Killer Lemonade

0:00Yeah, DeVito Manio. Oh, my God, man. Cutlets. Did you see his agent? Oh, my God. That's not a bit. No, it's not a bit. It's got to be a bit. No, it's not a bit. It's got to be. No, dude, look at photos of him. That's who he is. That's his – I mean, he's a little bit more rocky looking last night, but that guy is not – that's not like costume. If your agent looks like this, you're not getting a second contract. i think he is man i i think you know shout out to sean uh sean stellato that's his name sean stellato dude he looked like rocky that was incredible look tommy cutlets you see the coo-jean tommy cutlets i did yeah it was it's good they're really really milking tommy devito for dude coo-jean is everywhere man he's fucking he's like the fucking mayor of new york he is He should be the mayor.

0:55You know, he's fucking at the garden one night. Then he's on the field with the Giants. He's a staple. This man is a New York legend. Dude's getting around. He's fucking more famous than Ice Spice. Yeah. This guy. Coochine.

1:16Three, two, one. Kevin. What's up? We're in the New York groove, baby. I don't think personally I've ever limped into the end of the year as hard as I've limped this year. Come on. You got this, Kevin. No, we're good. We're good. Week and a half. Just some funny podcast math here. We're supposed to do the fronties today, but we maybe weren't as buttoned up or prepared. And to save ourselves the preparation and work, we're just doing a regular episode to create one extra episode to save myself work this week. So that's good. That's good pod math. So future us. Future me, Alex. So current us wasn't ready to do the year-end show.

2:00So we're kicking it down to future us. Yeah. And then doing a regular show so that you have to then edit. We have to edit. We have to prepare and then record and then edit a regular show. And then prepare, record, and edit an end-of-year show. Exactly. Okay. So in the next week. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. We have to record four episodes. Four episodes. Including this one. In the next. Oh, so we have like nine days left of the year. Yeah. We have to do four episodes in nine days. Awesome. That's pretty sick. Yeah. It'll be great. It's going to be super great. Kevin, must we start the show without congratulating the Los Angeles Lakers for winning the in-season NBA tournament.

2:43Hang the banner. Hang the banner. I did see they are actually going to hang a banner. Really? I mean, I guess you got to validate it or something. I mean, yeah, I guess. Otherwise, what are we doing this for? Money. The 500K per player that you win. I mean, that'd be sick. I wish there was some sort of in-season tournament I could participate in to earn 500K. Wow, bold take, Kevin. You wish you were a player in the NBA. I mean, I would take NFL, even with all the brain injury and shit. Yeah. I would take, you know, honestly, I'd take anything other than graphic design. I was originally on the record saying I love the idea of the in-season tournament.

3:23I like when they fuck with sort of traditions and norms and people get all upset. Like, how dare you? And it's like, you know what? We're watching. This is entertainment. It gave us good basketball. And this is more entertainment and more interesting. Like, let's get weird. But I did find the execution to be lackluster. I didn't understand that they were regular season games that they were only going to just change the court. And then they were then going to just turn into in-season tournament games. And that the way the tournament works is that the players play. If the Knicks didn't play the Bucs for another two months or so, then we wouldn't have had the end of the tournament.

4:05The tournament was structured around NBA season games. It's too fucking confusing. like just bring all the teams to vegas and like have a weekend of something like it was it was too spread out like the whole execution of the whole thing was too complicated too much and i didn't even know that the finals was actually happening until i saw lebron um like opening up champagne online i'm like uh i tick tock and i was like did they win this tournament good for them and it was like lebron's like yeah i gotta show these young guys how to do this i'm like Like, we're doing champagne? We're popping champagne for the end season tournament?

4:39What else? I mean, if I won$500 ,000, I'd be popping champagne. Yeah. I mean, the money is interesting. It does provide a wrinkle. It'd be popping champagne, making it rain. You know, all the classic championship activities. $500 ,000 is not much to LeBron. But to some guys on the team, maybe. I mean, listen. It's good money and pocket change. It's not even that much money. No, I'm saying to LeBron James, a billionaire? $500 ,000? He doesn't even pay for Spotify, so. Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, LeBron is notably... Count it. Yeah, saving his money. Stack it up, LeBron. That's good. That's good stuff.

