Eggs, Raw Milk, And Tariffs, Oh My!

Why is the bird flu outbreak that’s currently driving up egg prices different from past outbreaks? Are new tariffs about to make your groceries more expensive? And, perhaps most importantly, are Capri-Sun pouches about to disappear?

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dan Pashman?

  As we turn to fall and the weather starts to cool down, I think of things like crunching leaves. I think of sharing from the sidelines of a soccer game, walking the dog in the woods. And when I think of doing all those things, I'm usually wearing something from LL Bean. Whether it's my puffer vest, my puffer coat, my scarf, whatever you're doing outside this year, you probably need something from LL Bean, whether it's their boots, their Scotch plaid flannel, their rugged field coat, or more. Grab the layers and people you love and get outside. Visit llbean.com to shop the fall collection. LL Bean, be an outsider.

• 0:34Speaker 01

  Enjoy easy weeknight recipes using Land O' Lakes cheese and butter that can bring restaurant taste right to your family's home. Now, if only there was an easy recipe for washing dishes. Land O' Lakes, find it in the dairy aisle. Visit landolakes.com/reцепes for easy weeknight dinners.

• 0:55Speaker 02

  Am I supposed to have a salad spinner as just like part of life now? Is that a thing?

• 0:59Dan Pashman?

  I don't have one.

• 1:00Speaker 02

  Oh, okay, okay.

• 1:01Dan Pashman?

  The show we're making right now is the only salad spinner I have.

• 1:04Speaker 02

  Okay, well, it's great. I love it.

• 1:06Speaker 03

  I'll tell you what my dad, okay, this is so crazy. This is what my dad, an avid cook, an excellent cook, used to do instead of using a salad spinner. He's like, yes, if you put the vegetables in a colander, put it in a plastic bag and spin it around, it'll drain all the water out.

• 1:23Speaker 02

  She's making a lasso motion right now.

• 1:28Dan Pashman?

  This is the Sporkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. And welcome to another edition of the Sporkful Salad Spinner, our rapid fire roundtable discussion of the biggest, weirdest, and most surprising food stories of the moment. Today, we are going to cover everything from raw milk and the price of eggs to a new type of spaghetti that's the thinnest ever created. I'm not sure how tooth sinkable it is, but scientists say it could save your life. We'll get to all that. Joining me now to break it all down are two superstar journalists. Here in the studio in New York, we have Yasmin Tayag. She is a staff writer at The Atlantic, covering science and the future of food. Hi, Yasmin.

• 2:09Speaker 03

  Hi.

• 2:10Dan Pashman?

  And from DC, we are joined by Kenny Malone, a co-host of NPR's Planet Money podcast. Kenny has investigated everything from health hackers building their own pancreas to the origins of seemingly made up holidays like National Raisin Day. Hey, Kenny.

• 2:23Speaker 02

  Dan, this is, I am so excited. I get to say first time, long time, first time. Oh, I messed it up. Long time, first time. And Dan has been on Planet Money, and I've never had the occasion to come on Sportful, so I'm so excited.

• 2:33Dan Pashman?

  I'm glad to return the favor. Before we get to the hard news, I want to take a minute and kind of establish each of your respective sort of food personalities. I asked each of you to come prepared with one food-related hot take. Yasmin, I want to start with you. And I should mention, outside of your work as a journalist, you also run a pop-up Filipino diner called Green Hills Diner.

• 2:53Speaker 03

  That's true.

• 2:54Dan Pashman?

  So like, where is it? When is it? How can we go there?

• 2:57Speaker 03

  Well, it's currently on hiatus. I just had a child not too long ago, but I was doing pop-ups in the Lower East Side at Canal Street Market. Our specialty was Filipino-American diner plates. In the Philippines, our breakfast plate, meat, eggs, garlic fried rice.

• 3:14Dan Pashman?

  I love that. Okay. And people can follow Green Hills Diner on Instagram to know when you're coming back.

• 3:18Speaker 03

  They can, yes.

• 3:19Dan Pashman?

  Okay. So not only being a great journalist, I mean, you, you have a pop-up diner, you know food.

• 3:24Speaker 03

  I cook constantly.

• 3:25Dan Pashman?

  And so what is your hot take?

• 3:28Speaker 03

  Enough with the kosher salt. Okay, look, I'm aware. I have read the books. I have consumed Malibas, and I have consumed salt, fat, acid, heat. I understand why people like kosher salt. It's easier to spread, whatever. It has to be purchased.

• 3:43Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 3:44Speaker 03

  But you know what? I had a salt is just fine. If you care that much about how you season your food, you can learn to sprinkle it evenly onto a pork chop, you know? And biggest thing, it's so expensive. Kosher salt, like a box of Morton's is like 10 bucks now. I don't have money for that.

• 4:04Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 4:04Speaker 03

  I'm trying to buy the pork chop.

• 4:08Dan Pashman?

  So, one of the other arguments in favor of kosher salt is it's not just that it's bigger flakes, it's that it's less salty. And so you can kind of like spread it more around, but you're saying just with a little bit of practice, you don't think that's an issue?

• 4:22Speaker 03

  I think the people who are thinking about this stuff are meticulous enough cooks that they can learn.

• 4:28Dan Pashman?

  As much as I was initially taken aback, Yasmin, as I think about it, I'm sure there are billions of home cooks all over the planet who use good old fashioned table salt and make phenomenal food with it. So I will accept that it's not necessary to use kosher salt.

• 4:44Speaker 02

  Wow, just a bomb out of the gate, though, yes.

• 4:49Dan Pashman?

