What the Heck is Mushroom Coffee?
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What?

Welcome to our podcast, A Hot Dog is a Sandwich, the show we break down the world's biggest food debates. I'm your host, Josh Scherr. And I'm your host, Nicole Inaidi. And I am actually not currently drinking mushroom coffee. I'm drinking Celsius Energy Drink. God, do I need it right now? But we're about to drink a bunch of different mushroom coffees. And this is actually something that I've never had before. Me either, which is why I really wanted to do this. I want to experience something new.

Same. This is the episode where Nicole and Josh don't understand something, and so then we learn about it ourselves and then also teach it to you. Yeah, it's like Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, but Josh and Nicole eat mushrooms and go to Erewhon. Not those kind of mushrooms. No, no, no. We're not eating those kinds of mushrooms. Darren, that might be the first question to quell here, that these are not psychedelic, psychotropic mushrooms. No psychosilobin. Psilocybin. No psychosilobin.

psilocybin is in these mushrooms. But some people say that they are adaptogenic, which we have spoken about whenever we did that like cool new soda taste test like a few months ago. Yeah. So when we're talking about mushroom coffee, there are a bunch of new like bottled drinks that are out there on supermarket shelves. There are products like mud water that is a coffee alternative. We do have mud water. That was the first time. Mud water is the first time that

I heard of mushroom coffee at all. Me too. I love the ad because it was a surfer guy who's like, people were asking me like, bro, what's in my cup? Looks like mud. And I'm like, yeah, that's because it is mud water. And that blonde haired surfer dude was like the coolest guy I've ever seen in like a Facebook targeted ad ever.

So I had a buddy that worked for Mudwater, my old college roommate, and he sounds exactly like that and lives that lifestyle. I knew it. I knew it. It makes sense. But this is part of a larger trend of we're killing all of our drink idols that we kind of grew up with in a way, right? What do you mean by like Mountain Dew? Yes. Actually, yes. Like the new Mountain Dew is Olipop. They have something. It's like.

They switch mountain to like slope and dew to like rain or something. There's an Olipop version of Mountain Dew that's very similar and it's like, I can't remember the name of it. Dew Drop Slope. Like Hillside Rush or something like that. Cute, cute, cute. But yeah, but we are going through this big evolution where we're realizing that maybe all the drinks that our parents drank for decades maybe aren't the best for us or there are other alternatives and I think mushroom coffee is very much that

For, you know, the world's most popular beverage that's been drank for thousands of years. Well, for me, all of the, like, ads and the trends I've seen, it's like it's 50% coffee and 50% adaptogenic mushroom powder. Yes. Like, that's like the through line through all of these, the majority of these products and everything I've seen. They say that mushrooms reduce inflammation. They're anti-cancer. They're doing all these incredible things. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, do you really think that drinking, I don't know, whatever this is, Republic LA instant mushroom coffee that has focus and energy on it will like help you beat cancer? I don't think so. Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. No, that's the absolute key. Well, okay, it's like saying broccoli helps beat cancer.

It does because broccoli has... As compared to like what? Like a cheeseburger? If you ate broccoli instead of smoking a whole pack of cigarettes, your cancer rate will drop. No, like broccoli has a bunch of micronutrients in it. It has fiber. And like fiber is the biggest way to prevent colorectal cancer as far as I know. And so sure, broccoli fights cancer, but it's like...

Eating broccoli every day for decades might decrease your chances by a fraction of a percent, which is, like, great. You should eat broccoli. You should eat fiber. Broccoli's good. There are things in mushrooms. So when we're talking about mushrooms, these aren't just, like, ground-up button mushrooms or cremini mushrooms. No, these are, like, chaga mushrooms, reishi mushrooms, turkey tail mushrooms. I've never seen these mushrooms, like, ever in, like, the wild. Like, I've never seen them, like, at the grocery stores, but I know that they have roots in, like, Eastern medicine and stuff like that.

Yeah, so a lot of them do have roots in Eastern medicine, also even dating back to the Roman times. Like mushrooms have been eaten for thousands of years by people. I weep for the people who had to be the guinea pigs to find out which mushrooms you can and can't eat.

Oh, yeah, like the berries in the forest? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So many people throughout history and antiquity just dead because somebody was like, does this mushroom make you strong? Like, no, that makes you poop your pants until you're dead. We'll use that for poison later. Sure. Exactly, exactly. But like the Romans believe that mushrooms made you strong. And I do generally think not to get too woo on this. Too what? Too woo. I don't know what. Do you know the term woo? No. Do you know the term woo, Maggie? Yeah.

I've heard the term woke. No. Not woke, woo. Woo is in like granola, crunchy, spiritual. Oh, okay. Like not to get too woo here, but I do think if an idea has persisted for like thousands of years as in, say, Eastern medicine or even in like different Western folk medicine traditions of like, hey, this mushroom is good for you. Probably drink it. It prevents headaches or whatever. I think there's some truth to that.

I don't think that tradition would have stood for thousands of years if there was nothing to it. I agree with you. And there actually is a fair amount of modern science coming out that...

You can say it. Adaptogenic properties in mushrooms are actually great for human health. The science is very, very new, but a lot of this has been done on what they call the cellular level. For humans or rats? Oh, a human or rat. Have you seen Ratatouille? Them rats are out here cooking. Have you seen Pizza Rat? The rats are basically humans these days. Have I seen it? Yes, of course. Now, the thing that I really want to dive into is,

Cordyceps because the first time I ever learned about Cordyceps was when everybody else learned about Cordyceps, which was it ends with us. Is that what the show is called? Oh, yeah. I never watched it. Is that with Pedro Pascal? Yeah. And come on. Bella Ramsey. Bella Ramsey. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They were great in Game of Thrones. So all I remember is that Cordyceps and that is bad, but Cordyceps is good now.