5:13I mean, it would be nice to just, yeah, just have some play money for$500 ,000. But, Kevin, we have a lot of stories this week, and we got to talk about them. A lot of fast food and fast casual restaurants. I know, making noise at the end of the year. Making some noise. The only ones with the courage to speak up. In these trying times. First story of the day comes from an unlikely brand, Panera Bread, most known for their bread, Kevin. They've introduced a new product, Lemonade That Kills You. Yeah. Two people. Two victims so far. So two people have died. Obviously, the lemonade is not called Lemonade That Kills You.

5:51That's just the nickname that the internet has given it. And it is Supercharged Lemonade is the real name of it. And it has 260 milligrams in a 20-ounce serving. or you can go for 390 milligrams in a 30-ounce serving, and they just have this sitting in a Panera Bread. Yeah, but it's plant-based and clean. Oh, yeah, it's healthy for you. So this is a bit of a tricky situation because, yeah, not one, but two people have died, and they're suing Panera Bread. Again, did they die because of the lemonade? That is questionable. You know, again, I don't I don't know enough about we're not lawyers. Yeah, we're not lawyers.

6:34I don't know about their sort of health medical records or their sort of history with, you know, sort of other potential reasons why they may have died. But it is it is is complicated. And so the Internet obviously has taken this and run with it. Yeah, they have called this Lemonade That Kills You. Some really great memes. and just so you know exactly how much 390 milligrams of caffeine is, Kevin, that's more than a 12-ounce can of Red Bull and a 16-ounce of Monster combined. Wow. Super necessary. We need this. Yeah, that's pretty fucking crazy. Shout out to all the fast casual establishments giving us what we need.

7:17Yeah. So basically, there's all these amazing charts. Like a can of Coke has 34 grams of caffeine. Milligrams. Milligrams of caffeine. Sorry. Red Bull has 9.5. Bang has 18. Starbucks, a large. Wait, Bang only has 18? Yeah. Really? Per ounce. Okay. Per ounce. But 300 in a can. That's crazy. Yeah. Bang is fucking awful too. Like Bang is. Yeah. I wonder how many people have. I think people struggle with Celsius too. Celsius is like 200, right? Per. Yeah, it's not in this article. But yeah, and then you got Panera coming in at 390 for that 30 ounce. That's insane. Drink two of those? Yeah. Especially if you're a child or not, like an adult.

8:02Physicians recommend adults consume no more than 400 milligrams of caffeine a day, which is about four or five cups of coffee. That's a lot of coffee. Yeah. I mean, to have it one time is also insane. Are you going to try this? I mean, part of me wants to, but I'm not great with caffeine. this level of it would certainly be tough for me. You gotta take a little edible before to mellow you out. And then you can have those opposing forces battle within your system all day and it'll keep you on a nice even keel. Word of the wise. It's not too much though. You don't want to be paranoid and fucked up on caffeine.

8:40Tread lightly. The memes are really what makes it great. And I gotta say, Kevin, lemonade that kills you, that's pretty sticky. And I just had to think about this for a second and opened up my third eye, Kevin. And here's the connection. Grimace shake fake kills you goes viral on TikTok. Panera lemonade actually kills you goes viral on TikTok. Is this promotion? We're up in the ante. Is Nathan Fielder behind this? Because when was the last time we talked about Panera on this show? I don't think ever. I don't think we've ever had Wanoi. I mean, maybe they did some sort of baguette bag last year.

9:21I don't know if we had talked about it. We talked about maybe talking about it. We talked about talking about it. Yeah, we didn't talk about Wanoi. Panera's trash. Panera is... I don't understand why people even go to Panera. What's the point? It's for people in the middle of the country, in the suburbs. Ah, the donut botegas. Yeah, without access to good bread and bagels and stuff. Yeah. A lot of people don't have bagel shops, Alex. A lot of people grow up eating Panera bagels. Fuck, you bring up a good point. I forgot about the parts of the country that are in the middle. Yeah, yeah. So they go to Panera instead of just going to the bagel store or the bodega or literally any of the 100 sandwich shops on our street.