  How about you, Kenny? What do you got for us? Hot take?

• 4:52Speaker 02

  Well, I have felt this way for some time. And I, it is my belief that if I'm with someone at a bagel place and they ask to toast the bagel, it's gonna take some work to respect that person again. I just think bagels shouldn't be toasted, and if you're toasting bagels, I lose some respect for you 100%.

• 5:16Dan Pashman?

  Now, does it matter what type of bagel place we're talking about? Is this any place that sells bagels?

• 5:23Speaker 02

  There's a continuum. Like, the crappier the bagel, the more I am willing to accept a toasting. But once we're at a hand-rolled place that's like cares about the humidity in the air and the temperature and the artisans and they want to make sure that they're like, there are places here in DC that like bring in New York water. And it's like, at that point, you're gonna take that beautifully crafted differentiation between crispness on the outside and chewiness on the inside and density, and then you're gonna throw that into functionally what is like, a toaster is like a countertop space heater. You're just gonna zap all the moisture out of it? Like, what are you doing? That's an affront to the artisan hands that created this bagel.

• 6:05Dan Pashman?

  I...

• 6:07Dan Pashman?

  I think it depends a lot on the bagel. Toasting is the great equalizer.

• 6:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:12Dan Pashman?

  Toasting makes all bagels roughly the same. And so if you take a great bagel, you're making it worse. If you take a bad bagel, you're making it better. To me, the ultimate test of a great fresh bagel is that it should make a sound when you bite into it. Untoasted, untoasted, it should make a sound. It'll be very quiet. You have to whisper, you have to be very quiet to hear it. But there should be a light crisp on the outside without toasting.

• 6:37Speaker 02

  And listen, listen, I am in a mixed bagel toasting relationship. My marriage is that. And I can regain the respect for someone who toasts their bagels for sure, as I have for my wife. But like, it took some work.

• 6:52Dan Pashman?

  How long did that take, Kenny?

• 6:53Speaker 02

  Years, years.

• 6:57Dan Pashman?

  All right, let's crank up the salad spinner.

• 7:05Dan Pashman?

  Our first story, the price of eggs. I mean, the price of eggs. It's gone through the roof. Let me tell you, I don't really notice how much staples cost at the grocery store. Because if I'm going to the grocery store, I'm going to get milk and eggs. Even I noticed the price of eggs. I was like, am I in the super, like the eggs that have had classical music played to them? Section of the grocery store? What?

• 7:27Speaker 02

  Baby Einstein eggs.

• 7:29Dan Pashman?

  So according to federal data, by the end of 2024, eggs cost twice as much as they did in 2023, and they're expected to continue to rise this year. Yasmin, you've done a lot of reporting on this subject. First off, the quick and dirty explanation that I hear in the news is bird flu. Is that the explanation?

• 7:47Speaker 03

  It is explanation. Bird flu is bad.

• 7:49Dan Pashman?

  I feel like bird flu has been out there for a long time. It comes and goes. What's happening now that's having such an impact?

• 7:56Speaker 03

  Well, bird flu has been around forever, but it keeps changing. It's a virus that mutates pretty quickly. And the version that's circulating right now is supercharged in a lot of ways. This bird flu is carried by migratory waterfowl. Your ducks, your geese, they're flying around. But the virus has changed in a way that it can be carried by these guys, but it doesn't kill them. So that means they're just flying around, spreading it all over the place. Unfortunately, chickens do not respond the same way. So when these ducks land by a hen house and a chicken gets infected, it's dead in 48 hours.

• 8:41Speaker 03

  And this thing spreads like crazy. So when it reaches like an industrial egg facility, where there's like a billion chickens next to each other, it spreads very quickly. And there's no other way to control the spread other than to kill the hens.

• 8:56Dan Pashman?

  Are the eggs themselves, like if a hen with bird flu lays an egg and it ends up in my carton of eggs, is that bad for me?

• 9:04Speaker 02

  I have been wondering this too.

• 9:05Speaker 03

  This is a good question. It's unclear, but no is the current answer.

• 9:11Dan Pashman?

  The current answer is no, it's not bad for you. It's not going to hurt you.

• 9:14Speaker 03

  No.

• 9:14Speaker 02

  Is the reason then that the prices are spiking, it is just simply a supply and demand thing? Like that is what's going on. We all still want eggs at the same rates, but there are fewer eggs being produced because we're preventatively killing these chickens. And so like that's it.

• 9:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, there's just not enough eggs. The last time I saw eggs at the grocery store, there was a sign that said, limit three per customer.

• 9:36Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, I saw that at my local store.

• 9:37Speaker 03

  Yeah, and I real, I was like, am I going to be that person hoarding the eggs? And I did, I brought home three. And now I've been like rationing like, oh, we only have sunny side up eggs on Sunday breakfast. It's a special treat. That's such a crazy feeling.

• 9:52Speaker 02

  As a person who has, who has already once on this podcast argued for a substitution of expensive salt for cheaper salt, you have a recommendation for expensive egg substitute?

• 10:00Speaker 03

  I just spoke with an amazing recipe developer about this. She said flaxseed plus water.

• 10:07Dan Pashman?

  What?

• 10:07Speaker 03

  Excellent egg substitute for baking.

• 10:09Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 10:10Speaker 03

  But for if you want to make like a scramble, she said, if you mash up like mung beans and mix them with like cornstarch and a little bit of salt, turmeric, an uncanny substitute.

• 10:22Dan Pashman?

  Interesting.

• 10:22Speaker 03

  I haven't tried it myself.