That's the thing? Cordyceps are bad in It Ends With Us? Well, the cordyceps are what turn humans into the mushroom freaks, mushroom head freaks. Oh, no! There's mushroom head freaks? What's that show about? Mushroom head freaks! That should have been the name of the show, because it tells you the story right off the bat. It's an adaptation of a really cool video game, apparently. Not one that I've ever played, because I've never played a video game before in my life.

But cordyceps apparently have, again, like all this anti-inflammatory like properties and stuff like that. And you can actually buy them dried. And I think we've cooked them on the show once before. And they are quite delicious. So out of all the mushrooms that are in these products, the cordyceps are the only ones that are like culinary adjacent, I would say. I think there's one. No, there's one more. There's one more. And it's getting more popular. I buy it at farmer's markets. Tell me.

It's good. I had it at a vegan restaurant and they roasted it and they just called it... Lion's Mane? Yeah, Lion's Mane. They called it a short rib, but it was kind of just a roasted mushroom. Lion's Mane. It was weird. Yeah, I have seen. People are like, oh my God, it's so good for you, this and that and the other. Is it really? I enjoy eating Lion's Mane mushrooms. I like to fry them like I'd fry a chicken. I love... Here's the thing. Fried chicken sandwich is one of the greatest food in the world, but if you fry mushrooms...

It might even be better. I kind of don't miss the chicken. I like a fried troon. I consider that worse for me than a fried chicken sandwich, so I'm not doing it for health benefits. Because it has no protein. Yeah, to me, the chicken is the medicine I'm after. Right, right, right. Because I believe in the ancient medicine that you eat a bunch of chicken breast and you go to the gym six times a week and you get big and then you love yourself. And so that's what I believe in.

But no, lion's mane mushrooms are the other one that I'm like, oh, I cook with those as well. Right, right, right. Okay, so here is an article from harvardhealth.edu. In case you didn't believe any of this stuff, according to a recent review published in the journal Molecules, medicinal mushrooms popular in many fungi-infused coffee blends do have immune-boosting properties and may help regulate metabolism. Thanks to high antioxidant activity, medicinal mushrooms may also help slow down the aging process. I'm going to be young and beautiful if I drink this every day.

Young and beautiful Will you still love me?

My qualm is this. Why did we decide to – why did we as a society decide to mix it with coffee of all things? Because if there were like stands out there that were just like broth stands, I would probably find myself going more towards the broth stand. That would probably have a mushroom broth, a delicious savory mushroom broth, and I would just drink that on the go. Great question. Such a good question. Why? Why coffee? Why coffee?

I kind of never even questioned that. Mushrooms are much better in soup than coffee. Yeah, like what sort of person or group of people was like, you know what? We're going to mix a savory thing like mushroom powder. Is it savory? Yes, I'd say it is. I mix that with 50% instant coffee, serve it to you, hope you have a good day. You know who actually did invent it? Who? The Finns, baby. Finnish people? The kings of Eurovision, the Finns. Actually, yeah, no. So mushroom coffee. No way.

During World War II and any time, any wartime basically, people ran out of coffee and they found different brown things and roasted it and soaked water in it. Like date seeds. Like date seeds, like it's the origin of chicory coffee in America, acorn coffee, barley coffee, all this stuff. And in Finland, they had mushroom coffee. And it likely was chaga mushrooms. Chaga mushrooms. And so that is like one of the origins of it.

But I think there's another problem where Americans particularly, one, boy, do we love a health fad. I think it was Michael Pollan who said, like, it's bizarre that, like, one of the least healthy countries on Earth is the most obsessed with health. I think it's because we just want to do it quickly. We just want, we want that magic pill. We want that, like, we want that Ozempic.

We wanted something to solve all of our problems. And also we love industry and capitalism and novelty. And so like here we are with a bunch of mushroom coffee that was developed in wartime rationing in Finland. But also, yeah, we're super over-caffeinated as a society. Finland does drink the most coffee per capita, but there's not a lot of data on this. I want to find out who drinks the most caffeine. Coffee versus caffeine, yeah, yeah. Have you ever like gone to another country? I have many a time. And you get a cup of coffee.

And the cup of coffee is like three to four ounces. Oh. Or like watered down. Yeah. And then you go to a Starbucks. Oh, yeah. And you say, give me 24 ounces of cold brew. And they'll give it to you. That's nuts. Like that is baffling to a lot of the rest of the world. I think you're right. Coffee is a tiny thing. So we drink way too much caffeine in America. So you cut it with –

and then that's solving two problems at once. So I think that's why they do that instead of just making a Go-Gurt packet of cream of cordyceps soup. I think that... Listen, I'm so for opening up broth stands in America instead because, like you said, the protein... We love protein so much. Why not just have broth stands with bone broth? Chicken bone... Listen, chicken bone broth, beef broth, mushroom broth, call it a day, and then you run out, and then whatever. I would...

LA doesn't have the ecosystem to support that because we don't have enough foot traffic. Not if you sell it the right way, yo. Anything is possible. Anything. If they can be selling mushroom coffee for $10, we can be selling broth stands for $5. You're saying broth stands? Yeah, not brothels. Not brothels. You want to call them brothels? No, they have the, what are they called? The Bunny Ranch? I grew up watching that HBO show. That's weird. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah.