9:59They don't have 100 sandwich shops? They don't have 100 sandwich shops. Some people are lucky if they have one decent New York bagel establishment. Okay. And that's good. Well, I probably have Panera three times in my life. Lucky you. Listen, I don't want to brag, but I'm from New York, baby. I'm fucking Tommy Cutlets. Yeah, this is the most anyone's ever talked about Panera. So question, is this good for Panera? Is killing two people with your lemonade good for the brand? I think that's the - Listen, listen, listen. That's why we have this podcast. You cannot say that that lemonade killed them.

10:36You could say they drank the lemonade and then they died. But listen, saying that the lemonade killed them, I am not willing to say that. Not on the record. Not on this podcast. You sound like Ryan Kelly. I know. Shout out to Ryan. He's trained me well. Yeah. I mean, it's hard to say. I mean, obviously, you don't want to be making stuff that kills people. But look at Liquid Death. They're selling water and calling it Liquid Death. I mean, they're not even killing nobody. They got a lot of shine off killing nobody. Step your game up, Liquid Death. Come on. Supercharged water. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like one of the memes that I was like, tired, like grandfather died in the war.

11:14Wired. My grandfather died drinking lemonade at Panera. Oh, geez. I mean. What a time to be alive. This is crazy. How did this slip through? Like who was overseeing this regulation or like how many levels did it have to pass through in Panera where they're like, oh yeah, 390 milligram caffeine lemonade. Yeah, for sure. That sounds fire. Yeah. Let's drop it. I mean, listen, I'm going right to cardiac arrest. If that happens to me, there's no way. The milligrams of caffeine has been skyrocketing. It's crazy. The thing is, a lot of these drinks, Bang and this one too, they don't even call it out that much.

11:49They had to then call out the caffeine content now that people are dying. But you don't think that you should call out caffeine? Caffeine is intense. It's a drug. Especially if you're not used to drinking that much caffeine on a daily basis. That's fucking crazy. It's a drug, and the only reason why we accept it is it makes us more productive. That's right. You live in a society, bro. Yeah, we do. We do be living in a society. I would try it. Yeah, I would probably try it, too. I would try it. Actually, no, I'm not trying this. Put it on the list, Kevin. Get it for the year-end show. Get it for the front.

12:20Get it for the back. Yeah, we're going to need some. I mean, that would be pretty funny. Four episodes in, what, nine days, Kevin? We need some charge lemonade. I thought that they're still selling this thing. They haven't discontinued it, right? They haven't pulled it off, no. That's shocking. But I mean, I guess it's selling more bread and more soup and more sandwiches, I would imagine. People are going to the store. I mean, that Grimace shake thing, that did numbers for McDonald's. Did numbers. Speaking of McDonald's, they had a huge week. Huge, huge week. We actually haven't recorded the show in a couple of weeks, I guess, like two and a half weeks.

12:52Huge month. Yeah, they've had a huge month. The big one is Cosmix. So Cosmics, if you haven't seen or heard about it, is a new spinoff restaurant from McDonald's described as a, quote, small format concept with the DNA of McDonald's, but with its own unique personality. So this caught my attention on TikTok when a sign was put up on a restaurant in Texas, I want to say. Illinois. Illinois. And then the sign was covered with some sort of covering, some sort of tarp. And the tarp fell off, partly off of the sign. Again, did McDonald's do this on purpose? Who knows? And it's Cosmix. The logo appeared roughly about like 400 feet from a McDonald's and had a logo that people were able to trace back to a old futuristic 90s, 80s character from McDonald's called Cosmix, C-O-S-M-C.

13:56and so quickly people put the two together and said this looks like a new concept restaurant from mcdonald's and sort of has no um has no sitting seating for people to eat inside of but you can sort of drive your car through kind of like sonic great another thing i've never been yeah um this is kind of just same shit different day uh putting lipstick on the pig putting this put the package in their shit in a new box. I don't know. I'm not really here for this. I don't think we need another McDonald's concept restaurant, particularly. The graphics go pretty hard, and they did a good job there. Shout out to whoever did that.

