanted to create, my first idea was to create organic Armenian coffee, because most Armenian coffees are not organic. And so that, that’s what got us started. And then, uh, Now we have a line of espressos and, you know, mixed drinks and all of that. And you can find it at the cafe and yeah, it’s fun. It’s a, it’s a fun thing. It is fun, man. I’ve, I’ve been to the cafe to try the Armenian coffee. One, if you don’t think so serious about coffee, he’s got a guy. His name is George and George is literally doing QC on the coffee to make sure that this is through properly. Shout out the George over there. Um, but this is absolutely delicious. How is Armenian coffee? Different than like your standard American drip coffee. It’s the way it’s prepared. I mean, uh, first of all, you have to, uh, It’s very finely ground, uh, and then you prepare it in a cauldron in a pot Over fire rather than you know through a machine. So there’s no machine And uh water first and then some people add sugar second and then coffee third Uh, and depending the water will like depending on the volume of the cup how many People are drinking, you make it accordingly. So you literally use your coffee cup to measure the water. How funny. Um, and then they say that you’re supposed to boil it over three times for it to really, you know, kind of bring out the taste and all of that. And of course the sediments settle on the bottom. So once you’re done drinking and enjoying it, you’re supposed to flip your cup around and let the sediments kind of create a mysterious world, a mythical world, um, that you can. There are coffee cup readers, you know? I vow to read your coffee fortune at the end if you read mine. Okay, I’ll do it. We’re doing it. I’m doing it. When’s the first time you had a Knäffeägebne? I can’t remember. I must have been really young. Um, but it’s, it’s just an amazing, I mean it is like so sugary. It’s just like, it’s gonna make you happy immediately. I’ve literally been salivating looking at this. Honey cheese pastry, it’s just like, It’s just ridiculous. Mm. Mm. Wow. The way that the silly makes the heavy heavier, man. The sweet makes the bitter more bitter. Bitter interplaced with the sweet. This is, Chase, this is symphony right here. It is. This is it. It is. It’s like this balance. I want to talk about finding truth through art that you can only sort of get through lived experience. When you were in Beirut, you were living through the Lebanese Civil War at the time. You’re somebody that actually knows. What it’s like to be bombed. And your song tentative, you strike this great juxtaposition between people talking about bombings in a very disaffected way, and then the very pointed question of, you know, where are we supposed to go in the bombs fall? I mean, in my case, I was, I was really young. I was seven years old. My brother was four and I remember crouching in our bedroom, uh, when, when the Lebanese civil war started and the bombs were falling and we couldn’t go to school, And we were kind of, you know, trapped inside the house, but we were still fine, you know, but just hearing a bomb fall and like crouching, it is so random. It feels so random. And that is really, I mean, forget the fact that we were a child, even as an adult, that would be, you know, we get earthquakes here and it freaks us out, right? Earthquake is not a decision made by a human being, you know, bombings are so, I mean, you know, I mean, we’re seeing it now in Gaza, obviously, you know, with Israel and Palestine, and I can’t imagine what those people are going through, the trauma that children are going through, you know? It’s like, what we’ve done to the planet is really messed up, you know, and it doesn’t have to be this way. It’s just the wrong priorities, profits over people generally. And land and, you know, um, religion, just, just all of, you know, I wish we could go back 10, 000 years and before we started agriculture and just tell everyone, keep on walking. Yeah, there’s There’s some elk around the corner wherever you come from. Don’t worry about it. Keep on walking, you know Yeah, there’s a quote from Maximilian Weber I believe it’s 1918 that a state is only defined by its monopoly on violence. We saw you know in 2018 Armenia went through a velvet revolution a decentralized civil disobedience where it was very very strictly called for that like no Violent act shall take place Do you think that that is a valid tactic moving forward to actually affect change in the world or do Do you simply think we’re, uh, f ed, I believe is the term. When, when the revolution happened and people, you know, I came, I went to Armenia during the revolution and then I, I, people were incredibly elated. Like, um, I mean, I’ve seen happy people. I’ve seen people partying, rock and reel, 120, 000 people partying to heavy music. That’s happy, very happy. But elation is a different visual. When people