Yeah, why were we able to watch that as children? Josh, the fact that

I like the fact that you used to watch that, and so did I. It's so telling. I think the head of that legal brothel ran for governor. Was he the governor? He was the mayor of Nevada, I believe, and he hooked up with Heidi Fleiss, who was also a famous man. Oh, my God, Heidi Fleiss. You remember? Yeah, I watched that TV movie. You watched that TV movie? We had the same childhood. Josh, what's wrong with us? Why did nobody censor us as children? We were watching Gag and HBO entirely to ourselves.

It's so funny thinking about kids consuming TikTok today, and now that I'm like a 32-year-old man, I'm like, oh, the kids aren't going to be all right. And then I think about the access to the internet that I had, where I'm just like, that was worse. That was 100% worse. Rotten.com, that was worse. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Thanks a lot, Rotten.com. It was the world's atrocities. But at least then you had to like, you had to wait for five minutes of dial-up to see the world's atrocities. Yeah.

Do you want to drink any of these or do you want to chat some more? Let's drink them. I'm down for you to chat. I'm enjoying this conversation. What else did we chat about? We chatted about all the things to chat about? Okay, whatever. I'm done talking to you. Do you think that you would actually want to ever drink this as a daily thing? As like rip a Celsius energy drink? I don't know.

You know, I do like what? One coffee a day, maybe two coffees a day if I'm really feeling it. Like I'm not really that like obsessed with my coffee. I have a fantastic little coffee maker. I love my... I don't even have an espresso anymore. What do I have? I have a... Breville? I have a Breville espresso maker. Nice. And it really... You know, I put my collagen peptides in there. I get 20 grams of protein. My morning is pretty much set. I have some Fair Life milk. I was looking to expand my...

vibration I think I would have more mushroom coffee but no I wouldn't do this we're doing this because we have free will but my will isn't free enough that I would do this everyday also it's very expensive it's too expensive for me I cannot rationalize spending 8 to 10 dollars on a cup of coffee we're preventing cancer

Why don't I just drink more water? Doesn't that also prevent cancer? In ways, I'm sure it does. There's just a finite amount of powders that I have room for in my life. You have a lot of powders. And I already have powders. I have powders. You take so many powders. I don't take that many powders. I have the protein powders. I have the creatine powders. I still have half a bottle of ashwagandha pills that I'm determined to finish one day. What does that do for you? That's an adaptogen. That's kind of like the adaptogen. These are adaptogens. I know. It's all adaptogens. What's an adaptogen?

We explained it in a previous episode. It's just kind of a thing. It's just a thing. It's nothing really, is it? A lot of adaptogens come from mushrooms and they might regulate your stress hormones. That's what a therapist told me. Oh, this helps regulate your cortisol levels? I don't know. I'll take 50 right now.

As you just doom scroll on your phone, maybe the mushrooms will help. You know, Colby was asking me what my vice was, and I said doom scrolling is my vice. And I realize how sad that is because people are like, I drink, I smoke, I have casual sex. And then I'm just like on my phone for two hours and just scroll and see what's going on. I like to sports bet on Ukrainian table tennis leagues. That's my vice.

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I'm Robin Robinson, host of the new podcast, The Women's Hoop Show. Each episode, I'll be joined by a rotating group of women's basketball experts to talk WNBA, college hoops, the new unrivaled league, and the shifting landscape of the sport. The game is growing, and so are we. Listen to and follow The Women's Hoop Show and Odyssey podcast, available now for free on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts.

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So we're going to try La Republica Instant Mushroom Coffee. Let's go. I'm going to read the... Instant, not even fresh brewed. I'm going to read some things on this package while you take your first sip and you mull it over, okay? So this package contains lion's mane, chaga, reishi, turkey tail, cordyceps, maitake, and shiitake. I know those. This has...

more culinary mushrooms than I was assuming. Bro, this is soup. But the tasting notes, rustic chocolate, toasted almonds, and rich earth. That do be tasting like rich earth. Yeah. Do you have any open sores in your mouth? I have no. I have no HSV-1 flare-ups. I have herpes simplex one, but herpes simplex one does not have me. Let me know when you're done. I'll have a sip. That is delightful. If you just told me that was a...

type of brewed coffee from a country that I've never been to, if you're like, hey, this is Eritrean-style coffee... I would have said, hell yeah! I would have been like, yeah! I've had that before and lied. I'm cultured. No, but there are really deep chocolate notes. There is a bitterness to it. Obviously, coffee is already a bitter thing. Right. None of these are sweetened unless stated otherwise. But when it comes to coffee, a lot of people have their specific beans and their specific roast and their specific coarseness of grind and all this stuff. What I have...

is there's a company called Don Francisco and Don Francisco makes like a vanilla hazelnut free ground coffee that I buy for like $7 a tin over at the Ralph's. And I dump it into my Mr. Coffee coffee machine. Actually, I upgraded. I now have a ninja drip coffee maker that costs like $40. He has money.

$40 I do indeed have. And so I don't like go out of my way to brew nice coffee. To me, coffee is like a nice medicine and half the time I'm adding protein. Coffee is medicine and chicken is medicine? Actually, yes. And creatine is medicine. Great. I'm happy for you that you're well-medicated. I'm so happy.

These are the powders that improve my life. Creatine makes me big and strong. Protein makes me big and strong in a different way. And then caffeine makes my brain catch up to how big and strong I'm getting. Oh, my gosh. You know what I mean? But that is the way that I think about my own supplementation. And then ashwagandha does nothing to calm me down. And I have turmeric pills because I saw Tony Hawk in a commercial for him. Turmeric pills? Q-Nol turmeric. Is that why your skin is so orange?