• 10:23Speaker 02

  Uncanny is a high claim.

• 10:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, but she said traditionally.

• 10:26Speaker 02

  Let's set the bar lower, like reasonable substitute.

• 10:28Dan Pashman?

  Right, right. And this has become such a big deal. I mean, even Waffle House announced it'll be adding a 50 cent surcharge to all egg items sold at its more than 2,000 locations. A few weeks back in Pennsylvania, someone stole 100,000 eggs from a trailer. It's a total value of $40,000 worth of eggs.

• 10:43Speaker 03

  I want to find that cut.

• 10:44Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, I'm not quite sure what you're going to do with 100,000 eggs. But um.

• 10:48Speaker 02

  Police grew suspicious when world's largest omelet appeared in someone's kitchen.

• 10:55Dan Pashman?

  All right, let's keep it moving here. It's time to spin the spinner.

• 11:01Dan Pashman?

  Our next story is about tariffs. Kenny, I want to ask you to take the lead breaking this one down. First off, I just want to make sure, like, really, we're going tariffs 101.

• 11:11Speaker 02

  Okay, great.

• 11:11Dan Pashman?

  To make sure that I understand, like tariffs are basically taxes on goods that are manufactured in other countries. And we charge taxes on them when they're brought into America to be sold in America in part to make money as a way for the government to grow revenue and in part to tilt the playing field in favor of domestic companies.

• 11:31Speaker 02

  Well, you know, the rationale can be all over the map. You may be doing this as a, as a kind of foreign policy. Countries may do this in a, as retaliation for some things going on. But yes, like you've got it, that's it.

• 11:45Dan Pashman?

  And am I right that like many, many countries all over the world charge tariffs on many, many different products?

• 11:50Speaker 02

  Hundred percent. The distinction we need to make is there are generally two kinds of tariffs. There are hyper localized tariffs that are like specific to one item, one industry, whatever. And then there are broad based tariffs, which is what we are talking about today.

• 12:04Dan Pashman?

  So the specific ones are like, you know, if you're going to bring in aluminum to make soda cans, your tariff is X. Broad based tariffs are like everything from China.

• 12:13Speaker 02

  That's exactly right.

• 12:14Dan Pashman?

  So President Trump has, you know, been talking a lot about tariffs. It's obviously in the news. What's been done so far and what's been proposed? How will it affect or could it affect supermarket shelves? What we see in the grocery store and what it's going to cost?

• 12:29Speaker 02

  So, yes, proposed is the key word at the moment. The only, the only tariffs that have been implemented so far are the, are the, the additional 10% tariff on imports from China. The broad based 25% tariffs on items coming in from Mexico and Canada has been suspended for 30 days as of, I think it was early February. So we will, we will revisit this topic in early March and I'm sure it will be something that we cover at Planet Money.

• 12:53Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, and just to note for everyone listening, we are recording this on Monday, February 24th. This 30 day suspension of the tariffs will be over just a couple of days after this episode comes out. So the tariffs. Situation may have changed by the time that you hear this, or maybe not. Maybe there'll be another pause. We don't know. Anyway, sorry, Kenny, go on.

• 13:10Speaker 02

  Before we go into sort of the direct effect in the grocery store, I do think a thing that that often does not get mentioned at the beginning of this tariff discussion is that the vast, vast, vast majority of things that we consume are domestic products. They are produced here. It doesn't mean that they won't be touched by tariffs. Like, there may be ingredients that are imported. There may be packaging materials that are imported. But we are talking about way more things produced here in the States.

• 13:35Dan Pashman?

  That's true, although it kind of depends on what food you're talking about. I looked into this also, and even though we do produce most of our food domestically, we actually import 60% of our fresh fruit and 40% of our fresh vegetables. And Mexico is the leading foreign supplier of our tomatoes, avocados, and berries. So these tariffs could touch all those things. And also, it's not just produce. Mexico is our leading importer of beer by a huge margin. In fact, the Mexican beer Modelo is the best-selling beer in the US.

• 14:01Speaker 02

  Yes, of course. It's useful, I think, to take each of those kind of category by category. So with a product like beer, if there is a 25% tariff on products coming from Mexico, consumers in the US, they will have a choice. Like, there will be beers that you can switch to. I think the way that people will feel this a lot more directly is with a product like avocados. Something like 90% of the avocados that we eat do come from Mexico. You do not have a substitute option for avocado. So if you need to eat avocados, if, let's say hypothetically, you went into your physical last Friday and were told you have high cholesterol and you should eat better fats. I mean, just hypothetically, like, that didn't happen to me directly.

• 14:37Speaker 03

  That literally happened to me this morning.

• 14:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, oh, great, okay. It happened to me on Friday. So then I am paying attention to the price of avocados. Sure, there are other things that have, like, the good fats. But like, I love avocados, and that is going to be something that you're not going to be able to directly substitute. We've become accustomed to, like, I can get blueberries year round. I can get any fruit, any vegetable year round. And like, someone is making that. And if it's out of season where you live, there is a chance that it's being imported and that it would be affected by one of these tariffs. A reasonable person would then ask, like, okay, so then how much more am I going to, in fact, be paying if these tariffs go into effect? So just at the grocery store. The number I've seen cited is from a center-left think tank. They tried to sort of calculate like item by item.

• 15:20Speaker 02

  And they're coming out at like 185 bucks, maybe 200 bucks per household at the grocery store. So 185 is what we're talking about. But then would come the conversation about it depends on the item. Avocados, you can't escape.

• 15:35Dan Pashman?

