Fine Dining - All Garlic Everything at The Stinking Rose

Episode Date: August 9, 2023

Michael & Garrett are now 80% garlic-by-volume! The You-Must Bowl forces Michael to sing his table's order to the entire restaurant Garrett details the garlicky history of The Stinking Rose in Resty Fact Round-Up Cheese correspondent Steven gives his thoughts on the Garlic Crab Alfredo Fondue A cursed piece of wall decoration has Garrett reeling The boys try Garlic Ice Cream?? JUB tries his hand (or fingers) at being a stenographer A Real Doll placed right outside the restroom Garrett has the best chicken of his life Music by: James McEnelly (@Ramshackle_Music) Theme Song by: Kyle Schieffer (@JazzyJellyfish) We're on Patreon! Get an extra episode every month, extended Yelp from Strangers segments every other week, merch discounts, download access to our music including the 7 singles from our Olive Garden musical, and more! Patreon Producers: Sean Spademan & Sue Ornelas   Get our 5 Survival Tips for Casual Dining at www.finediningpodcast.com!   Send us your Stinking Rose stories at [e-mail].   Follow us on TikTok and Instagram @finediningpodcast   Let us know where we should go next by leaving us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, PodcastAddict, Overcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. We read every one!   Next time on Fine Dining: Twin Peaks! If you have ever worked for Twin Peaks and have a story to share, send it to [e-mail].

Hello and welcome back to the fine dining podcast, the search for the most mediocre restaurant in America. I'm your host, Michael Ornellis. And I'm your host, Garlic's work. I mean, Garrett's work, but it's clear what we have on our minds right now. So we went to a place today called the Stinking Rose. Now, this kind of departs from our usual.

It's not a chain. It kind of by technical definition was, but hey, briefly, it's not a chain. It kind of by technical definition was, but hey, briefly, it's our show. We make the rules and this place was amazing. It was really good. So yeah, the theme of this place is just garlic galore. Garlic garlic garlic. And garlic girls.

We were two little garlic girls just in there to evaluate this place based on its atmosphere based on its service and of course based on its guard. It's food. All in search of the perfect 5.00 restaurant out of 10 the perfect litmus test of average. Now the stinking rows used to have a location by us were based in Los Angeles and there used to be one in Beverly Hills Not anymore. No, it's really sad. Right when I moved out to LA people are like the stinking rose This is this garlic restaurant. You got to try it. I'm like that sounds great. I'll do it eventually

Same thing and it explodes. Yeah, we never got to so we decided you know what? Let's drive up to San Francisco to try it. Let's spend six and a half hours in the car to fill our bodies with garlic to the brim. And it was worth it. It was. It was a really good time. Before we go too much further, just a reminder to everyone, we do have a Patreon.

We do an exclusive episode that you can only get there every month, a bonus episode. You can hear the full Yelp from stranger segments that we have. We did an Olive Garden musical and you can download those songs there. You can see the full video episode of the Hooter Bowl, etc. etc. So if you feel like supporting us, we'd love it if you went over. Check out our Patreon. That's patreon.com slash fine dining podcast or you can click on the link in the description

of this episode. Fine dining party of two. From now, I think we've talked a little bit too much. Our table is ready. So we're gonna, yeah, head on in. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ I was fine, not too impressed Your table is ready Complementary butter and bread These walls have growth signs Knit, knack, cowboy hat, good luck

After graphic art, some crap from your city Behold the trusty of mediocrity I'm dining, let's find dining Find dining Two letters on the sign are shining You're not flickering irregular timing Identify the perfect vibe Two ledgers on the sign are shining Neil Plicker, ring your regular tiny Identify the perfect by How the 10

I'm dining I'm dining First impressions So, San Francisco is known for a lot of things And a miserable parking situation is definitely one of them. There are a lot of steep hills, there's this rule where you have to turn your wheels

in a direction or something. I don't know, I'm from the Midwest, we don't have elevation. Yeah, it's just, it took forever to just drive around and find a spot even. We got really lucky with a place that was about a block and a half away. And there was this giant branch right by your car.

And when our friend Stephen got out, stepped on it, right on the side of the car. That was a good way to start today. Wait, did it scratch my car and I didn't notice? I thought you noticed. I thought that was the branch. Yeah, the branch brushed up against your car. Is my car and I didn't notice? I thought you noticed. I thought that was the branch. Yeah, the branch brushed up against your car. Is my car scratch right now?

I don't know, that was the entire bit. I thought you were noticing that. Like, you were there for the moment. Ah, I'm not gonna pause right now to go check, but I'm angry now, probably for the rest of the podcast. All right, whatever. So we go to the stinking rose. We see this big purple neon sign amidst this like black and red building, but it's like

a Parisian cafe. There is just a row of tables facing the street. It's really quite. Yeah, you go in, everything's reflective and then you start to put together, oh, garlic, vampires, reflections, these guys are leaning heavily into their theme. Like everything is like Dracula slash vampire. There are braids of garlic just hanging from the wall everywhere. Like these guys are safe from a twilight ever happening in their establishment.

There will never be a glowing sexy vampire in their walls. Not if they have anything to do with it. I will say, I do love this aesthetic. It's very like 1950s collectible tins and old olive oil containers and garlic and all that stuff. They had, you know those little like wine holder, or like the stuff in the bottom of Kianti bottles. Yeah, the like fancy case that you hold it in,

they were all like garlic skins. It was a very nice on point theme, garlic skin. Yeah, what do you call it? I don't know. Garlic skin? Garlic skin? I'm not talking like silence of the lambs, it's not like a garlic skin suit.

Well, like I bet we smell like we're wearing garlic skin suits. We still do. Oh absolutely We have been hawking down mints and it is not doing a lot, but it was bright I loved this little vibe we go in we had a reservation the woman who greets us kind of sounds a little Transylvanian. I'm not kidding you, like. I didn't get that. Oh, well, like I called to confirm our reservation a week in advance and same lady must have answered. But very like, she sounded like she was doing

like a tacky vampire impression. And I'm here for it. Anywhere that leans into their theme so much that A, they put themes so much that a, they put on the accent or b, they hire someone with the actual accent. I'm like, okay, stinking rows. I see your game.

I approve of your game. And speaking of like that Transylvania accent, the first thing I thought about this restaurant, it's like I was transported to a live action Transylvanian loony tunes. Yes, it was like the bright color soul. That was like the set decoration. It felt so animated, yeah, it was like a garlic who framed Roger Rabbit.