Oh, my gosh.

For 12 fluid ounces, you get 175 milligrams of caffeine. Is that a lot, Mr. Josh? That is quite a lot. FDA caps your recommended daily intake of caffeine at 400 milligrams per day. Oh, my gosh. But this is 12 ounces, 175 milligrams. So a cup of coffee is a really weird thing. We've talked about this before. A cup in culinary terms or scientific terms is 8 fluid ounces. Correct. But when people calculate a cup of coffee, they do it as 6 ounces. Okay.

I think because that might be the measurement of the old styrofoam cups that were always like at a coffee water cooler inside an office. Mm-hmm.

So that's a really weird thing. So if this is two cups of coffee, 175 milligrams, somewhat standard, more on the high side, I'd say. Nuts. But 175, like Celsius says 200. Red Bull standard 8.3 ounce can only has, I believe, 87 or 78. Really? Yeah, Red Bull got sued because they don't have enough caffeine. Wow. And then these are the three mushrooms. So Lion's Mane, 300 milligrams, Cordyceps, 300 milligrams, and Turkey Tail, 300 milligrams. I'm going to take a sip.

Down the hatch you go. The thing with mushroom coffee is this kind of stuff like only affects the people who have enough disposable income to sort of... This is rich people BS. This is rich people BS, right? That's what we're going at? This is rich people Etsy BS. These are people who like to go on Etsy and spend their money on crystals, which I don't know if they work or not, but I choose to believe that they don't work. Uh-huh.

And they're like, I'm going to drink mushroom coffee instead of regular coffee and my life is going to improve. Definitely. I have a question about your personal finances. Bring it on, baby. I don't know anything about them. I want to be one of those personal finance podcast hosts who's just like... Caleb Hammer? Oh, my God. Oh, I don't like those videos. Oh, they make me so uncomfortable. Oh, my God. I love Caleb Hammer videos. You don't know your take home? You don't know your... We particularly cast you because we think you're an idiot and we want to make fun of you. You don't know your take home? They're sitting there just like, oh, I got to check.

But anyways, do you think that you buy more little trinkets and knickknacks because it seems so insurmountable to actually save up for a house? Do you think that I buy little trinkets and knickknacks? Do you assume that I buy? You're out here with collagen peptides and all these little knickknacky things. Is that a knickknack? I think it's a knickknack. I don't know. Does it work?

I'm out here drinking creatine. Do I consume more protein because of that? And does my... Has my diet improved because of it? Yes, that's not a knick-knack. Do I buy things because I think I can never afford a house? Is that what you're asking me? Yeah, so it feels easier just to like buy like an $8 thing to bring you joy because I feel that way constantly. I'm so like optimistic and stupid that I think I'll be able to buy a house one day. They're so expensive in Los Angeles. I know. I don't know what we're going to do. I... Buy an $8 coffee about it and think that it's improving your life. Just buy...

Link up with somebody, build a compound, I'll have one little corner of it. I've been asking you for months about this compound thing. I know, we gotta get the compound off the ground. You're married now, you're married now. I'm still writing the manifesto, I mean Bible, I mean foundational text of our compound. I've told you about this compound for months and it's not a bad idea and I think it would be more helpful if you just did that. We'd all just live off the land. I could learn how to farm and milk a cow.

This upsets me. I hate that. I already don't like cold brew as it is. I don't think it's the mushrooms. I think it's the cold brew. Sometimes.

Sometimes certain cold brews taste like soy sauce and kombucha, and that's no one's fault other than the coffee. We've done a couple. Nicole and I aren't experts on a lot of things, right? Oh, no. Coffee is one of those things that we're not big experts. I think we're experts on taste in general and generally are knowledgeable about the food space. But, like, actual coffee brewing isn't. We did a podcast, like, is cold brew overrated, where I fully stand by my assessment that, like,

There was nothing wrong with iced coffee, with coffee that was brewed hot and then chilled, and that's enjoyable. Drinking this, it's not the mushrooms that's making this taste bad. The coffee is disgusting. It's the cold brew. This is terrible. And it has this, like, coppery, sulfuric...

taste that I went to like a I was doing a little hot girl walk around my neighborhood I know I saw you put your sunglasses on and go no not today I'm talking about like a couple weeks ago and I wandered upon a new little coffee shop and I was like mmm yum I'm gonna treat myself and it's like in like a big antique store that I think got really successful and they're like well we're gonna open up the coffee shop of our dreams and I got a cold brew for like six dollars and I was like oh god and it was just the worst tasting thing Nicole for me to not finish caffeine that's a lot it's a lot I had to throw it in the trash it was so bad did you put any sweetener in it? it tasted like that

No, I love black coffee. I love the taste of black coffee. But a lot of cold brews, they just get disgusting and hyper acidic. And do you remember, let's put Smosh on blast here. Do you remember the first brand or the first batch of Smosh's cold brew coffee? Yeah, of course I do. And it was like something happened in the industrial process. And we said, did something happen? And then they found out something did. And was like, yeah, something did happen. It was brewed in the same, it was brewed in the same brand.

That kombucha was brewed in. And like live cultures got into the coffee or something. And they never washed it down properly, I believe. Again, please, Ian, fact check us. No, they fixed it. They fixed it. Yeah, it was good. But this tastes like that first batch. Yes. That's why I said it tastes like soy sauce and kombucha. There's something going on in there and I don't like it. Well, that's a bummer. Okay, well, let's try... Mud? Mud?

Mud water. Mudwitter. I'm going to read the... Give it to me. I want to read it. You read it. I'll take a sip of mud water. This is my first mud water I've ever had. Okay. Cacao, masala, chai, cordyceps, lime, main, reishi, chaga, turmeric, and Himalayan salt. So there's no coffee in here.