  Coming up, we're going to talk all about raw milk. More and more people want it. What is it? Is it going to kill you? We'll find out. Plus, we're going to talk about a possibly controversial change in Capri Sun. Then later on, a special lightning round devoted entirely to pasta. That's all coming up. Stick around.

• 16:01Speaker 04

  It's time to open up a can of advertisements.

• 16:07Dan Pashman?

  Thank you to American Express, the presenting sponsor of today's episode. I'm so happy to have them on board because I break out my Amex Gold card when I go out to eat. So I'm always thinking about them when I'm eating. Of course, my first thought is about where to eat. Now, I got pins in my maps to let me know where I want to go, where I've been. There's what am I in the mood for? What's got a lot of word of mouth? What looks great on social media? What's convenient or nearby? What's open? And then I go out to eat and it's usually very good. And then Amex Gold tops the whole experience off. Because I get four times Membership Rewards points at global restaurants up to $50,000 annually. Cardholders can enroll and earn up to $120 back in statement credits after paying at participating dining partners and get up to $100 back annually after you pay with the American Express Gold Card

• 16:50Dan Pashman?

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• 17:34Dan Pashman?

  Learn more at USPS.com/holiday.

• 17:39Dan Pashman?

  As we turn to fall and the weather starts to cool down, I think of things like crunching leaves. I think of sharing from the sidelines of a soccer game, walking the dog in the woods. And when I think of doing all those things, I'm usually wearing something from LL Bean. Whether it's my puffer vest, my puffer coat, my scarf, whatever you're doing outside this year, you probably need something from LL Bean. Whether it's their boots, their Scotch plaid flannel, their rugged field coat, or more. Grab the layers and people you love and get outside. Visit llbean.com to shop the fall collection. LL Bean, be an outsider. As someone who has been lucky enough to go to Napa Valley, I can tell you, it's everything people say it is. Beautiful scenery, quaint, beautiful towns, and phenomenal food and

• 18:23Dan Pashman?

  drink everywhere you go. I don't even know that much about wine, but I know that every glass of wine I had in Napa Valley was excellent. I mean, there's no bad glass of wine and no bad meal. Choose between hundreds of wineries, tasting rooms, and chef-led restaurants from a low-key lunch on a vineyard terrace to a full tasting menu paired by the winemaker. Plan your trip at visitnapavalley.com.

• 18:45Dan Pashman?

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• 19:13Dan Pashman?

  Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman. Last week on the show, I traveled to Centerville, Tennessee, where I met up with the pit master and preacher, Devin Pickard. During the week, Devin tends to the pit at Papa Cajun's Barbecue, and on Sundays, he's in front of his ministry at Hope Church. Devin works very hard to make sure his church is inclusive, and he says that members of the community can better connect with him, knowing that he's running his barbecue restaurant when he's not preaching.

• 19:35Speaker 05

  I don't have a church office, per se, but the office is out back in the pit. People seem to feel more comfortable showing up during the week. I'm out back cooking or doing whatever, you know, they make, say, can we talk? I need a little bit of time. And- I think some folks would rather do that than come to a church office where things seem sanitary and things seem rigid. I don't know. I hope that Hope Church and Papa K. Joe's in some ways are synonymous, not only because people can find me at either place, but because they know that they're going to be accepted and loved at either place. They're going to be fed at either place and hopefully that they leave both places feeling better than they did when they got there.

• 20:16Dan Pashman?

  Also in that episode, I learned about the Southern tradition of a sweet out where you save just a little bit of savory meat to eat after your dessert. And that last bite of salty meat has so much more flavor. It's so different after eating the dessert. Love the sweet out. Anyway, that episode's up now. Check it out. All right, let's get back into the salad spinner. I'm joined once again by Yasmin Tayeg of The Atlantic and Kenny Malone of NPR's Planet Money. Welcome back to both of you.

• 20:40Speaker 02

  Thank you, Dan. I'm getting dizzy from all this.

• 20:43Dan Pashman?

  Well, you better recover because we're about to spin it again.

• 20:47Dan Pashman?

  All right, next up, we're going to talk about raw milk. I'm very excited to talk about this because I'll have you both know that I did a story about raw milk when I worked at NPR. This story came out in 2008.

• 20:58Speaker 03

  Ahead of the trends.

• 21:00Dan Pashman?

  Seventeen years ago, raw milk, so that people understand, the milk you buy in the grocery store is pasteurized, which means that it's heated to kill bacteria. It may even be ultra pasteurized, which means it's heated to a higher temperature to kill more bacteria. And that kills potentially harmful bacteria and also gives it a longer shelf life. There are people who believe that in the process of killing bad bacteria, pasteurization also kills good bacteria. And they believe that you shouldn't pasteurize it. You should not heat it at all. And then we call that raw milk and that that's better somehow. It's more natural. It has special health benefits. So Yasmin, first off, what do health professionals and food scientists say about raw milk?

• 21:42Speaker 03

  Don't drink the raw milk. It's too risky. It can carry every food pathogen we're afraid of, Listeria, E. coli, all the stuff that can make you like terribly, terribly ill. Or, you know, if you're a child, an older person, or pregnant, it could.

• 21:57Speaker 03

  Be even worse.

• 21:58Dan Pashman?

  Now, I did drink it when I did that story.

• 22:00Speaker 03

  What'd you think?

• 22:00Dan Pashman?

  It was incredibly delicious. It was almost like a milkshake. I interviewed this farmer in upstate New York. And this guy, we interviewed Rick Reland, the farmer. He said, "We put up a sign on this rural road in upstate New York saying, 'Raw Milk.'" His quote, I still remember from 17 years ago. He said, "It was like we put up a sign that said, 'Free drugs for addicts.'" Oh, my God.