are elated, their eyes are like, full in a way that you can’t describe as happy. It’s way beyond. It’s another level. And when I got back, when people were like, what did it feel like? Like, I mean, what, what are the technicalities of it? I said, well, I said, well, imagine 30 million Americans protesting and shutting down DC. That’s what it would be like. Yeah. You know? I mean, that’s, Huge right like as a percentage and their technique as you well described was decentralized civil disobedience Which is a unique technique never used previously in revolutions Which means instead of sitting in the square and having the police come and arrest you You know you block a street when they come to arrest you you run Wait for them to leave then you come and block the street again or better It’s like Benny Hill right like so In the end, you, they just give up because, like, you prove to them that the people are more powerful than, than any system that exists. You mentioned that hopelessness is the worst thing that humanity can have. Uh, we seem like we’re in a unique point of hopelessness in human history, whether it’s justified or not. Um, where does hope lie for you in the future? My kids, I guess. You know, I’m hopeful because of them. For them. Yeah. I mean, you know, at one point in my life, I didn’t want to have kids, you know, and I told my girlfriend at the time, it was my wife now. And she’s like, well, I do. So that changed simple, but I’m, I’m more than happy that I, you know, had a child and wanted more, I think. And, and, and it was that reason though. It was that I think we, you know, I was looking around and going, what are, what are we doing here? Like, what are we doing to this planet? What kind of life are my kids going to live? You know, in the last few weeks we had what? 114, 115 degrees Fahrenheit here in the valley or more and more. What gives you hope? You know, I studied political science in college during the Arab Spring. I used to have very hard and fast beliefs about politics. And I mentioned I wrote about agriculture earlier. I had hard and fast beliefs, and then I realized that all my beliefs were doing were pissing people off in a very, um, you know, a non productive way. And I found that I can, um, be a lot more productive by telling other people’s stories and making, um, people happy and, uh, I think the hope that I actually have is the tattoo that I have on my lower back that was, uh, responsible for raising 300, 000 meals for underserved kids because our fans decided to donate 30, 000 if I got a back tattoo. That’s amazing. I guess that’s my short answer. That’s right. My lower back tattoo. Look, you’re making change and it’s great that And it’s what you first said as well, it’s the small things, you know, opening a door, not honking at someone even though you kind of want to, because they’re doing the same thing you’ve done. They’re a little longer on their phone or whatever. It’s okay, you know, like, you know how in the Bible they say at the end of times we will be judged as good or bad, right? Like this kind of division. I think that to me is either the understanding of everything is connected or not. Because if everything is connected, then I am you and you are me. And if everything is not, then we’re separate. Yeah, that’s good and bad. So what do you think happens after you die? Whether we are connected or whether we’re not connected? I’ve read a lot about near death experiences. Oh wow. I think, I find that fascinating, because it’s actually empirical scientific proof of people that have, you know, uh, what do you call it, flat lined and come back. Yeah. And the stories that they tell, the, kind of like a stairway to the sky, or, through a tunnel and a nonjudgmental beings, um, kind of arriving and showing them the way and giving them the option to either come back or, you know, or reside. Um, it definitely flips the whole Judeo Christian thing of heaven and hell in a whole different way. But And there’s been thousands of these cases, you know, a lot of different books written about them. I find them incredibly interesting. If anyone wants to know where you go, I mean, these are regular people that have died and come back. Now, there’s, of course, there’s explanations of certain neurons firing that may make you see certain things and stuff. Dimethyltryptamine, explosia. Correct. Not everything can be explained away by these circumstances. So, very interesting. Are you afraid to die at all? I’m not afraid to die. I’m afraid to leave my children without a father. Yeah. You ready to get into the lightning round? Yeah. We gotta read each other’s fortunes, though. Did you crash the coffee? Oh, no I haven’t. Okay, so we have the cell to the bottom. Drink, drink, drink. Let’s flip that. Okay. You’re supposed to put it at an angle as well. Uh oh. Uh oh. Well, we said we’d finish these. We gotta do it. Yeah, yeah, we