Yeah, so Mudwater was sold completely as a coffee alternative. Yum! And if you're looking for just a brown, delicious beverage to wake you up in the morning without caffeine, real lifting heads here will know the term stim-free. This is your stim-free pre. It's really yummy. You have stim-free pre or are you going pro-stim on your pre?

I'm pro-Simon Mapri every morning before I start my day. It was a delight. That was really good. Mud water is great. Really good. This is just masala chai. It's delicious. It's masala chai, but it's great. It's masala chai advertised for surfer white dudes. Yeah, correct. And it's really good. It's called mud water, dude. Getting muddy in the water out there drinking your masala chai. This is really good. Yeah, no, this is awesome. Oh, there is a little bit of black tea powder, though.

So that would be the chai and the masala chai. Oh, you're so like this is a cup of masala chai with mushroom. I'm so sorry. I'm so stupid. This was delicious. No cap. Very little caffeine, though. So if you're not. So if you're looking, they say the caffeine content on there. I know I'm reading it. Just iron potassium. I don't see anything related to caffeine in here.

Oh, here you go. I would drink this at night. This is a lovely beverage that I would sit down to watch the White Lotus with. 35 milligrams of caffeine versus 95 milligrams in an average cup of coffee? This is just enough caffeine. This is the methadone of caffeine that I need where it's just enough to

To stave off the itchies that I get if I don't have caffeine. Can I tell you something? Yes, please. That's really controversial and it might create a lot of drama for us on the pod. What? I don't like the White Lotus at all. Get out. You're fired. Maggie, you're the host of the podcast. Do you like White Lotus? Do you like White Lotus? I liked the first season. I did not like the second season. Oh my god! Both of you are fired! I'm running this thing. Do you have firing and hiring calls?

Get out of here. I really didn't like White Lotus. And maybe I just need to reflect on that. Aubrey Plaza, Theo James, Will, what's his face? The British actor that has a big cult following. He made that show Flowers that a lot of people like on Channel 4. But I can't remember his last name. He was in a real pain. No, none of it. Megan Fahey. That whole quadrangle did nothing for you? No, nothing. Interesting. I also haven't seen Severance.

You're just doom scrolling all the time. I started Yellow Jackets three days ago. Everyone relax. I started Yellow Jackets three days ago. Friend of the show, Ella Purnell. It's going great. Fantastic, congenial in that. Mud water, really good. Love it, it rules. I 100% would drink this. I think, in fact, I think I...

have mud water at home that I've not opened for a year. It's just sitting next to the tea bags. We'll figure it out. Yeah, generally impressed with that product. But again, it is kind of just masala chai, so just get some instant masala chai if you want that. But the mushrooms, I guess, do good stuff. Nicole, tell me about this last one. Okay, so I was looking for a local spot that makes mushroom coffee because if you're me, when I'm walking down the streets, everyone's like, oh, new Chagachinos. Oh, new, new, like, Chagachino is an upsetting phrase that I've heard. Yeah.

Like new mushroom coffee infused with adaptogenic whatever. So Alfred says that they have the OG Chagachino, I believe is what it's called. And Josh has a Chagachino. I have the Machaga, which is matcha. Oh. Yeah. So I have the Machaga and you have the regular Chaga. I guess it's fine.

I am often asked to go to coffee shops when I have already consumed my caffeine content for the day. So I understand the need for a non-caffeine drink. But what I love is getting like a nice iced tea. I don't like that. Does it taste good? Does that taste good? Not necessarily. It tastes like steamed sweet milk with a little bit of bitterness in it. I don't like it. Let me try the Chagamacha. Okay.

What do they call it? Chaga. Machaga? Machaga? Machaga. The Mexican air-dried beef dish? Mashuga. That's delightful. Mashuga. The mancha is significantly worse. The chagatino is way better. They're both really bad. Both awful. And wait, wait. They were both $8 a piece. I spend $6 on these little

little cubs? Alfred, you're killing me. Enough. Do these medicinal mushrooms maybe help stave off cancer and have anti-aging properties? The early science says like, yeah, a little bit, I guess, probably insofar as broccoli also has that stuff. Is this also solely the domains and whimsies of the absolutely rich with disposable income or people buying trinkets to keep them happy enough to realize that they don't

ever have the ability to afford a home. Yeah, I guess this to me will not affect the culture at large, but is a fun symptom of the fact that there's a massive title shift in the like food and drink space as we question all the stuff that our parents sort of grew up drinking as Diet Coke is gradually supplanted by...

Health Aid started a new probiotic soda brand. Sun Aid or Sun Health or Drop Dew. Dew Sun. Dew Sun. Dew Sun.

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Well, all righty, Nicole. We're all filled up on chagachinos. We've heard what we have to say. Now it's time to find out what other wacky ideas are rattling out there in the universe. It's time for a little segment we call Opinions Are Like Casseroles.

All right, let's see what the first opinion is. What do you think it's going to be? Hello, my name is Amy and I wanted y'all's opinion because I love eating peanut butter and sugar sandwiches. Yeah. But apparently it's an abomination. No. And it's crazy. No, no, no. You guys try them and then you'd see that they're good.

Anyways, good job on the podcast. Thank you. Good job. Peanut butter and sugar sandwich. Sounds so good. It sounds great. I'm curious if it's just sprinkled with granulated sugar because there is a product out there that's kind of like a liquidy sugar, but it actually comes from nature. Do you mean honey? It's made by animals. Honey. Honey.