• 22:22Speaker 03

  Oh, my God.

• 22:24Dan Pashman?

  It's so people really want raw milk, Yasmin.

• 22:29Speaker 03

  They do.

• 22:29Dan Pashman?

  One of the things that has changed, though, in the 17 years since I did that story, is the people who want it. The demographics of raw milk lovers has evolved. For a long time, I had always said that, you know, there's some areas where I think conservatives can be very anti-science, especially like global warming on average. But there are also areas where liberals, I think, are anti-science. And I always felt like food was one of those areas because there's this perception that, like, everything natural is good. And anything that has been tampered with by human beings is unnatural and therefore bad. And that's not completely true, as we know. Bird flu is natural. The bacteria in milk is natural. That doesn't mean you should be drinking it.

• 23:12Dan Pashman?

  But the demographic of people who want raw milk is no longer sort of my stereotype of hippie liberals. So who wants raw milk now? Why? What's changed?

• 23:25Speaker 03

  I like to think that a new faction is forming. This is how I've been thinking about it. Because, yes, it used to be a hippie liberal thing. But then you have people now on the right who are also interested in raw milk. And I think what joins these two groups is an anti-establishment attitude. It's like, we just don't trust the system.

• 23:48Speaker 03

  And you know, you've got the influence of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now Secretary of Health, who is an avid raw milk enthusiast. And he, at least to me, is sort of the leader of that new group of people who are questioning science, wanting to do their own research. That's something you hear from RFK Jr. a lot, from the people who support raw milk. Like, we don't trust the studies, they're compromised by industry, by academia. We're going to do our own research. We're going to find out what is best for us, and we can decide what is healthy.

• 24:29Speaker 03

  And I think this is so fascinating because milk consumption in general is declining. It's been crashing since like after World War II. And it's like at a historic low, but the raw milk interest is going up.

• 24:43Dan Pashman?

  Well, one of the things that you've written about is the role that milk has traditionally played in sort of Americana and the American identity.

• 24:54Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's like a symbol of that, of like the Red Barn. The Red Barn on the hillside with the beautiful pasture and the clean cows.

• 25:06Dan Pashman?

  Like Norman Rockwell.

• 25:07Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah. And so I think milk is so much more than just a drink now. It's a symbol of this bygone era of America that a lot of conservatives and a lot of liberals want to hearken back to. And, you know, they see pasteurization as this like modern evil that is adulterating what is naturally good. And the thought is that removing pasteurization, getting rid of it, would just return us back to this like pure state of being. I don't buy it.

• 25:51Dan Pashman?

  I mean, how much milk are people drinking that they would get the bacterial benefits from it even?

• 25:57Speaker 03

  I spoke to a scientist who did research on like, what is in raw milk versus what's in pasteurized milk? And yes, you know, the claim that it contains more stuff, living bacteria, this broad category of molecules called bioactives, things that, you know, help your body run. Yes, raw milk contains more of that because when you heat it, all that stuff goes away. And I asked the scientist, like, how much would you have to drink to get the benefits of all these things? She's like, you'd have to drink like four gallons in a week, say.

• 26:33Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 26:33Speaker 03

  It's a lot. It's a lot. No one's drinking that much.

• 26:36Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 26:41Dan Pashman?

  Our next story is about Capri Sun. They are introducing plastic bottles. Yes, it's true. Capri Sun has officially announced that a 12-ounce twist-top plastic bottled version of its signature juice pouch will be rolling into stores to, quote, "meet the needs of busy on-the-go families," allowing Capri Sun to grow with its fans. Now, some millennials are very upset about this. One person on X called it, quote, "one of the most shocking product changes in the history of food and beverage."

• 27:08Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 27:09Dan Pashman?

  Another wrote, quote, "I feel like it ain't gonna taste the same. I wanna taste the alumina." Now, it's important to note, because this got mixed up on social media, Capri Sun is not getting rid of the pouches.

• 27:21Speaker 02

  Oh, blessed.

• 27:22Dan Pashman?

  They are adding a second version of the product in plastic bottles. Now, Kenny, I can see you've got a strong opinion on this. Was Capri Sun like a big part of your life growing up?

• 27:31Speaker 02

  Well, listen, I wasn't allowed to drink Capri Sun growing up. Shout out to my parents. Probably had enough hyperactive ingredients in my system anyway, so I think that's fine as I grew up. You know, I developed thoughts and techniques. Like, I always felt like you go for it, right? Like, you give it a little squeeze, so you're playing with danger, but you get a little tension in the foil cover, and then if you miss the stab, juice everywhere, but like, go for it.

• 27:56Speaker 03

  I was also not allowed to drink it, but I would, you know, swap with my classmates. Just turn it around, squeeze it, and punch the bottom.

• 28:05Dan Pashman?

  Whoa.

• 28:06Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 28:07Dan Pashman?

  Punch the bottom? Is there a hole in the bottom?

• 28:09Speaker 03

  No, there isn't, but if you stab it hard enough and you create enough pressure, boom, it's like chugging a beer.

• 28:16Speaker 03

  From it like stabbing.

• 28:17Speaker 02

  Shotgunning a Capri Sun.

• 28:18Speaker 03

  Shotgunning a Capri Sun.

• 28:19Dan Pashman?

  Yeah, I also didn't grow up with, my mom didn't buy Capri Sun, but like I would send us trade for it in school, as you did, or I did once or twice, or someone gave it to me, I don't know. But this is, this is where I, I have something to share. I've never said this publicly.