Yeah. Now, we are getting ahead of ourselves in terms of what the place looked like. I want to talk about how it hit our other senses. The name of the place is the stinking rose. And obviously, you walk in first thing you get hit with garlic. It wasn't as strong as I expected. No, it was just like a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh,

a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh,

a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh,

a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, a fresh, fresh, a fresh,, a fresh, a fresh,, a fresh,, a fresh, a fresh, fresh, in a garlic smell. I wanted to feel like I was walking into a box of garlic bread. Random sidetrack here, frozen garlic bread. Have you ever had coals like the department store? Oh no, COLE. Yes. Oh no. Best frozen garlic bread you ever have. It's so overpoweringly garlicy and juicy. I like the sound of that. Oh, it crisps up perfectly. You know, you've got all the recommendations, all the facts. Do you have facts rounded up for the stinking rose? Oh, I do. Well, why don't we go into a segment dedicated to the history

and the facts about the stinking rose? That would be convenient if we had that section on this podcast. You know, we actually do. Let's go into this week's Resty Facts Roundup. Yee-ha! Now, of course, podcast. You know, we actually do. Let's go into this week's RESTYFACT Roundup. YEEHA! Now, of course, as we all know, my mom doesn't like the whips sound that we use for RESTYFACT Roundup. She thinks it's too abrasive. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

We have to replace the whips sound with something else. However, Garrett's mom, of course, also likes the sound of the whip because she thinks it's thematically appropriate to RESTYFACT Roundup. So we got to leave a little whip in with a different sound effect to kind of fit the vibe of this place. What do you got from me, Garrett? Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, give me your blood. Uh, you just want to do a Dracula?

Uh, daddy. With a little whip sound, it's going to be like a little BDSM Dracula. I'm down. All right, give it to me, daddy. The first stinking rose opened up in San Francisco in 1991. I'm older than the stinking rose. Okay. This restaurant was inspired by the Gilroy Garlic Festival, which is actually the world's

largest garlic festival that set an attendance record of nearly 110,000 people over three days. I know that Gilroy is famous for their garlic. The founders went to the Gilroy garlic festival. But is it affiliated at all or is it just inspired? It was inspired by. Okay. Ah.

The location we went to was actually the second version of the Stinking Rose in San Francisco. The original building was slightly larger, about two blocks away, and in 2022, this current location opened up. So this isn't the historic Stinking Rose. So I mean, it's 1991. I wouldn't call myself historic,

and I'm from 1988. Hey, full house is historic. That's true. And we're in San Francisco, it's perfect. Ah! The second location opened up in Beverly Hills in 1996, and it closed at the end of 2021. And that's the one that we were sleeping on the whole time.

We had the opportunity and we just didn't do it. The restaurant slogan is, we season our garlic with food. And that's good. Yeah, oh, that's good. They aren't even kidding. They use seven tons of garlic every single year This one restaurant uses seven tons of garlic per year. That's so much. That's 40 pounds a day

Seven tons of garlic. That is almost as big as a male African elephant can get per year So they're just an elephant's worth of garlic every year That's wild. So for more context, the average person eats about two pounds or 300 cloves of garlic per year. The average person. Yes. Really?

Yeah, that's a lot. That seems like a lot, but I mean, I probably am eating more garlic than the average person for sure. I at least eat that many whole cloves of garlic. Not to mention. on their own. Just you graze at the grocery store, you walk by produce and you just like, I'll just eat full cloves.

Yeah, like you do it with grapes, so I can't you do it with garlic. Yeah. The current world record for the most garlic consumed in one minute is 42 cloves eaten by a Nepali man in 2017. Why? That's what I got to wonder. Because a world record, that's why.

Oh my god, dumb. Ooh, that sounds terrible when you think about it. Yeah. Ugh, just 42 Clothes. But world record? Yeah, sure. Speaking of world records, the world record for the largest garlic bulb ever grown

is two pounds 14 ounces, which is over 30 times larger than the average bulb of garlic. 30 times. Yes. That's crazy. It's rumored that local cabbys and Uber drivers avoid picking up patrons from the restaurant due to the smell. That's mean.

Do you think the cabbys and Uber drivers get paid enough to have the inside of their cars reeking of garlic? That's profiling. Their menu contains around 40 dishes featuring garlic, including garlic ice cream and a garlic martini. They should call it a garden. I think that actually might be when it's called. Oh, really?

And I've heard it's terrible. Well, that's the thing, it sounds gross, but a lot of the things where it's garlic plus whatever, sounds gross, but then you have it, like the ice cream we had, it wasn't bad. No, it just tasted like garlic-y ice cream. Yeah. So they have all these garlic recipes.

They actually publish two full cookbooks of every restaurant recipe plus extras. If I could make that chicken again. Yeah, I bet it's in there. Yeah. It's on Amazon. Oh, I might be getting this. Yes.

They possessed one of the world's longest braided chains of garlic that has over 2,000 bulbs. Where? We didn't see it. Like the cheese. It's not our display. It would have to be hung up and roped around the place. And I don't even know if it's at this location. This was present at the Beverly Hills location.

Oh. So I'm assuming they moved it here because why would you get rid of that? Garlic has become a pop culture repellent to vampires and there is some truth in this. Mosquitoes are actually repelled by a strong presence of garlic. Oh, that might explain why mosquitoes tend not to bother you too much. Me too, it's all about garlic. Conversely, garlic actually attracts leeches. Oh, well, I don't spend a lot of time around leeches,

so I guess they don't have the opportunity to find me. Garlic is one of the oldest herbs to be cultivated by man with archaeological evidence from ancient Egypt in Babylon. So how old does that place it? Those two specifically put it 3, 4,000 years. Oh wow. There's actually evidence going back to Sumeria, even farther. The longest back I saw a reference would be 7,000 years. That explains why we've had so much time to master it.

I feel like garlic is probably that spice that we do the most with. And actually speaking of garlic in ancient Egypt, the builders of the pyramids were given extra garlic because it was believed it would give them strength. It's not even for their enjoyment. It's so they can do this work harder. This labor better. So basically it's like cocaine at a law firm.

Yeah. According to the origin myth of the first kingdom to settle the Korean peninsula, a bear stayed in a cave for 100 days eating copious amounts of garlic, and then it turned into a beautiful woman that became the mother of their first ruler. Naturally. Yeah, I guess that's how all cultures are formed. Of course. Of course. They turn into hot chicks, you have bono and then they pop out kids. You are a poet. Kids, you are a poet. Yes.

One last tip from Martha Stewart, the easiest way to get that lingering garlic smell off of your fingers is to rub your fingers on something stainless steel while running them under warm water. It sounds like a lot of work. Just like take a stainless steel spoon, run it under the faucet and then rub your fingers on it. Yeah, I've seen a lot of work. That seems like so much coordination. I'll just have garlic stinky hands.

I don't mind having garlic stinky hands. Other people might make my name. I guess you don't wear contacts. No, I don't. Things I just don't have to think about in the world. They actually happened to Aubrey the other day. She was slicing up some garlic. Didn't wash her hands quite well enough.

