Advertise on podcast: Double Dusted with Harley Morenstein

This week, Harley and Big Lynch autopsy the quietest deletion in sandwich history. For decades, Subway carved a trough into the top of the bread and cradled your sandwich inside it. Then, around 2000, the U-gouge quietly vanished, no announcement, no clean date, and over the next twenty-five years the standardization it hinted at took over everything. The boys trace it from a 17-year-old with a $1,000 loan from a nuclear physicist, to the 8% royalty machine that rewarded opening Subways next to other Subways, the Irish court ruling that the bread is legally not bread for tax purposes, the 2021 franchisee letter about stores seized over a smudged window, and the family selling to private equity for a reported value of up to $9.55 billion while the sale rebate franchisees asked for never materialized. Plus: Quebec's lost fluorescent-green Subway sauce, the great loafing confessional, a $22 Jersey Mike's sub, the stamp-card hustle of a lifetime, and whether you can still walk in and ask for the old cut. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch are joined by Chef Atari for the tale of two dogs, a line taken from Taco Bell's own Supreme Court brief. In 1996, Michigan creators Tom Rinks and Joe Shields pitched Taco Bell a character called Psycho Chihuahua and spent nine months sending art, merch, and proposals at the company's request. Then Taco Bell's new ad agency pitched a chihuahua of its own. A Taco Bell staffer warned the company's lawyers the two dogs looked a little too similar, and they launched anyway. The boys break down the campaign that sold 13 million plush chihuahuas in a single quarter, the record sales slump that ended it in 2000, the Grand Rapids jury that awarded $30,174,031, the interest that pushed the judgment past $42 million, the confidential settlement, and Taco Bell suing its own ad agency to cover the bill and losing that too. Plus: the Godzilla crossover, RIP Wishbone, the great dog-actor salary debate, Wendy's grocery store burgers that reportedly disintegrate on the grill, and the Christopher Nolan Star Wars coffee rumor. Next week: the phone police. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch autopsy Fiji Water: the square bottle that won the status-water war of the 2000s and then watched the culture move on. The boys trace it from Canadian millionaire David Gilmour drilling into a Fijian aquifer in 1996 and pricing the water above Evian on purpose, to the reported $50 million sale to the Resnicks, the Cleveland ad war that ended with arsenic found in Fiji's own bottle, the 2010 tax standoff where the company shut its plant and folded in 48 hours, and the Fiji Water Girl photobomb that turned into a lawsuit. Now the price gap has compressed, the purity brand has a recall on its record, and Saratoga holds the Golden Globes stage Fiji made famous. Plus: Harley's Liquid Death survival system at Burning Man, the great movie-theater popcorn bathroom debate, and the truth about Double Stuffed Oreos. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch autopsy the strangest coup in restaurant history. In 2014, hedge fund Starboard Value published a 294-slide deck roasting Olive Garden: 700 million breadsticks a year at three per guest, breadsticks that tasted like hot dog buns, a $42 million signage change, and pasta water left unsalted to protect a warranty on the pots. Darden management answered with 24 slides. So shareholders fired all twelve directors in what Forbes called the first total overthrow of an S&P 500 boardroom. The boys connect it back to the Red Lobster fire sale that started the war, break down the deck's greatest hits, and tally the body count: one CEO, twelve directors, one corporate jet. Plus: the 100-pound chocolate bar gets a Lynch layer, and a Chef Atari callback. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch are joined by Chef Atari to autopsy the most litigated crust in history. In 1987, Brooklyn cheesemaker Anthony "The Big Cheese" Mongiello patented stuffing the crust of a pizza with cheese and mailed it to Pizza Hut, who told him it was not a new concept. Seven years later, Pizza Hut launched Stuffed Crust with $45 million in ads and a Donald Trump commercial, and Mongiello sued for a billion dollars. The boys break down the competing origin stories, the patent registered as "Stuffin' the Crust" because the real name was too descriptive, the case that came down to how employees folded dough around string cheese, and the movie Mongiello made about it all. Plus: DiGiorno's frozen stuffed crust rings, and the YouTube golf drama tangent. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch go deep on stomach share and the Bliss Point. Lynch breaks down how a Harvard psychophysicist fixing army rations discovered the curve that maps exactly what tastes best, and what happened when the packaged food business got hold of it: 3,904 taste tests to build one Dr Pepper, a spaghetti sauce study that found three kinds of Americans, and $6,500 quietly paid to Harvard researchers in 1965 to point the blame at fat instead. The boys get into the 1999 meeting where eleven food executives were told exactly what was coming and chose to do nothing, what the science actually proves about obesity versus what everyone assumes, and why GLP-1 drugs are the first thing in fifty years to take stomach share off the table. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion every Monday.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch autopsy SoBe, the ghost brand nobody officially killed. The boys trace it from John Bello, Tom Schwam, and Kevin McGovern launching the South Beach Beverage Company in 1995, through the flop first shipment that had Bello putting his house up as collateral, to the ginseng and guarana pivot that made the lizard a gas station king. Then Coke backs out of a deal only for Pepsi to swoop in with a reported $370 million, and the money era begins: CGI lizards doing Thriller next to Naomi Campbell, the most viewed Super Bowl ad of 2008, and 125 million pairs of 3D glasses for the Ray Lewis sequel. And then, nothing. No announcement, no death date, just empty coolers, $20 empty bottles on eBay, and a Pepsi tweet insisting SoBe was never discontinued.New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch go deep on the McPizza: McDonald's decade-long war to win dinner from Pizza Hut. The boys trace it from the 1985 pizza-pocket prototype to the 145 pepperoni taste tests, the $950,000 custom rapid-cook ovens that still needed 11 minutes to serve a pie, the widened drive-thrus, the Howie Mandel commercials, and the full-size pies served on metal racks across Canada. Then the long death: 500 stores shrinking to two holdouts in Pomeroy, Ohio and Spencer, West Virginia, the fans who drove 1,000 miles for one last slice, and the corporate order that finally killed it. Plus: Harley reports back from Shambhala, and the guys plot a road trip to the last McPizza in Orlando. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch autopsy Sizzler: the California steakhouse that sold a 99-cent steak dinner in 1958, grew to 733 restaurants, then invented an all-you-can-eat buffet court that swallowed the whole company. The boys break down the legendary 1991 "Choice of America" corporate video, the Sunday night in June 1996 when Sizzler closed 130 restaurants and cut 4,600 jobs before lunch, the E. coli outbreak that started at a salad bar, the $208 million private equity rescue, and the second bankruptcy that left just 74 US locations standing. Plus: the Shane Dawson Sizzler lore, and whether the guys should host a meet and greet at the Sizzler on Los Feliz Boulevard. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Join the Discord, Harley's Trap House, and check out the Double Dusted Discussion text channel.Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch perform the autopsy on Denny's and the death of Always Open. The guys break down how a donut shop and someone's last $50 became America's 24-hour diner, the Christmas in 1988 when Denny's had to buy 700 locks because the doors had never closed, and the one October earnings call that killed 150 restaurants, half the menu, and the 24/7 rule before the whole thing sold for $620M to the owners of TGI Fridays. They react to a $1.99 Grand Slam commercial, rage about the price of breakfast in 2026, settle Denny's vs IHOP vs Waffle House, and get low-key depressed by adults ordering off the kids menu to save money. Plus, Googie architecture, Mondelez slides into Harley's DMs, Costco hot dog economics, the Nelk Boys' never-ending hole-in-one challenge, and the AI attacks Harley on air. Don't miss new episodes of Double Dusted Discussion every Monday!Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch break down the hit 1991 soda Orbitz, Clearly Canadian's soda with balls: a drink so futuristic it had suspended orbs, a dedicated website, and every flavor except a good one. The boys cover the $155 million company that gambled on science and on balls in a bottle, the 85% sales faceplant, why the whole thing was secretly boba tea arriving a decade early, and the one flavor crime that Harley never forgave. Plus Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, Marvel selling off Spider-Man while bankrupt, the death of physical games, and peak 1997 nostalgia. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch break down how the coolest drink in America became the most expensive bottle of iced tea in business history. The boys trace Snapple from a Brooklyn health food store to a glass-bottle, fact-under-the-cap phenomenon, the private-equity operator who bought 70% for $140 million and walked away with $900 million, and Quaker Oats outbidding Coca-Cola to pay $1.7 billion at the absolute peak. Then comes the fatal mistake, running the Gatorade playbook on a brand that lived in bodegas and corner stores, followed by benching Wendy the Snapple Lady, getting squeamish and torching the Howard Stern and Rush Limbaugh deals, and dumping the whole thing to Nelson Peltz's Triarc for $300 million just 27 months later. The brand didn't fail; the owner did. Plus: how the Tylenol poisonings invented the tamper-proof seal, Rao's marinara math, and a Fruitopia-and-Sobe nostalgia spiral. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley, Donnie, and Big Lynch break down how a $20 all-you-can-eat shrimp deal exposed the cracks in a 56-year-old icon and dragged Red Lobster into bankruptcy court. The boys trace it from founder Bill Darden to the $2.1 billion private-equity sale to Golden Gate, the sale-leaseback that gave away the land out from under the restaurants, and Thai Union, the shrimp supplier that also owned the company and allegedly steered Red Lobster into buying its shrimp at a premium. Then there's the CEO who turned a limited-time promo into a permanent everyday menu item, the $11 million lost in a single quarter, the $530 million write-off, the Chapter 11 fire sale, and a new CEO now trying to make Red Lobster fun again with hush puppies, happy hour, seafood boils, and a cautious return of Endless Shrimp. Plus: a food-myth fact-or-fiction round, the "100% beef" McDonald's wrapper conspiracy, Donnie's theory that shrimp are spider cousins, and the $2,200 AR glasses nobody asked for. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley, Donnie, and Big Lynch break down how a single Subway franchisee accidentally invented the most famous deal in fast food history,  and how that same $5 sandwich nearly broke the empire that sold it. The boys trace the footlong from a slow weekend at a Miami hospital Subway to a 27,000-store juggernaut, the jingle that's still stuck in your head, the $3.8 billion it raked in, the franchisee revolt over a price that didn't math, the "11-inch footlong" puffery lawsuit, and the $9.6 billion private-equity sale that left Subway stuck at $6.99 forever. Plus: the great how-many-neighbors-is-too-many debate, Cracker Barrel recovery from walking back its logo, the Subway x Moana collab, Xbox's new era, and uncovering the best corporate training video ever made. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday!Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected] sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Harley and Big Lynch break down how Tim Hortons went from owning Canada (eight out of ten cups of coffee, double-doubles, Timbits, Roll Up the Rim) to getting branded anti-Canadian. The guys get into the hockey-player founder, the 2014 sale to the Burger King owners in Brazil, the "always fresh" par-bake reality, the franchise squeeze, and the temporary foreign worker firestorm that dragged Tims into Canada's youth unemployment rage. Plus: the fact sheet Tim Hortons dropped to defend itself, why Dunkin' marching back into Canada might be the thing that saves them, Crumbl naming a 186-gram dirty soda after the boys, the unwritten laws of golf attire, and an investigation into Harley's hair. New episodes of Double Dusted Discussion, every Monday! Tell us what you think at r/EpicMealTime, @EpicMealTime on Twitter, or [email protected]. Make sure to subscribe and follow the podcast. New episodes every Monday! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices