Pod Insights The Sporkful What Will America’s 250th Birthday Cake Look Like? About this episode In just a few weeks, the United States will mark its 250th birthday, with celebrations all across the country. But when cake artist Grace Pak started looking into it a few months ago, she realized the festivities were missing something crucial: a birthday cake! Now, she’s been tasked with making it.
Transcript 10,445 words · 8 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:46 Dan Pashman? So Grace, we're sitting here chatting about the mystery cake that you've brought that's in this sealed box in front of us. This is like the Chekhov's gun of this taping. At some point, it's gonna get open and I'm gonna eat some cake. But right now, I have no idea what's inside there.
2:00 Speaker 01 Right.
2:03 Dan Pashman? This is the Spork Fall. 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. Today, we're bringing you two different stories about big summer food spectacles happening in the next few weeks. Later on, we'll get the inside scoop on some very exciting restaurant collabs happening as part of an upcoming food festival in New York called the Great Nosh. That includes a Jewish taco and an Indian bagel. But first, you might have heard that this July 4th is America's 250th birthday. Now, the formal name for it is the Semi-Quincentennial, but literally no one's gonna use that word. Let's just stick with America 250. And of course, every birthday needs a cake, right?
2:44 Dan Pashman? So today, we're gonna get the full story behind the official cake, the design and planning, the hundreds of pounds of materials needed to make it, and the person behind it. Her name is Grace Pak. So how did you end up being the person making the official America 250 cake?
3:02 Speaker 01 That actually was my own doing.
3:07 Speaker 01 I was looking at the America 250 Commission. It's a commission that they established over 10 years ago. And I was looking at all their programming, and they have these fascinating programs all around the country on July 4th. And I realized that there was no cake. So I had emailed the commission and also congressional caucus leaders and said, "What you're doing is amazing. It's historic. It's so impressive, but there is a grave omission."
3:37 Speaker 01 "Our country's biggest birthday party is missing a birthday cake." And I said, "I would love to make this birthday cake."
3:45 Dan Pashman? Now, to be clear, America 250 works with the nonpartisan Congressional Commission. It was created 10 years ago to plan this whole big celebration. America 250 is totally separate from Freedom 250, which was created by President Trump and which has been the source of much controversy. Now, it's not like anyone could have emailed America 250 and secured this very special baking gig. Your meemaw's Dr. Duncan Hines cake ain't gonna cut it. Grace is a cake artist. She has her own bespoke cake bakery in New York City called Duchess of Cameron. She's known for making incredibly elaborate cakes. She's been on the Netflix show, Is It Cake? And perhaps most impressively, she's made cakes for the Marine Corps' last two birthday parties, which are huge events where the cake is especially important. So Grace has been building towards the America 250 cake for a while.
4:30 Dan Pashman? But not forever. She started out as an artist. When she was an art student at NYU, she did installations and performance pieces.
4:37 Speaker 01 I had something called Snowball in Summer, and it was a performance where I just sat on the floor, made sandcastles but out of ice cream. And it was throughout a few hours where my hands were freezing and it would just melt.
4:51 Dan Pashman? And what was the temperature in the room? How quickly did it melt?
4:54 Speaker 01 Room temp. It took forever because I had buckets of ice cream sitting with me on the floor and it, yeah, it took forever. But I also did other installation pieces like a tree that grew french fries. I laid out a picnic blanket in the middle of Astor Place and there were tiny hamburger clay sculptures. There were, I think, 200 something clay sculptures of hamburgers and only five of them were actual real hamburgers. And I would walk by, pretend like I didn't know what was going on, looked at the hamburgers, picked up the one real hamburger, ate it and then just kept walking. And then people would look at me like, what is, like, what is going on? And they look at the hamburgers and it's all clay. I wanted to present something that kind of introduced humor, but also confusion.
5:40 Dan Pashman? But so it's interesting, Grace, because there's a few through lines that I see in your early work in art. Taking you up to today, one is food.
5:49 Speaker 01 Yep.
5:51 Dan Pashman? One is a bit of a sense of humor. What was the other thing you said? You said, um, that it was-
5:57 Speaker 01 Confusion.
5:57 Dan Pashman? Confusion, right.
5:59 Speaker 01 Yeah.
5:59 Dan Pashman? Which is like, is it cake or is it not cake?
6:01 Speaker 01 Right, right.
6:02 Dan Pashman? And then also just this idea, uh, especially like with the ice cream, sandcastles of sort of like impermanence.
6:07 Speaker 01 Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yep.
6:09 Dan Pashman? What was it about all those themes that, that excited you?
6:12 Speaker 01 The fact that something can't live forever, I feel like people pay attention to it more and really appreciate the time that they have with this object right now. You're really in the moment, you have to soak it all in. And something about food that I love, and especially with my cakes, is, you know, you see a painting on the wall, you take it in visually, mentally, emotionally, but it's not becoming a physical part of your body. And this cake, it becomes a physical part of your body. So I'm like, my art is part of all of you now. I'm part of all of you, which is really, really cool.