Just got garlic in her eye. Contacts and like, oh, well, thanks, Martha Stewart, I guess that does it I've seen up some garlic, didn't wash her hands quite well enough. Just got garlic in her eye. And she put it in her eye. And it's like, oh. Well, thanks, Martha Stewart, I guess. That does it for this week's Resty Facts Roundup. Yeah! Attenessier. So the inside of the restaurant is thematically a very similar continuation of the entrance way of the restaurant,

checkered black and white floors, mirrors everywhere, bright red ceiling and upper walls. I was all about the color pattern in here, lots of on display, old packaging, like the tens of olive oil. Yeah, like the hostess. Gear deli chocolate I saw, olive oil, stuff like that. It reminded me of like my grandfather.

Like, he just had an aesthetic about like, the type of stuff that he would collect and kind of decorate his room and his workshop with and stuff like that. So I got immediate nostalgic feelings for that, very endearing. This place leaned in heavily to what it wanted to be.

And I thought that it worked. It was cohesive. It was a very cozy environment to be in. And it was a really efficient use of space too. It was two stories. So upstairs, they had like a one more private dining area than an open area, a server area. And then big mirrors that kind of made it look,

mirrors open up a space to where it kind of fools you and to think it goes further, but used to great effect, like this was a very nice place to sit in. It was a little packed, a little loud, but it didn't bother me. It's the overall vibe was just so bright and energetic that everything else was just appropriate, right?

They are obviously super clearly anti vampire. Everywhere you turn, the mirror, the mirrors, and yeah, why are they racist against vampires? You know, probably because they kill you, drink your blood and turn you into one of them. Oh, yeah, like genocide and kidnapping, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The normal reasons to kind of be against a thing. I tend to not like things that like kill people and then change their lifestyle and genetic makeup

and force them to like avoid the sun and seek out other people to turn into the thing that they've now become. Yeah, not a fan of that. Wow, it sounds like your average magic the gathering player. I love magic the gathering. I know you do.

I'll talk shit about magic players because I am one. Because they avoid the sun and our blood suckers. I mean, I just have to bring it up. The garlic smell that I was expecting even now that we're inside, wasn't as strong as I expected. Once food got on our table,

it was obviously pretty pungent, but for a place that has a smell sensory implication in their name, I thought it would wafthover just a little bit more, and it didn't. We were seated by the bathrooms, and I did get one unfortunate loft of that. I didn't get one point.

I didn't enjoy that. But also right by the bathroom, they had this, let's say it, a real doll. Yeah, they had a little doll. It looked like a rubber sex doll with a closed mouth. Yes, it did. Yeah, yeah, you're right. It looked kind of like a plush sex doll. It looked like rubber.

It was plush though. Was it plush to the touch? I didn't touch it. I didn't really want to touch it. Yeah, I didn't either. I didn't feel safe. She had like a quirky garlic hat on and like a big blonde wig and sunglasses and like a cleavage.

Huge cleavage. Giant knockers in like a pink cocktail dress basically. I have no idea what purpose she was supposed to serve. I don't know why she's here, she's not a part of the theme, she just looks like a garlic fan. I really don't know. I have to ask Garrett. What's going on over there? What's going on over there? What's going on over there, Garrett?

Okay, so this woman will call her... Shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, sh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, sh I will read shit on game! What is going on over there? What is going on over there, Garrett? Okay, so this woman will call her. Sure, that's generous. She was placed right by the bathroom. Right, right next to the door. I don't know, when I see someone that close to a bathroom, I tend to think, oh, you're waiting to go in, right?

Right. So she's waiting to go to that bathroom. Is she a deterrent? People look, they see across the restaurant, oh, there's someone waiting, I'll go later. Yeah, so it's just like on an airplane. You see someone standing outside the airplane bathroom. You don't approach.

No, you don't approach. Yeah. What are you gonna do, stand in the aisle? There may be turbulence, you'll break your neck. There may be turbulence. you'll break your neck. There may be turbulence. I hated that. Yeah. What if they're named the Stinking Rose

because of that bathroom waft I got? Oh yeah. Which was pretty bad. And they're really trying to be like, what can we do to crack down on this? The law says we have to include bathrooms for patrons. They really don't want to. They know that it creates a stinky situation. So they put a decoy there to deter people from going to the restroom line.

So she's a deterrent. Why does she have such huge knockers? See, you're thinking the knockers will be a point of attraction, right? No, no, no. As we've established in several episodes at this point, cleavage is something where you only glance at. It's to stop people from recognizing that she's big. They're just staring at the boobs. They're not taking in the whole thing, the whole picture, so they don't realize the decoy. That's brilliant. It's camouflage. Wow. So the best way to not be noticed is to have huge boobs exposed to the world. Yeah. Then no one will notice if you're a robot, a vampire, or any other thing.

I think we've figured it out. I think we've put it together exactly. What is going on over there? What is going on over there? Also, right when we walked in to the right, there was this giant, like, me on sign for, like, real wood oven fired pizza. It was such a cool little cove with this deep pizza oven.

Again bright colors. I love the color scheme of this place. I believe that is a remnant from the former restaurant. The owners of the Stinking Rose already owned the space. So they replaced one of the restaurants that they are. It was actually an Italian slash pizza joint. Oh, so they have that. Their other restaurant property, the Stinking Rose into this building. Okay. So they kept the pizza over from because the other place was called Calzones. Yeah. So like they actually held over a lot of the menu items from that restaurant. Oh, that makes sense. So what we got was a Calzone's, the Stinking Rose combination menu in the end.

Because they did have a lot of pizza options that we didn't end up getting but yeah. There was also a poorly but in a fun way, illustrated painting or picture on the wall, but it was like crayon drawn. And it was just a guy with a giant clove of garlic for a head wearing a crown and it said, proof of true love, a kiss after a garlicy dinner. I don't know. That's not exactly funny, but the curl, God, the curse, the curse nature of this drawing is so cursed.

We'll put this on our social media so you can see it. That's right, we're on First nature of this drawing is so cursed. We'll put this on our social media so you can see it. That's right, we're on Instagram at Find Dining Podcast. We're on TikTok at Find Dining Podcast and you can email us whatever you want. Find Dining Podcast at gmail.com. We might regret that, but I don't know, maybe we won't. Garrett is, he has his hands out in a defensive position right now,

like I'm trying to cause him, like, okay. You ever just like see something and think, that thing is gonna tackle me and do something I do not want. That's probably not, probably commit a murder. Yeah. Yeah.

Or it'll enter your soul somehow. I don't want this garlic beast entering me in any way. It is haunted. It looks like something out of a horror movie mixed with the Burger King mascot. Yeah. It's an eldritch garlic horror. That will let you have it your way.