Peanut butter and honey sandwiches are like my favorite thing in the world. I like peanut butter and honey sandwiches. I mean, I would almost, I would put brown sugar. Brown sugar sounds nice. Brown sugar peanut butter sandwiches sounds right up my alley. Love it. You know what I think they're kind of halfway to creating though? If you ever just take. A peanut butter cookie. No, no, no, no. Reese's peanut butter cup filling. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which is basically you just take peanut butter and blend in a bunch of powdered sugar. Yeah. Then you get that kind of like.

salty from the peanut butter, earthy, but also real, real sweet. Right, right, right. It would be really good. And then you could just, instead of the bread, just cover it in chocolate, you know? I'm down with this. And then you have a peanut butter and sugar sandwich. Who calls it an abomination? Whoever you're surrounding yourself with is a wee bit dramatic, okay? Tell them to relax. Can I ask you a question? What would happen if you made a peanut butter and sugar sandwich, like cut out a round of it with the bread, but then coated the whole thing in chocolate? You'd just be having a good time, baby, what you mean?

I think that'd be really nice. A little thin chocolate coating on like a full sandwich. I don't know if we just talk about how America is so obsessed with healthy yet wildly unhealthy. I'm like, coffee or sandwich and chocolate. Put sugar on the peanut butter. We are the problem and the solution. That sounds nice. Hi, Josh and Nicole. Big fan of the podcast. My opinion, like casseroles, is actually a recipe. If you take...

uh red wine and or balsamic vinegar and a little bit of oil and you soak the cheapest garlic and butter croutons you can find in it you have poor man's fancy bread at restaurants that's all i have love the podcast bye let's dissect this let's dissect this josh

What's going on? What's going on? I'm going to tell you what's going on. You ever been to a restaurant, they give you bread with olive oil and balsamic? It feels like a relic of years past in a way that I love. This person is saying, you ain't got to do all that. Just give me croutons. Yeah. Soak the croutons in that. Sure. Then spoon it out.

Do you think they meant red wine or red wine vinegar? I think maybe red wine. Yeah, I think, oh, they said red wine or balsamic vinegar, as in red wine vinegar. I see. I thought it was literally just wine. Me too. And I thought you were referencing like a medieval wine sop. Yes. Because what they used to do, so the term toast literally refers to the piece of toast that they would put in their wine. So I thought you were creating a medieval wine sop.

Me too for a second. What they're talking about is instead of... Croutons instead of bread. Instead of buying fresh bread. Yes. You let your bread dry. Shelf-stable croutons keep forever. How many times have you found a bag of croutons in the back of your pantry and you're like, this is three years old. I'm going to still eat them. You got to know something about me. My household at this point is a crouton-free house. No way. Crouton-free. For health? No, we're just not crouton people. Sometimes I buy them for David. I'm like, here you go. There's your little treat.

But for the most part, we have very... Because in my salads, my salads are mostly on the fresh...

Like heart of palm, cherry tomato, romaine, butter lettuce situation. Yeah. Which croutons I think take away from that. Yeah. You're not making like the sizzler crouton side salad. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah. I love to make big entree salads. Oh. I make big entree salads sometimes. You know, just big ass bowl of salad. I thought you said big Andre salad. No. Like Andre the giant. I'm like, oh. Oh, I thought you meant Andre the champagne. Like I'm reducing that into a vinegar. Oh.

No, but I love toasting panko with some garlic and olive oil. Yeah, I'll do that. That's a fun time. I'll do that. This sounds interesting because I do love a dressing-soaked crouton. I feel like you need the lettuce next to it as a certain plausible deniability. This is a little odd. We all know we love the crouton. This is odd. Bro, I went to Bob's Big Boy the other day. Oh, yeah? And I got there like, you know, they kind of invented the Big Mac thing.

What? It's called like the Bob's Big Boy Special or something. But yeah, Bob's Big Boy basically invented the Big Mac. I didn't know that. Same exact thing as Big Mac. Came out before the Big Mac. McDonald's kind of copied them. Wow. Yeah, but it comes with a side salad and they're like, what dressing do you want? I said ranch, obviously. And it was almost like a ranch soup with floating lettuce bites. Ew. And it was... I threw half my french fries into the salad. Oh, Pittsburgh style. Pittsburgh salad, yeah. But anyways, yeah, this is great. I don't... I wouldn't call it like a...

But I guess you called it a recipe. So, yeah, if you're happy, I'm happy, dude. Same. Okay. My opinion is cookies are a dessert. Oh. I know it seems obvious. What do you mean? But my family recently got in a very heated debate about this where I was appalled to find out that my father, who I love and respect, thinks that cookies are not dessert. What are they? Cookies are, in his words, a sweet dessert.

Yeah. So I really just need you to settle this for me and basically tell me that I am correct, that cookies are dessert. Okay. Thank you. Why can't they be both? Well, I think her father is saying that they certainly are not both because I think she would argue that if you asked her, are cookies a sweet treat? Certainly. That's just a fact of life. They're sweet and they're a treat. But are they dessert? Father says no. She says yes. What kind of cookies are we talking about? Let's see.

Let's say a chocolate chip. A chocolate chip cookie. Is that dessert? Yeah, that's both. Yeah, what do you mean? Yes. I agree with you, but I'm guessing for her dad, a dessert is like a piece of pie, a cake with a fruit compote on it, a bowl of ice cream with whipped cream, a sundae, whatever. And then a cookie is kind of like an everyday snack at any time of day. I don't agree. I don't agree with your father. There is actually a fascinating sort of cultural political history here revolving around, God, what do they call it? Like, like...