• 28:33Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 28:34Dan Pashman?

  I am almost 48 years old.

• 28:36Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 28:37Dan Pashman?

  And I have never successfully opened a pouch of Capri Sun.

• 28:40Speaker 02

  Oh, please tell me you brought one with you.

• 28:42Dan Pashman?

  No.

• 28:43Speaker 02

  Oh, come on.

• 28:44Dan Pashman?

  I haven't tried in decades, Ken.

• 28:45Speaker 03

  What goes wrong?

• 28:46Speaker 02

  I just want to be clear. When we're done with this episode taping, I want the coda to this episode to be Dan alone with a Capri Sun on mic, like just haplessly trying to open it.

• 28:56Speaker 03

  Wearing a white t-shirt, wearing a white t-shirt.

• 28:58Dan Pashman?

  I mean, I, I must have gotten sprayed at some point in like, I, I don't remember it specifically, but there must be some sort of suppressed memory, uh, where I was trying to open it and I couldn't, you know?

• 29:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:08Dan Pashman?

  And so I am always stabbing it too gingerly, or it's spraying everywhere.

• 29:12Speaker 02

  You need to confidently stab the Capri Sun, is my, is my memory. Yeah.

• 29:16Dan Pashman?

  I just, I've never done it. It's never worked for me. A little bit more seriously, I am curious, like it does seem like the, the packaging is what made Capri Sun different.

• 29:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, no one drinks Capri Sun for the juice.

• 29:28Dan Pashman?

  Right, like without the packaging, you can mix up Capri Sun with Hawaiian Punch or any other sort of like mostly corn syrupy, quasi fruit flavored beverage. Is this a mistake? Is this a branding mistake?

• 29:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, in my professional opinion, this could set this company back decades down, is my feeling. So my favorite thing as an economics reporter is we have now entered the realm of stated preference versus observed preference. Like, people may say they want a bottle or not a bottle, or maybe people are like, no, I'll, like, I'll never, I ride or die for the pouch. Let's see. Like, we will now find out what people are choosing in reality. And like, now we get to find out.

• 30:05Dan Pashman?

  All right. One of you guys want to take a turn spinning the spinner? Yasmin, hit the button, Yasmin.

• 30:14Dan Pashman?

  Next up, we have the rebranding of two major food and drink chains that are have fallen on hard times. Red Lobster, they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May. They emerged from bankruptcy in mid-September with new ownership, a new CEO, and fewer locations. Starbucks also is in the midst of a big shakeup. They have a new CEO who's refocusing the company on its core identity. They want to rebuild from the inside out. Both of these companies struggling. Kenny, what are your thoughts? Is there a connection here even? I know it was kind of a funny punchline that part of what gave Red Lobster trouble was that they did this endless shrimp promotion. People ate too much shrimp. And that obviously didn't help, but that wasn't the only reason why they had to declare bankruptcy.

• 30:55Speaker 02

  I went down that rabbit hole, too. I was like, that can't be the thing.

• 30:58Dan Pashman?

  And what did you learn?

• 30:59Speaker 02

  What's funny is their willingness to publicly state that that is a big part of it. I mean, there's no denying that this is something that's been mentioned in official documentation, or at least official speeches, it sounds like. But yes, it sounds like they're like, people changing consumer preferences is perhaps being alighted a bit here, where it's like, maybe people don't want to go to a seafood restaurant as much, seemed to be some of my reading. I'm by no means an expert on this. I just, I'm a guy who went down a rabbit hole trying to find out about unlimited shrimp.

• 31:26Speaker 03

  My thought is that they're both big, recognizable, American brands that once meant more to Americans than they do now. It's funny, I, for my 16th birthday, I had my, my parents host a dinner for me and my friends at Red Lobster.

• 31:46Dan Pashman?

  Yes, that's great.

• 31:48Speaker 03

  It was awesome. We had the endless shrimp, we had the cheddar bay biscuits, and it was, it was great, but it's, you know, I think if Red Lobster wants to rebrand to anything, they should sort of lean all the way back into the nostalgia. Young people, I don't think, have any connection to Red Lobster.

• 32:07Dan Pashman?

  And what about Starbucks? What do you think is happening with Starbucks?

• 32:11Speaker 03

  They just became so unwelcoming to customers. My, my colleague, Ellen Cushing, wrote this great story about Starbucks closing its bathrooms to customers, and I think that's sort of representative of everything that's going wrong with them. They want to be this place where you can hang out and chill, when really it's become, you know, a fast food restaurant where it's...

• 32:38Speaker 03

  Takes a long time to get your order and you can't go to the bathroom. It's like the worst kind of fast food restaurant. So, uh, no wonder people aren't going anymore.

• 32:47Speaker 02

  I have a theory to spitball.

• 32:48Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 32:49Speaker 02

  So, okay, so I, I remember very distinctly like Red Lobster was one of the fancy restaurants in my, in my somewhat small hometown. And I remember like going there was kind of a thing and you were expected to kind of dress up. And Starbucks, the original pitch was like coffee as a, what was the affordable luxury was the idea initially, right? And so I do wonder if some, if there's been a general like casualification of society that has made these kinds of places like awkward to fit into the world. And maybe Red Lobster perhaps didn't adapt well. Still sit down, still very kind of formal in its, in its existence. And then Starbucks tried to adapt and perhaps is trying to bring it back a little bit. Like they adapted too far perhaps, and they think like, okay, we need to walk it back. We need to be a place where people stay.