That'll let you have it your way. Yeah. You know, my dad told me he looks at expensive things and puts it in the context of how many whoppers that could get him. There was like a hundred dollar glass of, I wanna say it was like bourbon or whiskey or something, and his response was just to the bartender,

I could have 40 whoppers for that. And the bartender was like, I'm not gonna serve this to you because it was like a tiny, tiny bit. Hahaha. I'm not gonna serve this to you, because it was like a tiny, tiny bit. So now we need to get to kind of the big part of the atmosphere that we contributed. I love it when we are the atmosphere.

So last time I picked Shakey's Pizza Parlor for us. Oh. It did not fare well. I had a you mustable punishment. You know, the punishments we have to do at the next restaurant, if the previous one didn't score within that mediocre zone of 4-6? You know, you know well. Oh yeah, we've had a lot of these in a row. Oh yeah, I had to wear a Pokemon card suit to a five star restaurant and masters. I had to crab block, like, doing from the buffet at Shakeys.

And this time, I had to put my order into song. And it wasn't just enough to put your order. Nah, you had to do the whole table. I ordered for the table. I made an announcement. I literally stood up and to the entire restaurant, I looked at the table. I made an announcement. I literally stood up and to the entire restaurant, I looked at the waiter and I was like, I'm sorry about this everyone, but I lost a bet. And I have to sing my order. This isn't going to be great. Please bear with me. And they loved you.

Dude, they were so supportive. They were so fun. I got a nice big round of applause afterwards. You know, I actually practiced ahead of time. Yeah, you did in the car on the way. Yeah, I put in the work again. I literally was rehearsing over and over in the car, making you guys listen to me like, I found out. Make a truck of the syllables, right and stuff.

I found out EDM through my AirPods can drown you out. But yeah, I felt like the bell of the ball. It was very nice getting support. Our server did a little specific something. We'll talk about that in the service section. But before we go on, I want to know, why do you get support? And I get looked at like I'm cancerous because you were literal cancer in that the crab is the zodiac sign for cancer as you crab walk to a buffet And everyone's just like don't look at him. He feeds on attention But for you everyone's like let's look at him. He feeds on attention But I also kind of asked for it and in like a positive like hey guys, sorry like I

Addressed the elephant in the room before the elephant even walked into the room much like a vampire It was invited in yeah, so I know you're singing is vampiric my singing is vampiric I had a lot of fun doing it I was actually very nervous in the build up to it because I'm like this is basically an impromptu Public singing performance that nobody asked for. No, but it was a positive ordeal. The table next to us got involved. It went well, right?

After that, we struck up some conversation with them. It's a really good icebreaker, singing your order in a restaurant. So listeners out there, if you ever just randomly sing your order, people around you will love you. Yeah, later in the meal, we had a real nice conversation with the table next to us and, you know, found out that their daughter is and running out. Hopeful power lifter. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was very interesting just to like share stories.

They were in town from Pennsylvania and they're doing a trip down the coast. So we gave them some restaurant recommendations to LA and San Diego right within our ballhouse, right? Yeah, to give restaurants, to give restaurant recommendations. So I think it added a lot to the atmosphere. But even without this, I'm going to thumbs up. Yeah, to thumbs up. Easy. Like this place knew what it was. This place delivered on it. The anti vampire theming was very fun. It was very tongue and cheek, and I thought they executed it well. And the only negative was that cursed creature on the wall that's gonna take its garlic crown and just feed it to you.

Let your throat with it and wear you as a garlic skin suit. Ugh. Oh, man. That's not good. I think it's great. Surface. So our service situation was interesting and that the hostess was very polite, very nice. We came in, started taking pictures and she was very accommodating. Like, take your time. No rush.

I'll see you as soon as you're ready, but your table is ready. Wonderful. Awesome. Then we go in, we sit down and we see our server kind of running back and forth. She's just buzzing around. She's working hard. It did take a while for her to kind of acknowledge her.

But I think like we weren't even looking at her menus. Our faces weren't our notebooks, we were writing, we weren't engaging with the space. Those around us, yeah. Well, to be fair, we knew well in advance what we were getting because I knew I had to sing it, which I actually kind of like, I'd like to go to every single one of these places and already know the order.

I felt so much more relaxed not having to look at the menu and decide I could put all of that energy into like taking videos, looking at the atmosphere. For me, there's something about, I don't know, the tactile nature of flipping through a menu and kind of seeing how it's laid out, seeing some options that might surprise me and jump out to me.

I like not knowing because I like the idea that I could change my mind or surprise myself or whatever, but if you want to do it for yourself, moving forward, you know, go forward. Yeah, it's a nice time saver. Oh, admittedly, like, I read some reviews for this restaurant. So you knew which one. I got new.

I wanted going in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, and you ordered right. Yeah, you really did. Thanks, San Francisco Chronicle. Yeah. So it takes a while for it to check in. The first time she does, it's not even like a hello, it's just, so do you know what you want.

And I was like, oh, I'm not gonna like this server. Ended up not being the case, I ended up really lacking. Yeah, she's awesome. And she had a really good sense of humor. But that first impression I was just like, oh, she's really trying to, I don't know, rush us through, which, you know, given how much she was kind of going back and forth, makes sense.

I will say that the guy's refilling the waters, very on top of it. Empty glasses did not last long. And yeah, the same people are plates got bust really quickly. And they asked to, I love it when they ask. They don't just take plates. Yeah.

And same with the refills. First time she came by, it was, do you know what she want? We said, no, she kind of just keeps moving. Second time she comes back, I'm like, hey, so I'm so sorry, I lost a bet. I'm gonna have to sing my order. And this is my favorite moment of our server.

She's like, okay, let me get some other people. No, she said, do you want me to get more people? And I go, no. And Steven and I go, yeah. Yeah. And she was like, oh, it's gonna embarrass and put them on the spot, okay. And then she goes away when I'm like ready to order,

she comes back, because I like kinda need three minutes to like mentally prepare. So she comes back, I'm like, okay, I'm ready. She's like, oh, okay, and she like leaves. She just bolts, she goes over to the pizza oven area, picks out two guys. She's like, you're lucky. I could only find two. So it's the three of them standing there

staring at me. I stand up. I make my announcement to, I guess, the restaurant or at least the people near me. I start singing my order. And then as soon as I'm done singing, she's like, sorry, I know you're emotional, but I do have to repeat the order to you to make sure I got there right. So it was Steven's birthday. Steven, our cheese correspondent that we take with us, his mouth was working today. I tried to put it in our reservation

that it was someone's birthday because I didn't know if they do something special but you and I were birthday boys. We like seeing what different restaurants do. And when I tried to put it in the reservation, they basically just told me, remind your server. Well, I walk in today and my mind is on this song, this public performance that I have to do now because of the stupid, you must bull. Fucking you must. No one likes the you must. I do. I like it. I love it.

I kind of like embarrassing myself. It creates a fun element. I'm for it, whatever. I'm just bitter to put myself through this. But I forgot it was Steven's birthday because of it. So we're in the middle of the meal, and I stand up just out of nowhere and don't tell either of you where I'm going.

And I just kind of walk in the opposite direction of the bathroom, which is realistically the only place I would be going. Yeah, that's what both Stephen and I assumed. You were like, oh, you like what? Bathrooms, I was deterred by the lady waiting in line in her cleavage. Yeah. So I be line it, happened to find our server,

and I go, hey, it's the guy with the leather jacket's birthday. I don't know if you guys do anything, but just wanted to let you know. She's like, okay, cool. And then I just keep walking past her. And now I'm in the lobby, like the host area. And the only place to go is out. And I'm like, I have no justification to be over here. And I find like a purell like hand sanitizer.

And I just do that and walk back Steven just flat out bought it like oh he was just going to find hand sanitizer Okay, whatever yeah, yeah, just doing that just a week week-ass excuse and I want to nominate Yeah, all of the effort that you went through for this as way too much. This is way too much. Wow, I'm flattered to win in a war. Yeah, you know, I was trying to keep it subtle. I didn't want to let on to Steven that I was doing this for his birthday. You know, birthday surprises are nice, but I had no idea how to like tactfully approach it at all.

Not at all. Your attempted secrecy was way too much. I do not know. Now what we do like to observe from a lot of these restaurants is what are their birthday traditions? What do they do? Does the staff come out and sing? Well, what they ended up doing was bringing out a dessert that the ice cream with a candle in it

and then just bailing. And then after we sang, our server comes back and says, I did you a favor. The place would have emptied out if I sang. And I was just like, okay, thanks. I guess that's an excuse. She was a lot of fun. I'm gonna go one thumb up on the service. They were very fun. I don't really have a strong reason to not go two thumbs up.

I think it's just because we went to Mastros so recently that getting just that barrage of attention the entire time. I agree. Like this was excellent service, but to give the two thumbs, there needs to be the extra thing, like the extra four different people at Masthro's, a balloon animal person at Rainforest Cafe. Yeah, you know, she was very attentive and very fun.

Yeah, I wouldn't say that we saw her a ton, that might have improved it a little bit, but she was, she's a really strong one. It's a very solid one thumb up. Food. Yum. Now, the reason we wanted to do this place in the first place, food.

Garlic. Garlic. Garlic. Garlic's work. Yes. In the house. We started with the Banya Calda, which logic tells me that it,

like Banya sounds like bath and Calda sounds like cauldron. But that's kind of what it was. It was cloves of garlic taking a nice, relaxing bath in a cauldron filled with olive oil. Yeah, so I don't know if that's the exact transition. It's garlic confi.

That's what it is. Okay. Garlic confit, as I would say, was the perfect garlic spread for my taste. We got two different garlic spreads, and I think you and I differed on which one was better. They were both fantastic, but this one, I think they both have their use.

Yeah, full close of garlic, bunch of oil, hint of anchovy that whatever was there was the right amount. This thing, I'm telling you, it comes with two buns basically that you kind of pull apart, you dip it in there, you load it up, and let me tell you, there was not enough surface area on this bread, despite it having plenty of surface area,

for how much garlic I wanted. There was no bite I had where I was like, I should have had less. No, I wanted to pes dispenser this thing into my mouth. I just wanted to open my neck and just go, go, go, go, go. Like you're, yeah, unreal. It was to me a 10 out of 10 starter. It is the thing on their menu that is right at the top,

it is in the biggest font, it is the foot that they are putting forward. It is delicious. It's really cool. They had a candle and like a metal ring that they placed it on top of. So it was like a, just like a little mini heater. It's not like extreme heat,

but it's enough to just, enough, but more than anything, it's just kind of like the visual nature of it. I can't say enough things about this. This garlic, it was like just sweet enough because how it was made, I want to be buried up to my neck in this. I just want to like fall into a quick sand of this garlic.

And that's the thing, like this isn't that difficult for you to make at home. You could do that at home very easy. All you need to do is just put the cloves of garlic into like a small potter pan, cover it with olive oil, hit it maybe low to medium heat, stir it every once in a while, make sure it doesn't burn about an hour later you got that. Check for vampires Yeah, we had two different breads an acme bread that was a baguette and then roll the roll round roll So I'm the roll I thought it was an eight and a half out of ten

But I will go nine out of ten on the baguette. Yeah, simply because I think it was slightly more sourdough It was a little crispier the sourdough taste was a better balance to the garlic. I had the normal bread and the baguette, I guess just rated on their own without these different things, but largely the garlic spreads, I had the same rating regardless of the bread. The normal bread, I felt like, you know, it doesn't need to be more than just a vehicle for garlic

to get to your mouth. Six and a half out of 10 on that bread by itself. Oh, okay. I didn't read the bread alone. Okay. And then the baguette, I felt it was a little too thin. Like the crust to, you know, center bread ratio was just a little too crust heavy for me.

If this thing had just been a little bit bigger and kind of had more of that inner bread surface area, whatever you wanna call it, I thought that it was a very good taste and it worked really well with the garlic relish that we got. But I mostly had the round roll with the bun, yeah, called it. Now that garlic relish, it was just a mix of parsley,

olive oil, garlic, and a few other seasonings. Yeah. I thought it was definitely sharper. It was more of a pungent garlic because this was just raw garlic, finely chopped, as compared to the banyu caldo, which was slow roasted garlic. Yeah, this almost had a look of like a chimichurri. Yeah. Fun fact, the reason this tasted more pungent was because when you prepare garlic by either

crushing it or slicing it, when it's raw, that releases the allium, which is that pungent garlic flavor. When you slow roast, when you make garlic-cone-feet, it stays in it, and then it just sweetens instead. I see. So basically, what you're doing is you're just breaking the cell walls and you're releasing this enzyme

out into the world. You're making such passionate hand gestures right now. You look like a volcano with a man. Oh, it's actually the diagram of like, I don't know, like my hands are like the walls of a cell. No, and then like the cell ruptures. I understood. I just want to paint a picture for our listeners in this audio only media because they can

see it. Yeah, with their ears. They can see it with their ears. This garlic relish, I went eight and a half out of 10. I mostly ate it on the wood fired oven baked acme baguette, which I gave a seven out of 10 to that bread. But yeah, that as far as like those little bread and dip starters, those are all my ratings.

And then I'm gonna go eight and a half out of 10 for the garlic relish on both breads. That was good. I happily would come back here just for this. Yeah, definitely. So like, this was a tip I saw going in. If you're looking for that strong, knock your lights out, garlic, go for the relish.