Diner de Russe or something, which means Russian-style dinner service, which like the French royal courts, this is dead serious where it comes from. So like at some point, the French royal courts switched to what they called Russian-style dinner service, where dessert became a formalized course in a dinner service. I know why. Why? Why?

Because of the queen who came from Russia. Yeah, yeah. Who was it? I don't know. I saw the Elle Fanning. Catherine the Great. Was it Catherine the Great? It probably was. Why else would they change just for the sake of it? And even that changed the eating habits of Americans. Right. Even like Russian-style dinner service had more individualized plates as opposed to like large roasts and family style. Makes sense. Which would have been more popular in Western Europe. So this idea of what dessert is, and it literally comes from the term desservir or to like de-serve the table. Right.

So basically I'm clearing off the entrees and here's a little sweet treat for you as dessert. So this is like a pretty new concept. Sweets aren't. People have been eating sweets forever. But the idea that dessert is strictly something at the end of a meal is like really new in human history. And so I get why your dad would say that.

And I think a lot of our dads grew up with more formalized ideas of what a meal is. Like for my dad, a meal was a vegetable with starch with meat. That's still my ideal of a meal. But you would eat like a stew for a meal.

Yeah. Well, the stew is the vegetable and the meat. My dad had the beef stepper. Not all the time. We kind of ate whatever. But like for him, the quintessential meal was like a ham steak, mashed potatoes, and peas. Okay. You know? And a lot of that comes from like these old timey rules of dining. Like that particular one was that foods were harder to digest if they were mixed together. Okay. You know? And it was like a kind of high class thing to not have to eat soup. Oh. Yeah.

You know, a great book called Revolution at the Table by I think Harvey Levenstein is his name, but goes into all these sort of antiquated notions of dining. Well, I think a cookie is both, so sorry to your father. I agree. I think like...

Dessert can be anything you want it to be. That's kind of sweet. Cheese boards are considered dessert? No way. Cheese boards are not dessert whatsoever. That is weird as hell. With a nice tawny port with a little cheese course? I get down with cheese and fortified wine, but as dessert? Does it satisfy the same thing at all? Have you ever done it before?

Yeah, of course I've done it. You go to a fancy restaurant. Wait, hold on. I don't believe you. Instead of getting a dessert, you get a cheese. There's like on the menu, there's a cheese course that you could do instead with a nice tawny port or what's that one wine you talk about? Sauternes. Oh, Sauternes. You could either do a Sauternes or a tawny port. Or like a Madeira. Yeah. Or like a nice Madeira. Like, have you ever done that instead? Yeah, I think it sucks. And you think it sucks? For like years.

I love cheese. I love cheese, but I would rather eat cheese before my meal. Oh. After my meal, I do really like crave something sweet. With like grapes though? Like the cheese board comes with grapes. I'm familiar. Like a fig jam or something. Yeah, what's the problem? I would much rather eat cheese at any other point in the meal. Okay.

I don't. And they aren't substitutes at all. Like a cookie or cheese. A cookie or a pie. A cookie or a cake. That makes sense. Those are both sweet pastry driven things. Ice cream. A cookie or cheese. That's weird to me. And it's just a very French thing. Well, maybe you should be a little bit more French.

I love a dessert that like a clever play on a cheese that's like, ooh, here's like a Roquefort cheesecake. I hate that. Really? No, I had it. It makes me sick. What it was was a Brioche Savarin cheesecake. That's what it was.

That I had. Makes me sick to my stomach. We're so relatable right now. How many times have you had a brioche supper? We just drank mushroom coffee. We are so unrelatable. It's probably our best quality right now is how unrelatable we are. Give me a cookie for dessert. You're right. Cookies are the best. Well, that was a very sensual intro. I wasn't expecting. We're very sexy. We watched that house. Hi, my name is Chris from Rhode Island. Also, hi, Josh, Nicole, Maggie, and the guys with the glasses.

So as I stated, I'm from Rhode Island. So this isn't so much an opinion, but maybe just a question for anyone who may be there. We can answer. Have any of you experienced any of the delicacies from Rhode Island? No, never. Never.

Clan Cakes, New York System Hot Wieners, Dell's Lemonade, which is somewhere between an Italian ice and a plushie, our pizza strips, aka party pizza, or also coffee milk. Coffee syrup with milk. Let me know. I appreciate it, though.

Have a good one. Is that like Bosco? I, what? Is that like Bosco? What's Bosco? You ever seen Seinfeld? No. Ah, get out. You're fired. Not a single episode of Seinfeld. I've missed it all. Disgusting. How can you claim to be Jewish? I've seen Curb. Okay, fine, fine. And I love Jesse Eisenberg. I consider myself to be

One of the more like well-versed people in terms of American regional. I'm not a scholar, but you know, I spent a lot of time. Scholar adjacent. Researching, reading a lot of books. Brother, I've heard of like one of those things. I've heard of coffee milk. I've never heard of coffee milk. It's a literal syrup that's a coffee flavored syrup that you mix into your milk. That I've seen. But like that's a Rhode Island thing? I don't know.

I don't know. Look at Rhode Island coffee milk. You've done that? This is a Rhode Island thing? I've never had it, but I saw it on Twitter like three years ago. I know Rhode Island has a lot of Portuguese influence because they were Portuguese fishermen. Yeah, see? Autocrat. That's what I know. Like this. Autocrat. That sounds like a Russian brand. Coffee milk, it sounds delightful. Clam cakes, I've never had. It sounds great. Clams are my favorite little sea critter to eat. I don't have anything turned into a cake. I have had the Red Wieners.