• 33:34Speaker 02

  We need to simplify the menu. We need to get good at the things we're doing. I know, that's my thought, that, that.

• 33:39Dan Pashman?

  Well.

• 33:39Speaker 02

  They lost their way in some, or, or became irrelevant in some way.

• 33:42Dan Pashman?

  That's interesting. And I think, I mean, what, one of the general things I've observed in food is that I think like that you, you've seen a stratification that dovetails with the general, uh, sort of hollowing out of the middle class, which is that you have kind of one set of brands and, and stores that are for the top, whatever, 10 to 20% of people with a lot of disposable income. Uh, and then everything else is just like, how cheap can we get it?

• 34:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 34:07Dan Pashman?

  And Red Lobster and Starbucks were both meant to be kind of like affordable luxuries.

• 34:12Speaker 02

  Affordable luxury, yeah, that's right.

• 34:13Dan Pashman?

  For people in the middle class. Um, like you say, Kenny, like Red Lobster is like a nice night out. It's not, but it's not, obviously it's not the same as going to a super high-end seafood restaurant and same with Starbucks where it's like you're, you might not be the kind of person who has access to or money for an $8 cup of coffee at some super fancy place where they have a six paragraphs about where the beans came from. But you also want something a little better than McDonald's coffee. You want to feel a little more special than that. So that's Starbucks. So they both kind of occupied this, this, this place. And now their target customers, they don't exist as much. There are fewer of their target customers around.

• 34:50Speaker 03

  People are either too poor or too rich.

• 34:52Dan Pashman?

  Exactly.

• 34:53Speaker 02

  Do you, do you think there's a world where they just lean all the way in until, into like, the biscuits or something?

• 34:59Speaker 03

  Oh, just make it about the cheddar, cheddar bay? Cause they are the best part.

• 35:02Speaker 02

  I mean, that biscuit is so, like, I remember I was at a party once and no one had any business just showing up with a bag of biscuits, but they just did and every, the mood palpably increased. It was already a good party and it just went to like 15 after that.

• 35:15Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 35:15Speaker 02

  And someone was like, no one ever thought to just bring biscuits to the party. So genius. I don't know.

• 35:21Dan Pashman?

  My wife's gonna be away for a week in May and I'm already thinking about where I'm gonna take my kids to eat. I gotta take my kids to get some cheddar bay biscuits.

• 35:27Speaker 02

  I mean, they are unparalleled.

• 35:29Dan Pashman?

  They're incredible.

• 35:30Speaker 02

  They are non-real, as they say.

• 35:31Dan Pashman?

  I did buy the freezer section ones once and I made them at home for my kids and they were, their minds were blown, but still, you know, getting them at the source is the best.

• 35:37Speaker 02

  Fresh and hot. So good. Yeah.

• 35:39Dan Pashman?

  All right. Spin the spinner.

• 35:43Dan Pashman?

  All right. We're gonna finish strong now with a pasta themed lightning round. Are you all ready for this? I want your quick reactions to these pasta themed stories. Ready?

• 35:50Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 35:51Dan Pashman?

  Here we go. A scientific breakthrough on cacio e pepe. Now, you may know when you make cacio e pepe, you mix starchy pasta water with grated cheese. And if you do it right, you'll end up with the sauce that's silky smooth and glossy and amazing. But sometimes it can end up kinda clumpy and it just doesn't really come together. Well, scientists found that the key is to wait some time before mixing the water and cheese to let the water cool down. Now, this feels very counterintuitive, right? Cause you would think the hotter the water, the more that cheese will kind of melt and infuse into the water, the more they will become one. But in fact, the scientists say that at high temperatures, cheese proteins can form clumps upon denaturation or simply aggregate, therefore ruining the sauce.

• 36:33Dan Pashman?

  Simply put, if the water is too hot, when you add it to the cheese, you might end up with a lumpy sauce.

• 36:39Speaker 03

  This makes sense to me.

• 36:40Dan Pashman?

  Okay.

• 36:40Speaker 03

  It's like when you make a cornstarch slurry, you always do it in cold water, cause you want it to be suspended. But if you make it with hot water, it won't work. Same idea, right? You want the starch to mix up and, and get into the cheese. So I think that, that makes sense to me.

• 36:54Dan Pashman?

  All right.

• 36:55Speaker 02

  This still makes me happy to just buy cacio e pepe. Like, I'm glad someone figured that out, but that sounds still hard.

• 37:01Dan Pashman?

  All right. Next in the Pasta Lightning Round, a January article in Taste points to a trend that's been lighting up the internet. Crispy gnocchi. Everyone online seems to agree that you should not boil your store bought gnocchi, but instead crisp it up. Now, of course, look, there's nothing wrong with boiling it, but I do definitely agree that crispy gnocchi is just like, it's one of the simplest ways to make something amazing. You just buy the store bought gnocchi, throw it in a pan with some oil, toss it around till it's golden brown, you get to start to a delicious meal.

• 37:27Speaker 03

  It slaps. It's so good and it's so easy, so much easier, fewer pans to wash.

• 37:32Speaker 02

  Are you frying it then? Is that what functionally is happening?

• 37:35Dan Pashman?

  I mean, you're pan frying. You only need a light coating of oil. You're not deep frying. You're just, you're just crisping it up in the pan.

• 37:41Speaker 02

  So this is mostly for this shelf stabilized version of it?

• 37:44Dan Pashman?

  Right, the one in the vacuum seal.

• 37:46Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 37:47Dan Pashman?

  There's a crispy gnocchi tomato preserved lemon salad in my cookbook.

• 37:51Speaker 03

  Ooh.