14:39But yeah, you will not find me enjoying any Cosmics. Agree to disagree, Kevin. I love this. I think more restaurants, more brands should have spin-off brands. Like, you know, we don't need a hundred million mcdonald's when we can kind of have why don't we open up a couple of cosmics yeah we need 50 million mcdonald's and then 50 million cosmics yeah no we just need to take some of those and make some cosmos like i i like a spinoff i like that it's a little bit weird i like the purple and yellow i think the branding is particularly interesting it's got this sort of future nostalgia vibe to it and uh yeah i think it feels like mcdonald's it it feels a little bit Yeah, it feels whimsical.

15:20It feels fun. I wanted the menu to be weirder. I kind of was hoping that the menu was so different than McDonald's. Same shit, different thing. It's pretty similar. I agree with you. That is a fair criticism. They have their own lemonade, and they need to up their sort of caffeine content. Let's get people dying. Yeah, we need some real. It's more of a slow burn, you know what I'm saying? You're going to die slowly with this one. But they do have some fun things, like they have pretzel bites. They have something called McPops, which look like little donut holes. They have spicy queso egg sandwiches.

15:55So listen, I'm here for this. I think it's a little funky. It's a little weird. I like the yellow and purple. It feels like McDonald's, but just a little adjacent. And then the name Cosmix is great. That's a great name. Yeah, it's a great name. Great creative, great graphics. Pretty poison. I love it when my poison is pretty. That's right. I mean, listen, I'll be honest. I went to McDonald's the other day for a little breakfast sandwich and was not disappointed. So it's that time of the year, you know? Diet's out the window. You're eating Thanksgiving. Pick it up in 2024. You know, new year, new me.

16:30And so meanwhile, I got about three weeks here. Just let it fucking go. Fuck the old me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a future B problem. Yeah. So now's a perfect time of the year to eat fast food. And so may I recommend. Doesn't count. Doesn't count. Yeah. May I recommend McDonald's. It's also cold, so you've got to wear lots of layers anyway. So listen, all the fat guys know, this is the real time of the year for some good eating. But for the people on a diet, Kevin, McDonald's actually has a lot of things that they've sort of introduced this week. Oh, yeah, super healthy. Snack wrap is a fan favorite from the McDonald's menu item.

17:07I'm going to be honest, never had one. I've never had one either. But because who goes to McDonald's and gets a wrap? That's like getting a salad. Like, you're going to go to McDonald's and get a salad. People love the snack wrap, apparently. People do love it. And so I didn't know, but apparently it wasn't on the menu. They took it off the menu. And so McDonald's made a big announcement this year. Joe Erlinger, the McDonald's USA president, announced that the snack wrap will return with an updated version. will be part of the fast food chain's McCrispy, which was previously called the crispy chicken sandwich.

17:40We did it, Joe. The McCrispy snack wrap will be available in nearly all markets around the world in 2025. Let's fucking go. Let's go. Listen, they're pulling out all the stops. If it's taking a whole year, you know, we're in 2023 still, but if it's taking a whole year plus to roll this thing out, it's got to be good. 2025 is insane. You may as well introduce that and say it's coming out in 2030. That's so far away from now. 2025? Why are you telling me about this now? Tell me next December. Next December. You know what I mean? How many times do you think the McRib will be back? Over under two and a half before this launch?

18:24Before this launch, yeah. At least twice, you're right. Over under two and a half. Yeah, I'm going to go under, but just barely. I'm going to say twice. I'm going to say it will come back, of course, this summer, and then maybe one. Well, I guess let's adjust the line, one and a half. Okay. So I'll say it comes back twice. But, yeah, no, this is – yeah, supply and demand. People want wraps at McDonald's, which is a bit shocking to me. But here's the thing. I bet it's delicious, and I bet it's absolutely not good for you. So I'm sure that wrap is made from pure sugar or something. Oh, 100%. There's some way that that wrap is like way better tasting than any traditional wrap.

19:02It probably goes hard. Yeah, I'm sure it's great and I'm sure it's delicious. But people are going crazy for that. So good for McDonald's. Again, I think McDonald's is having a hell of a year. I've said this before and we'll probably talk about it, you know, sort of calling my shot now for fronties. McDonald's has done a lot of interesting things this year. And even, yeah, just in this month, like Cosmix, Snack Wrap. And then the last one, which is probably the most interesting, they teamed up with acclaimed artist, Crow and Frost, to bring back the adult Happy Meal. He brought back the McNugget Buddies from the 90s.