If you want something really a more muted, savory taste that's just gonna linger on your tongue, go for the bony calda. Then we got an appetizer, the Italian garlic pot stickers. They didn't racially profile me. What the hell, where are my chopsticks? No chopsticks for our Korean boy here.

I feel like these were good, they were good. But I don't understand the marketing of calling them Italian. Nothing about them tasted any different than when you would get these in an Asian restaurant. Yeah, not at all. Like nothing. The garlic was understated, it was good, it was there. It's still a seven out of ten appetizer, but it didn't deliver on the promise of like garlic overload.

And I just don't understand the word Italian in the name of the dish. I just don't. Yeah. Oh, excuse me. Oh, fuck, there's the garlic. You garlic, birthing? Oh! What are we talking about?

Oh, the cheese. Did you just dissociate for a second? I just... We're talking about the pot stickers. She scored them. And now a word from our totally not made up sponsor. Does this ever happen to you? You eat yourself into a stupor and you're all burpy and gassy and you lose track of

your surroundings. Hi there! Your favorite sponsor job here and I'm back with a new business proposal. If you find yourself in a situation that you're eating so much that your reality falls away from you, which is very commonplace in America and for some reason legal even though it's kind of like ayahuasca in that way specifically. Well no worries I'll make it that you don't lose track of where you were because Jum's gonna be a stenographer.

I found a vintage typewriter at a local stoop sale. I'm the perfect person to document all the things that you say because due to all the amphetamine salts I have to take to stay awake because of my chronic nightmare syndrome. I can type upwards of 170 words per minute. Just be careful not to say any words with the letter W in it because this keyboard is definitely missing the letter W. If you can work around that, I've got you covered. Call me.

Not via phone because I don't have one. There's just too many apps. They intimidate me and I don't know where to jump in. So I stick with old technologies like typewriters and long underwear. So to reach me, just scream like I do when I wake up from one of my nightmares. And I'll hear ya. I gotta go. Okay, bye.

So the inside of the past stickers wasn't as garlic eats, I thought. But I think the garlic was more in that soy sauce mixture that they were sitting in. I got more garlic taste out of that. Yeah. So I'll give these a seven and a half out of ten. They were crisp on the outside and the dough was still soft and pliable. Like you want a good pot sticker to be. Yeah. No, I mean, it was a solid pot sticker. Yeah, it just wasn't. It just very special. It fell out of place, I guess. That was my only note, but it doesn't make the dish bad. No, no, they just, they just fell out of place. They were so happy.

Almost as good as my local Chinese joint. Right. So then, entrees and sides. I guess we'll talk about the side first, and then we'll jump into what we got for our entrees. Both of our entrees came with the same side, right? Yeah. The garlic mashed potatoes.

The garlic Yukon gold potatoes mashed with zucchini. Okay, that's what that was. I was wondering what the green stuff was. Yes. Very, very light use of zucchini. It was not a lot of it. I love garlic mashed potatoes and you take me to a restaurant that is all about garlic. I expect the best garlic mashed potatoes that I've ever had. I didn't get that. I did like these, but they just, I didn't fall in love with them. I couldn't tell you what it was, but just something,

I don't know if it was the zucchini, but something about the texture, it wasn't as hot, I guess, as I would have liked it to be. And they were, you don't like lumpy mashed potatoes, right? I don't mind lumpy if it's done a certain way. I can't really put it into words, but like, texture wise, there is a range that I'll accept on a mashed potato.

This one just wasn't cutting it. Again, not bad. I went 6.8 out of 10. It's good. It's solidly good. The very first bite I had of these sent me writing to Flavirvana. I was surprised.8 out of 10. It's good. It's solidly good. The very first bite I had of these sent me writing to Flavorvana. I was surprised.

I noticed, yeah. Honestly, the taste wasn't even that great. It was more of a texture sensation I got. Was it exactly where you like it? Or at least that first bite? The first bite was exactly the amount of moist and chunk that I like in my potatoes. That sounds really gross.

Did that pervade throughout it? No, that was just my first bite. Okay. So I. Did that pervade throughout it? Or did that? That was just my first bite. So I can only give these a six and a half out of 10. I had a couple of really good bites that, you know, I would say were great, but yeah, as a whole, most of the bites I had were, they were okay. Yeah, but yeah, I really had high hopes for these.

And they didn't deliver on those high hopes, but still not a bad dish. Yeah. Now the things that these were on the side of, you and I got the top two listed dishes under on trays. Do you want to go first or do you want me to go first? Go first. Okay. We went to Mastro's not that long ago.

We went to Sizzler right before it. We had a really shitty steak. We had a really great steak and we kind of swore off of steak at least for a little bit two episodes later. Steak. I got Count Vladimir's Sizzling garlic prime rib-eye steak S-T-A-K-E

I see what you're getting there like a wooden steak This was covered in garlic. It had the green garlic relish on top of it. It was very visually pleasing. It was well cooked to medium rare. Yeah, all of the fat was rendered perfectly on the inside. At least it looked that way from... There were a few little textural things,

I was like, oh, it's a little chewy or whatever. I wouldn't call this perfect by any means. This doesn't compete with the master's steak. It's not in the same breath, but it was a very good steak. Delicious. If we're talking, masters is in the A tier. This is at the high end of the B tier. It impressed.

The garlic was the gimmick, and it really delivered on on the garlic and it had a great blend. Nothing about this garlic was unwelcome or overdone. It blended so well with the flavor of the meat. The fatty bites were good, the leaner bites were good, everything mixed well. I'm going 8.5 out of 10 on Count Vladimir's Sizzling Garlic Prime rib ice steak. I had a bite of it. I thought it was great. The thing that most impressed me was the crust on the steak.

Yeah, I'm a crust lord. I know you are. And that was beautiful. I'm gonna give it a seven and a half out of 10. Yeah, I liked it. It was good. Now let's talk about your little residents of perfection in garlicville.

The 40-clove chicken. It was delivered in the silver tin, basically, kind of like the Bonyakolda, but larger, like entree-sized. Take it from here. Oh, yeah. It was just this beautiful golden cooked look. It had like roasted garlic just beautifully sitting on top of it inside of it underneath it. It was sitting in a garlic emulsion. Yeah, so the pool is so good. Garlic emulsion was the thing where like you just,

you slice a thing and then you do a little dip. I had two bites of it and I looked at you and I was like, oh man, I ordered wrong. It mine was good. I liked mine a lot, but yours was the dish to get. Yeah, because we were looking at this, we're like, we're going to count the close of garlic and there weren't 40 whole cloves, but I bet that emulsion was 20 of them. Yeah. This was the best chicken I've had in my entire life.