gotta do it. Cheers. Can we get the banana terracotta pie for the lightning round, please? Terracotta pie. Hey, terracotta pie. The more coffee you drink, the faster you’re gonna be able to sing it. Oh my god, I am so gacked right now. The coffee, I’m like Brother, there is no going back. Wow, there is no going back. Wow. This is one person, that I would like to share your actual last meal with. Don’t talk. Yes sir. That is too good. Oh my god. That’s f ing incredible. Thank you. I, Nicole made it. Nicole. Nicole, good job. That’s incredible. I’m taking this. No, I’m just kidding. Take it. No. The terracotta is yours. I can’t talk. Game over. Keep eating, man. No, I’m here for you to ask you a question when you want to. Sorry, what’d you say? Who’s the one person dead or alive you’d want to share your actual last meal with? My wife. Yeah. Uh, what song do you want to be played at your funeral? Ooh. Or are you going to score your own funeral? You guessed it. I think I am. Who’s your dream eulogizer? Have you heard of the Georgian women that are paid to come to weddings that pull their hair and cry like crazy? Yes, the professional grievers. Yes. Oh my God, get a whole group of them. Uh, what’s your biggest fear? Fear itself. What’s the hardest goodbye you’ve ever had to say? I guess to my friends that have passed. Yeah. Who’s one artist that you would love to collaborate with that you haven’t yet? Tom Waits. Tom Waits. What’s your greatest regret in life? Selling my software company, Ultimate Solutions 1. You wish you still had it. I wish I still had it. Never should’ve, it should’ve stayed in the software. Never get out of software. Never get out of software. I almost put software salesman in your, uh, bio and I didn’t. That’s right. That’s right. I love it. Finally, Serge, are you happy? I am. Happiness is a choice. It’s not something that happens to you, you know? I’ve had a very difficult couple of weeks. Very unsettled. Um, you made me happy. This made me happy. I mean, it’s a choice. Yeah. So, thank you. Serge, you have made me incredibly happy today. Truly, thank you for The awesome words, and thank you for sharing your stories, man, about life, family, Terracotta 5. This is incredible. Thank you. Of course, of course, I’m going to deliver your last words to that camera right there. My last word. Cheers. Cheers. Thank you. Of course. Oh, we gotta read each other’s fortunes real quick. Yes, let’s do it. Is it settled? Mine’s only one sided, but I think you can make something of it. Okay, I’ll take that. Oh, I see it. Yeah, no, it’s the grooves right there. Mm hmm. Yeah. System of a Down releases four more albums in the 2030s! Oh my god! Is that? Oh, no. No, that wasn’t it. I find your cup very interesting because, unlike my cup, where all of the sediments are on one side, creating a mountain or whatever you want to come to, yours is So when I spin it around, like a carousel, you’re thinking about many things. I see a father reading a book to a child. You want me to show you? Actually, yeah. Oh my god. I don’t know if you can see it. No, I actually do see it. It’s like sitting down reading a book. Could be a mother, but I thought father. Up to the sky. Everything’s up to the sky. Like your intentions are clear. I thought this was going to be a silly bit and now I feel bad that I didn’t actually try on yours. I mean, it is a silly bit. Dancing woman between two different, uh, poles. Hold it, hold it. I don’t mean like, I mean like, I mean like south and north. I’ve been practicing actually. Great core strength. What an incredible experience. Serge, I cannot thank you enough. Everyone make sure to check out Cop Out Coffee. And check out Down With The System, a memoir of sorts. A memoir of sorts. A memoir of sorts, a really fantastic book that made such an impact on me, and I know you all will love it. Thank you so much, man. This was really incredibly fun. This was incredible. Thank you, all of you, you know, who made all this food. And, and, I’m like, blown away. I’m like, totally coffeed out. I’m ready to run a marathon around this building. We gotta finish this. This is not going on drank. Cheers. I’m so mad I didn’t ask Serge about why eating seeds is a pastime activity for him, but what a special episode that was, along with all the other ones. I really hope you all enjoyed. I hope you’re not thinking about death too much right now, unless that’s a very productive thing for you to do. then by all means, please do it. But thank you so much for sticking around with us this year. We got plenty more Last Meals and other Mythical Kitchen episodes coming into the future until we spiral into the entropic heat death of the universe. May it be far, far away. We’ll see you next time. We all got to eat and we’re all dying to see you in our Last Meals merch. We’ve got a tie dye hoodie, a hat, and a tee all available now at mythical. com.