19:39Kevin, do you remember those? No. See, I do. I remember those little weird chicken nuggets. Only 90s kids will know. So I'm a 90s kid. Shout out to all my 90s kids. um yeah there was like a you know a gift or whatever the fucking toy a collectible toy in the in in the uh happy meals and it was sort of these little chicken nugget uh collectibles that had little eyes on them yeah and then you could kind of like put oh i kind of remember you could put like a hat on it or you could put hair on it or you can kind of like dress them up and get all weird with them and so um crow and frost whose name has come up on the show a couple times um They've teamed up with him to create his own meal.

20:18Then they gave him his – he brought back the collectible McNugget toys with sort of his face on them or sort of like a play on his aesthetic. They also introduced a pair of clogs called Fry Guy, which are blue. Oh, yeah. Those are pretty sweet. I did see those. And they have big, chunky eyes on them and then sort of a big, chunky McDonald's logo on the back. Yeah. Were they clogs or crocs? They called them clogs because I imagine they're not a collaboration with Crocs. Okay. Yeah, those are pretty cool. I'll give them that. Yeah, they look pretty sick. And so all of these McDonald's collabs with Kerwin Frost brings up one question that I have.

20:58Who is Kerwin Frost? One article called him a DJ. The other called him an artist. He does it all. He's a Renaissance man. He's a Renaissance man. Is this... Let's call him a creative. Is he creative? Okay. Upper echelon creative. General creative. I mean, I've seen some of his stuff. Like he did some really chunky like shoes with Adidas. I thought were kind of sick. He made shoes that look like rats. Did you see those? Those are pretty crazy. So this guy's like kind of on some mischief vibes. Yeah. You know, making some weird funky, you know, shoes and streetwear adjacent stuff. And I just think it's cool that McDonald's would partner with him and that he is getting this treatment at a pretty high level.

21:41right like getting your own collectible happy meal like that stuff that's reserved for like k-pop stars and cardi b and like yeah you know shout out to kervin frost for doing for getting this level of attention and creativity this stuff is cool like i i it's not for me um because i'm a grown man and i'm not a baby but like i appreciate the creativity i appreciate the sort of the the uh the weirdness of it yeah i take the clogs yeah i think the clogs are pretty sick i think those toys are pretty i hadn't thought of the of the mcnugget buddies in a long time so shout out to them i mean and shout out to kerman frost really digging in those archives yeah which is cool i remember them and i remember thinking like there was a time when mcdonald's was really weird there was a time in the 90s when like almost all brands uh especially targeting kids were like a little you know a little a little weird and a little funky and a little groovy and i don't know um i it's cool to see some of those things come back it makes me feel old but shout out to karen frost sweet um so that's three things happening in mcdonald's so shout out to them um we must move on though and uh we're back with what i would call the opposite of mcdonald's which is has had a lot of stories that we continue to talk about on the show but none of them stick and it's subway we've already talked about this and said that subway feels like they had a brainstorm and they're like what could we do that would be weird this year and like they sat in a room for like a day.

23:07Maybe they had like a hothouse, Kevin. I don't know if you're familiar with that concept, but basically it's like a creative session where you just get a bunch of people in one room and you just kind of like brainstorm all day and probably eat some Subway for lunch. You then come back in the afternoon drink a charged lemonade and continue to just come up with ideas. Keep it pushing. I feel like Subway did that with whoever their creative agency is. They came up with like 30 ideas and then they said, yes, let's do all of them. We'll just roll them out at different times of the year. Doesn't matter if they're good or bad ideas.

23:41They're ideas and we may as well just try them. This one is called the Footlong Cookie. Which has got to be their best idea. Really? To date, yeah. I disagree. I think this is a terrible idea. Guess what it is, Kevin? Based on the name. It's a Footlong Cookie? It's a Footlong Chocolate Chip Cookie coming to all restaurants on National Cookie day. I don't know when that was, but I assume we missed it. Cookie lovers and footlong lovers in Chicago, Dallas, Miami, New York can visit select Subway restaurants and transformed into Cookie Way. So they're changing the name of the restaurant from Subway to Cookie Way because that really goes, that really just rolls right off the tongue.