• 37:52Dan Pashman?

  Strongly recommend.

• 37:52Speaker 03

  Gotta check that out. It has a texture like a, like a tater tot almost, a chewy tater tot.

• 37:58Dan Pashman?

  Crispy on the outside, chewy in the center. Yeah. All right. One more for the Pasta Lightning Round. When this news first broke, I think 25 different people sent it to me. Researchers have published a new recipe for the world's thinnest spaghetti. It's called Nano Pasta. It's just a tiny fraction of the width of a human hair, invisible to the naked eye. Now, you're probably wondering how it tastes, but it's not a food. It's actually a super tiny fiber that can be used in a variety of ways. It's called Nano Pasta because just like regular pasta, it's made with flour. I gotta say, I, I think this is super interesting, but Yasmin, you're, you're shaking your head, but you disagree? What, what, what do you think?

• 38:34Speaker 03

  Everything about this screams evil to me. It makes me think of, I don't know if you guys watch the show.

• 38:42Speaker 02

  The Three Body Problem?

• 38:43Speaker 03

  The Three Body Problem.

• 38:44Dan Pashman?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 38:45Speaker 03

  Where the nano fibers slice, the invisible nano fibers slice an entire ship and all the people on it in half.

• 38:51Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 38:52Speaker 03

  That's what the Nano Pasta will do to us.

• 38:56Speaker 02

  Hundred percent.

• 38:56Speaker 03

  You don't want to eat that.

• 38:58Speaker 02

  It reminds me of like the stuff you're not supposed to breathe, like the microscopic fibers you're not supposed to breathe in that like gets stuck in your lungs.

• 39:05Speaker 03

  The insulation.

• 39:06Speaker 02

  Furthermore, may I read a quote from the story that you sent us about this?

• 39:09Dan Pashman?

  Sure.

• 39:09Speaker 02

  Okay, it said, quote, "It's made with a mixture of formic acid and flour, almost like regular pasta is with water and flour, et cetera, et cetera." Okay, not almost like water and flour. Do you know what formic acid is? Formic acid, specifically cited by NIOSH, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, is a class 2 combustible liquid, quote, "colorless liquid with a pungent penetrating odor." Which then sent me down, I was like, wait, what does it smell like? Which will then quickly take you to a Reddit feed that talks about, what do ants smell like? Apparently formic acid because of the venom in their faces. So like, it isn't, it isn't like flour and water. It's like formic acid and water, but you can't see. I don't know, I don't like, I'm with, yeah, it's evil.

• 39:54Dan Pashman?

  Look, I think we can agree, I don't think it's gonna taste very good, but we should make clear that that's not really its purpose, okay? This nano pasta has been designed, one day, they hoped to use it to bandage wounds, to be able to go inside people's bodies and to be able to tie things together with this extra thin fiber that will, they'll be able to bandage wounds and fix you up in a way they couldn't before. Is it still evil knowing that, Yasmin?

• 40:19Speaker 03

  I think we have other ways of bandaging ourselves that don't involve formic acid and flour.

• 40:27Dan Pashman?

  This has been a ton of fun. Kenny Malone is a co-host for NPR's Planet Money podcast. Thank you, Kenny.

• 40:31Speaker 02

  You're so welcome.

• 40:32Dan Pashman?

  And Yasmin Tayeg is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she covers science, health, and the future of food. She's also the person behind the Filipino diner pop-up, Green Hills Diner, at Green Hills Diner on Instagram. Thank you, Yasmin.

• 40:44Speaker 03

  Thank you so much for having me.

• 40:46Dan Pashman?

  And for those of you who are waiting for me to open a Capri Sun on mic, I'm gonna do you one better. I'm gonna do it on camera. Follow me on Instagram, at TheSporkful, where I will post a video this week of me attempting to successfully open a Capri Sun pouch for the first time in my life. Again, on Instagram, I am at TheSporkful. Next week on the show, I talk with food writer Laurie Wooliver. She's best known for working closely with Anthony Bourdain. She's written books about her time on the road with him. Now she's telling her own story about addiction, scandal, and her time both with Bourdain and another chef she worked closely with, Mario Batali. That's next week. In the meantime, if you're looking for more Sporkful to listen to, we just wrapped up a month in the South. I spoke to Karen Blockman Carrier in Memphis. I took a road trip visiting gas station restaurants in Alabama and Mississippi.

• 41:30Dan Pashman?

  And I talked to Deb Freeman, who released a new documentary about the iconic Virginian, Edna Lewis. Then, as I mentioned last week, I met Devin Pickard, a preacher and barbecue pit master in Centerville, Tennessee. Come spend a month with me in the South. Check out our last few episodes. And hey, did you know you can listen to the Sporkful on the SiriusXM app? Yes, the SiriusXM app, it has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports coverage. Does your podcasting app have that? And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more. It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app all rolled into one. And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the SiriusXM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful. This episode was produced by me along with managing producer-

• 42:14Speaker 06

  Emma Morgenstern.

• 42:15Dan Pashman?

  And senior producer- Andres O'Hara. Our engineer is- Jared O'Connell. And our intern is- Julia Liu. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher Studios. Our executive producer is Camille Stanley. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 42:28Speaker 06

  And I'm Mallory in Washington DC, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.

• 42:46Dan Pashman?

  Thank you to our presenting sponsor, American Express. Amex Gold makes your dining experiences more rewarding so you can discover and connect more. Enjoy every meal with the benefits that come with the American Express Gold Card. For terms and to learn more, visit americanexpress.com/withamex.

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• 43:49Speaker 06

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