You said that you wanted to start a family with the garlic, and then I said no, Garrett, we can start a family with this. Like, the garlic flavor was pervasive throughout the entire meat. Everything was moist. Everything was cooked perfectly. It was perfectly textured chicken, perfectly mixed and balanced garlic, enough white meat to dark meat.

I'm losing my words right now because I've never quite experienced the flavor of garlic in the center of a chicken breast like I did there. I didn't know it was possible for garlic to seep that deep into the meat. Yeah. Can I give you some words? Yes. 10 out of 10. Yeah. 10 out of 10. That is a 10 out of 10 chicken. That's a 10 out of 10 anything. Yeah. Yeah. That's a 10 out of 10 life partner. Like no contest. This was the best thing. life partner. No. No contest. This was the best thing. Yeah. This was the best thing. I mean, the Bonnie called I loved. Yeah. I loved. Yeah. I think I put this over there. And I only and only off of two bites. Like the Bonnie called, like I said, I just, you know,

you had half of that. I de-tapped my jaw like a snake and like put the cauldron down my mouth. Yeah. This is so good. This place knows how to do garlic, not everything, not everything is a home run on this menu, but the things that are make it worth coming to this place. And of course we all know that cheese is not a home run. Garrett and I don't like this stuff, but our cheese correspondent Steven does,

and he was with us. And because it was his birthday, we didn't sock him in the jaw rendering him unable to speak, so he can actually voice his own review of the cheesy item that he got from the stinking rose. But, as per usual, we will not tolerate a lot of talk about cheese, so one minute on the clock, Stephen go. Hey guys, Stephen Goh.

Hey guys, Stephen Zerita here. I had the garlic crab Alfredo fondue at the Stinking Rose in San Francisco. I had my heart dead set on some kind of Alfredo pasta earlier in the week, so this came at a perfect time. If you don't know, a big component in Alfredo sauce in and of itself is Parmesan cheese. So that's where the cheese part of this dish comes in, if you didn't know, and top of that I had Parmesan cheese, freshly grated on top.

It was delicious, the extra garlic was an amazing addition. It didn't overpower the Alfredo sauce. And like I said, it doesn't taste cheesy. It tastes like Alfredo sauce with a little bit of Parmesan, so it wasn't in my opinion over the board, but it also wasn't overshadowed by the garlic. Extremely delicious, the crab that was in it was fantastic and expect nothing less from San Francisco which has a good seafood scene.

Some of the best Alfredo pasta I've ever had. I'm going to say 8 out of 10 for the score. Now we gotta move on to the last thing we get. The interesting thing that half of you listening are gonna be like, ew, and the other half are also gonna be like ew, but maybe. We got Gilroy's famous garlic ice cream. This is a vanilla ice cream with garlic and fused

and it's covered in like a chocolate like a chocolate chocolate chocolate Chocolate shell not over the chocolate shell was perfect I thought the chocolate shell was necessary to balance the garlic. Yeah, it's just like salted caramel No, I I loved the chocolate shell. So I took a bite of it immediately. I didn't love the taste Then it dissipated real quick and I kind of got like the slight hint of vanilla because it wasn't a lot of vanilla. And then garlic swoops up and hits that note where it's like, okay, I like this. Yeah, I had the same reaction to the first taste was like, whoa. Yeah, but I think that was the more the runny melted

part. So I just took a thick spoonful right through the middle and I get a little bit of garlic, but once the garlic mixed in with the chocolate and the vanilla, you could taste all three elements at once and it was just amazing. I wouldn't call it amazing, but with all three, I think in an ideal bite it was. It was a very complex mouth adventure.

It was a creative dish. I'm glad I tried it. I don't know if I would ever order, like I would eat it again, like gun to my head. It's not like I hated it or even disliked it. But it's never gonna be my first choice. Like if I even came back here, I would recommend it to the person I'm with

to be like, yeah, just try it. I think it's a 100% try thing. And then I would order something else for my dessert. I go six and a half out of 10 on the garlic ice cream. I'm also gonna go six and a half out of 10 out of this. My enjoyment was honestly the novelty of it and having garlic ice creams pretty novel. Mm.

Overall on the food. Yeah, I think I'm going two thumbs up. The smell of this room right now gives us two thumbs up for this. of this room right now gives us two thumbs up for this, like the amount of garlic we ate. We are garlic. We are garlic. And garlic is us.

We are garlic. We are garlic. We are garlic. Garlic is us. Why am I pants off? What? Honestly, a question I ask you every time we record us. Why are my pants off? Honestly, a question I ask you every time we record at this point, I'm used to it. Yeah, two thumbs up.

All right, we got to give this whole thing a score. But before we do, let's go to Yelp and see what other people are saying about the stinking rows in this week's Yelp from strangers. We need a little, little, little, little, you're from strangers. in this week's Yelp from Strangers. Give us those complaints while you literally whine and die! Yelp! Alright, this is Yelp from Strangers, our segment where we go to Yelp and read out our favorite one, two, three, four, and five star Yelp reviews of the very restaurant that we went to. Three star review.

I'm gonna start us off with a 3 star review. This is from Lauren H. One year ago. It's definitely an experience. You go and order the Vat of Garlic and enjoy it on bread while watching San Francisco roll on by. It's definitely not somewhere I'd recommend for their cuisine, but it's a fun place to go sit and eat massive amounts of garlic in people watch. That is true.

The chicken was tasty for sure. However, I woke up the next morning in a room full of garlic gas. So be warned, garlic does make you stinky and not just your breath. That's true. So, thanks Lauren H. for I guess publicly yelping about your leaky butt hole. Your garlic butthole. Yeah, I mean, you and I are three hours removed from eating this meal and we are stinking up the place. So tonight is going to be a unique situation that our air Airbnb. Five Star Review.

Let's go for a five star review from Kim A 12 months ago. Great. Kim, enjoy your time here. Hot bartender. Italian. Wait, did you talk about the food or the bartender? I don't know. Hot bartender. I don't know. Hot bartender Italian. Okay. As far as drinking food and espresso martini is perfect. Prime rib eye is outstanding. My favorite. I love garlic and Italian men.

I'll be back. She did not say and Italian men. But she does love Italian men, but she definitely did with her other words. Thanks Kim for your love of Italian men. So many people put their thirst on Yelp. You can go download our full Yelp from Stranger's segment at our Patreon. The link for that is in the description of this episode, or you can go to patreon.com slash find outing podcast. And we're now offering a one week free trial, so what do you have to lose? Go check it out! People have wild opinions, and we get to read oh so many of them.