24:22And they'll get one free footlong cookie. They do have a photo of this footlong cookie and the only way I describe it is like... They put it in the bread pan. They put it in the bread pan it kind of looks like an incense holder like you ever see those long skinny things that you put an incense in and it burns in i mean their cookies are great dude do you not like their cookies is that your is that your beef here they're fine they're fine cookies they're you know i thought a subway stand like you would uh like the cookies i don't go to subway and get a cookie i go and get a you know italian bmt and uh with all the vegetables and i'm and i'm out of there basically a cookie that is a cookie because the bread is cake but um just throw a footlong cookie on there so i'm not here for this uh kevin uh no one wants these they look dumb they don't even look tasty in the in the image which you know is like styled and photo shoot and like well they're baking them in the bread pans they're gonna look worse in real life this is a cookie way um we do have a quote from a senior vice president culinary innovation at subway the overwhelming response we received from fans around the world last year let us know that we need to make the footlong cookie a permanent addition to our menu so they've already done this okay great quote and cookie way this year stop it uh our guests will get a sneak peek of an even better footlong cookie thick gooey packed with chocolate chips and served warm right out of the oven it's the perfect pairing with your favorite footlong sub and may even become your favorite footlong after the first bite i'm sorry how is it fresh out of the oven i mean i assume they're making Like baking them a little bit and then throwing them in that weird toaster oven microwave.

26:01That's probably right. Which brings up an interesting point that actually I'm going to steal this take from someone I saw on TikTok. Name, I don't remember. No credit. No credit. But there's a new bagel place that's sweeping New York. It's called Pop Up Bagels. Is that the small ones? It's the small ones. And they don't make sandwiches. And the idea is that you're supposed to just break them open, dip them in cream cheese and sort of eat them, you know, with a schmear and a dip. That's sort of the concept. And there are lines all the way down the block. And so I saw this guy on TikTok. He went there and said, listen, anything you make and give to me fresh out of the oven is going to be delicious.

26:47Yeah. The real test, if this is a good bagel or not, is to wait two hours and eat it, not the next day, but just a little bit later when it cools down. And he was like, and so he literally got the bagels, put on a timer, went home and ate them in two hours. And he was like, they're rock solid, really sort of like tough to eat, chewy and not in a cool way. So, I mean, come on. He played himself. the whole thing of that bagel shop is the hot and ready like but he brings up a good point and like i think this is the same thing here like is that a good cookie or is it just a hot cookie that just came out of the oven that's valid and that's what i'm saying about these days it's not it's not a good cookie well anything is good if it's just been it's coming fresh fresh from the oven or like you know hot like i don't know like i think that applies those bagels i've never had those bagels so i i do want to try for my for myself but it is an interesting point that like yeah if you cook something that's fresh points to give it to me right then and there like of course it's going to be the best bagel i've ever had dude i mean yeah obviously i mean i don't know like what do you expect like you know it's it's not like the easiest thing to walk into a bagel shop and get a hot fresh bagel that's fair because most of the time that's hard the night before or anything like that but like i don't think that makes it the best bagel just because they figured out a way to make them fresh and hot and serve them to people immediately.

28:11I mean, I think it might. You think so? I don't know if it makes it the best bagel, but like – But people are saying that this is the best bagel. It makes them good because they figured that part out. They look good. Let's give them credit. Listen, they're doing well. They don't need my endorsement, but I just thought it was an interesting experiment to sort of debunk this sort of like, these are the best bagels in New York that I've ever existed because what he's saying is like, yeah anything is really good fresh idea yeah i mean i i see it both ways i agree i agree but uh yeah so big agree subway footlong chocolate chip cookie yeah if it's coming fresh from the oven it's like yeah it's probably going to be pretty hot and fresh out the kitchen yeah but uh i'm i'm not there for the for the cookies i'm there for the footlongs come on um kevin moving on we have a story that comes from the dialine the number one place for packaging news sustainability news The award show is open, 2024 Packaging Awards, win the Big D, the best trophy in design competition.