They're called something weird. They're called like New York Transit System Wieners or something. Look up Rhode Island Red Wieners, what they're called. I've had those. We shipped them from Rhode Island to make like a really specific hot dog once. And they were like perfect.

perfectly fine. I would love to. I would love to go. Rhode Island Board of Tourism, please send us there. We need to go to Providence and all your other cities of which I can surely name. Oh, PETA. That's Rhode Island, right? Pizza strips. I've never heard of a pizza strip. I can imagine what it is. This is nuts. Is it like the St. Louis sliced bagel? Oh, maybe. Maybe. I don't know. Which I respect.

I'm so sorry. That you respect? I'm so sorry. I love your culture. I respect it. It's beautiful. I just have never participated. I don't. Just kidding. I have never tried any of these things, but I got new things to Wikipedia later, and that's always a good time for me. Thank you. It's not your job to educate us, but I'm very glad that you've taken the time to do so. Love a good wiki hole. Always just get sucked into the wiki hole. Why did you open your laptop? Because I don't look at pizza strips.

Hi, Josh and Nicole. It's Z from Rhode Island. Really love the podcast. My food hot take is that just eat the leaves on the strawberry. It's really not that bad. You don't have to deal with the fact of coring it. I think it tastes good with chocolate covered strawberries. It's a nice green tasting finish in the end. Just eat it. It's fine.

Bye. Z, no, I want to go first. Go ahead, go ahead, go ahead. Z, let me tell you, I have actively avoided eating the leaves of a strawberry my whole entire life. But now, at this point, let me tell you right now, I'm going to start eating the leaves. Thank you, Z. I'm going to start. I have an update. We did have a couple months ago a caller say something similar and I vowed.

That I would never eat a strawberry without the leaves ever again. They were correct. And I'll change my ways. I ate one strawberry with the leaves and I went, ah, no. I missed the old strawberry. Yeah, you know, I think it's one of those things where it's been ingrained for so long. What I do do. Here's what I do to combat food waste. What do you do do? Here's what I do do. Because generally I cook dinner and then, you know, Julie will do the dishes. And after she does the dishes, she'll slice up our nightly fruits. Yeah.

That's so wonderful. We eat like fun little fruits at night. It's like our little healthy dessert. And so there's a little cream on it, a little crumbled shortbread. But less strawberries. They're kind of outside my top five favorite fruit, but I eat them because she loves them. And that's called compromise. And then I get off the couch and I...

scurry over to the kitchen and I nibble around all the leaves and I make sure that all of the flesh gets eaten like a little rat. You know what my husband's favorite fruit is? A pomelo. Could he have a more annoying fruit to love? Pomelos are so annoying. They're delightful. I love them. It's a big ass grapefruit with a ton of like hard pit. Oh my gosh. It is the most labor, of course my husband loves the most labor intensive fruit to have ever existed on planet earth and of course because I love them obviously I get down in there and I do it all by hand.

Pomelos have a thick styrofoamy rind to them, too. When you love somebody, you are willing to sacrifice time, energy, and your fingernails to make them happy with the pomelo. Are you not just carving it with a knife? I do, but then I like to put my thumb in and just get at it. I like to pre-segment it as well because I love my husband. You know what's been a great...

A great advancement in our lifetime that I think we need to pay more attention to. The peelability of oranges. I love oranges. Oh, they are more peelable now? So, clementines, I feel like that's like a somewhat new. Cuties, Halo, a couple different brands. Growing up with it, if you ever as a kid tried to peel like the lunch line navel orange and you're like, this is all pith. My fingers are bleeding. This sucks. I have to tell you something.

the school I went to, they would like start it for us. God dang it. I'm so sorry. They had the labor to start the orange for you. They would like start the orange. I was just digging with my fingernail. And then cuties. You got to fully peel it. The whole thing is edible, even seedless. I love cuties. And now sumo oranges. I haven't had a sumo.

had a sumo this year. Oh my god. Is it still sumo citrus season? It is still sumo season. Please let's buy one. Go to your local Ralph's. I've been ripping through sumos. They're a giant clementine. They have this like beautiful knobby skin just loose. You can slough it off and just the biggest, sweetest internal orange segments that are so fun to eat. Sumo citrus. Incredible. The peelability of oranges. We are living in the future and I think that's awesome. I think we're done. Do it with pomelos.

I think we're done. Billable pomelos. You ever buy a pomelo? How else can I show my love? That's a fair point. I do love cutting fruit for my sweetie. Love cutting fruit for my sweetie. We're just, you know what our problem is? We're turning into old men and women, me and you. We are aging and I am loving every second of it. Did the mushroom coffee make me feel younger? No.

Maybe I'm feeling a little bit. You got a pep in your step? A little ecstatic right now from the mushrooms. Maybe they're kicking in. I think it's the caffeine. The walls are melting. You just had a Celsius. I just saw God and suffered ego death. Those mushrooms are kicking in, baby. Let's go to Yosemite. And on that note, thank you for listening to Hot Dog is a Sandwich. We got new audio-only episodes every Wednesday. And if you want to see your beautiful shining faces, make sure to watch the YouTube clip that comes out every Sunday. Yeah.

Yeah, it'd be pretty cool if you did that. If you want to be featured on "Opinions" or like "Castrols," you can give us a ring. Leave a quick message at 833-DOGPOD1. I swear there's nothing weird in the voicemail. For more "Mythical Kitchen," check out our videos. We upload all the time. We have great series like "Myth Munchers" and "Last Meals." Check them out. Comment, like, subscribe. Just do it. We'll see you next time. Bye.