Thanks! Final rating. Okay, well now I'm ready to give a score. I know you're ready to give a score. Garrett, this was one of the highest rated places we've gone in terms of our thumb ratings. I went two up on atmosphere, up on service two up on food That's five thumbs up. Hey, and I had an identical amount of thumbs to you. That's 10 out of 12. We're thumb twins We're thumb twins you and I we're just two hands all thumbs We're like weird mutant thumb boys. Oh

Man, just think of the motion you could get while throwing a baseball with five thumbs. I am haunted at that image. Alright, I really liked this place a lot. I would go back. I wish it would become a full blown chain. At the very least, can we get one back in Southern California again and get just up to two? It doesn't feel good that we pick a former chain that's now back down to just one. I don't like that. I want this place to get attention. I wanted to succeed. That's what we're doing. We are

giving a platform to the stinking rose. We're bringing awareness. Guys, the stinking rose, if you're in San Francisco, I recommend it. I really enjoyed this spot. I will, the stinking rose, if you're in San Francisco, I recommend it. I really enjoyed the spot. I will choose the stinking rose over basically any restaurant. Really? Almost any restaurant. Like, well, not Masters.

Sure. As far as our run so far, though, I think this is my second highest score. If not second or third, it's really up there. I'm going 8.70 for the stinking rose. Real high. This was a truly great dining experience from the supportive atmosphere during me singing the order, the fun that we had with our server, the food being delicious. I kind of wanted a little bit more on the garlicy side, but man, these delivered what I wanted in a lot of ways. So great spot, 8.70.

And I'm going to go 8.55. Right, so right there with the love garlick so much. I've been looking forward to this ever since I picked this place. Hell, I've been looking forward to this restaurant ever since I moved out to LA. And that's been what a decade? Yeah, yeah. While I will admit, some dishes could be more garlicky, but I'll just mainline garlicky right into my veins. So if I say something is not garlicky enough, it's garlicky enough for you people. So that means the stinking rose goes up

on the Chachki of mediocrity at 8.63. We can also say that this wasn't mediocre enough. No. Not mediocre enough. Draw. Not mediocre enough. Draw from the bowl. That you must bowl. I had to sing my order. You got to draw from the you must bowl this time

and see what you're going to do at the next restaurant. Did you put this in here? I don't know which one you drew, so read it. You must embrace the juggalo lifestyle. Oh yeah, that was me. She's spang. I guess you know I'm from Michigan, so it's kind of appropriate. You gotta be a little insane clown Garrett.

We'll go get you some face paint. What size shirt are you? I'm a medium. Great. Good enough. Yeah. I seem like I'm a little disappointed, but secretly deep inside my heart. All I can say about this is, whoop, whoop. Oh my God. I'm going to be so embarrassed by you. Okay. great. Well, let's see where you're gonna paint your face and go to like an insane clown posse fan. Oh, God. We gotta figure it out because we didn't get the most mediocre restaurant we gotta keep looking. We gotta play a little game.

We gotta play the headline game. The Red Line Game The rules of the headline game are as follows. Garrett will present three headlines to Michael that include this week's restaurant. They can be made up, or they can be actual headlines. If Michael can correctly guess, if at least two out of three are real or fake, he will get to select next week's restaurant. However, if Garrett stomps him, he'll select again. Are you ready to play, fellas? I am in fact ready. Here we go, headline number one. Man spits on ballet outside the and hits him with his car. Oh, I just...

Yeah, that's straight from your brain, but it's... Mmm. Yeah, I'm gonna say false. That's such a me headline. It is. It just needs an intact infestation. Yeah. Okay, next one.

Local man runs from Bakersfield to San Francisco just to eat at the stinking rose. Runs? Yes. Bakersfield to San Francisco. That's like five marathons. That's insane. Poor scump did work across the marathons. I don't know. or scump did work across the moon. I don't even know. Ha ha ha. Ha. Not like, what kind of timeline are we talking?

There's no timeline given. Local man runs from Bakersfield to San Francisco just to eat at the Stinking Rose. Maybe a took a may air. I'm gonna say true. Final one, the Stinking Rose, the heart-healthiest restaurant in San Francisco. True. So first headline,light, man spits on Valle outside the stinking rose, then hits him with his car.

You went false, that is true. No! And guess where that happened? This one? Beverly Hills. Oh, yeah. Oh, okay. Honestly, a big reason that I said false was because the valet was not a thing at this one.

Yeah. Ah, okay. All right. Now, the next one, local man runs from Baker's field to San Francisco just eat at the Stinking Rose. You guessed true, that is false. Yeah, that's too far. All right, I'm not gonna be able to pick

what about the last one? The Stinking Rose, the heart healthiest restaurant in San Francisco, I also made that up. I get all free wrong. You did. Aw. That hurts. Hey, at least you had a good meal.

Yeah. Man, I suck at the headline game when you're the one behind the range because you're such a wild card. All right, where are we going to go next time? So we're going to be in San Francisco for a few more days. Yeah. And we're like a jump hop and a skip away from Sacramento. There's one restaurant whose only location in the entire state of

California is in Sacramento. Only. I think I know what this was because I look up what all of our viable restaurant options are You're not we are going to go to twin peaks No, and not only are we going to twin peaks, uh-huh We're gonna bring your cousin eminent twin peaks because she sent us to hooters I Feel like we have to get permission from her mom to do that

But I guess we can ask. Oh, it's not like this is a strip club. I mean, it kind of is. Okay. Yeah, I mean, that's what she gets for it. Everyone go listen to our Chuck E. Cheese episode, so you can know what kind of rapport we have with Emma. But she deserves a come-upence for sending us to Hooters. Sure.

Yeah. Let's take her to Twin Peaks. You insane clown psychopath. Oh God, I didn't think what it would be like going to Twin Peaks as a jug of love. I'll make up with a teenager. Actually, it's probably a thing they see in Sacramento every other week anyway.

All right, well, this is gonna be a wild time. I am. All right, everyone. Well, thanks so much for listening to this week's episode of the fine dining podcast, the search for the most mediocre restaurant in America. Check out our Patreon, get some exclusive episodes, follow us on socials.

Yeah, and on our socials, we are posting Michaels entire singing order. We are on TikTok and Instagram at Find Dining Podcast. You can email us finddiningpodcast at gmail.com. We did not find the most mediocre restaurant, but we will keep looking. Maybe it'll be Twin Peaks, maybe not. We'll see, we'll see you there next time.

Have a fine day. Woo-woo! No! The search continues. We still need the perfect fine. The search continues. Like and subscribe. The search continues.

Our journey did not conclude. The mother and the search continues. Rattles and I do's review And hey, while you're at it, why don't you go ahead and make it five stars? Come on Follow us on TikTok The same on Instagram All the socials at Find Dining Podcast And don't forget, you can always suggest where we go next.

Okay! We're going to find it, meteor-crafting. The search continues, see you next week! Do not swing! I heard my throat a little. Have a fine day. When you say it was inspired, but oh my gosh, that was the garlicious burp. I am, oh my gosh, this is disgusting. I'm in a cloud of garlic right now. Buh-bye!