6:46 Dan Pashman? After getting her fine arts degree, Grace took the logical next step, going for a graduate degree in neuroscience? Well, she was really interested in how art and science fit together, how artists' brains work. By the time she was 30, she was done with her masters and working in a lab. That's when tragedy struck.
7:03 Speaker 01 I lost a few people in my life in a very short amount of time. In a single week, I lost three people, completely unrelated events. And it was just one of those moments where it didn't make sense. The world didn't make sense, this didn't make sense. And then I said, I don't make sense. Nothing makes sense right now. So I had to take a pause and really think about life. And I started listing, what do I love spending my time doing? I love hands-on work. I love making things with my hands. I'm very DIY at home. I love learning new skills and just experimenting. And lastly, I love heightening people's experiences. And I want to make people's experiences more memorable. And out of that exercise, immediately I said, oh, I have to make cakes.
7:48 Dan Pashman? Grace quit her job at the lab and signed up for culinary school. When she showed up for the first day, she realized she might be a little different from the other students.
7:55 Speaker 01 I think I was probably the only one who had never baked a cake before. So everyone came in with experience.
8:00 Dan Pashman? You literally had never baked a cake?
8:01 Speaker 01 I think the probably two or three times I baked a boxed cake.
8:06 Dan Pashman? Okay.
8:07 Speaker 01 But no, I had never baked anything from scratch. It was just boxed cakes three times, maybe, growing up.
8:11 Dan Pashman? Were you even like a home cook?
8:12 Speaker 01 No, no, never cooked. I never, I, but I was a big booby. My mom.
8:20 Dan Pashman? So what are they, like, how, was there, gosh, I have so many questions, so many more questions now. Like, has anyone ever gone to culinary school with less cooking experience? Like.
8:32 Speaker 01 Honestly, probably not. Probably not. I knew nothing. Some tools they would say, and I wouldn't know what it is. And I would have to just look at my classmates, like, what is she grabbing? I'm gonna grab what she's grabbing.
8:46 Dan Pashman? It's a baking pan.
8:48 Speaker 01 This is a spatula. But you know, it was fun because I think as an adult, we don't really experiment and we're kind of afraid of new things. And you don't want to put yourself in a vulnerable position.
9:00 Dan Pashman? Yeah, afraid of looking foolish.
9:01 Speaker 01 Right. But for some reason, that to me was like a playground. I was a little kid just experimenting, experiencing new things. What can I learn? I love learning. So yeah, it was fun for me. It was a mixture of science and art put together. And I said, oh my God, my past is coming together. I don't know how it's gonna, you know, unfold, but I just loved the very exact preciseness, but also how I can experiment with ingredients and different chemistry. And also I can make art out of this cake. I can paint on it. I can sculpt it. So it was meant to be.
9:36 Dan Pashman? But was there any moment where you were like, I might be in over my head?
9:40 Speaker 01 No, I have a weird sense of confidence. I'm like, I don't know how to do this, but I'll figure it out. And if I make a fool out of myself, well, it's a learning experience. You learn from your mistakes.
9:51 Dan Pashman? This trial by fire learning method seemed to work well for Grace. So well that one of the judges of Grace's final project invited her to be part of a cake themed TV show that this judge was working on. That's where Grace started to learn to sculpt cakes. Think of the super elaborate stunt cakes you see on food shows. Eventually she opened her own cake business Duchess of Cameron. She mostly did weddings, but then she went on another TV show called Candyland, where she upped her game even more.
10:16 Speaker 01 All these TV shows, they want something crazy. They say, we want giant, we want big, we want crazy. I had never made a five foot tall creature made out of cake before. So yeah, I learned all these structural elements that people don't really know about. When they see these big cakes, people don't really realize that there are steel structures inside. There is wood. We're always working with power tools.
10:41 Dan Pashman? So this is one of my questions. So in a competition cake show, in general, are you allowed to use inedible components?
10:48 Speaker 01 Yes. You have to use it for structural components or else it just, the cake just won't stand.
10:53 Dan Pashman? Right. What about the taste of the cakes? And we're talking a lot about the appearance.
10:58 Speaker 01 Right.
10:59 Dan Pashman? But like, tell me about the journey of deciding how these different cakes are gonna taste.
11:03 Speaker 01 Yeah, I have my go-to classic flavors. You know, my favorite one is chocolate cake with passion fruit, Swiss meringue buttercream and pistachio Swiss meringue buttercream. But yeah, I like to experiment with different flavors, different pairings. I do like to bring in different ingredients from all over the world.
11:20 Dan Pashman? What's the longest amount of time you ever worked on one cake?
11:23 Speaker 01 Oh, wow. Um.
11:27 Speaker 01 Probably like a month.
11:30 Dan Pashman? So how does it feel to watch something that you've spent weeks or a month working on? You it's finally finished with this beautiful masterpiece and then it gets destroyed?
11:40 Speaker 01 Yeah.
11:40 Dan Pashman? How does that feel?
11:41 Speaker 01 I love it. Which may sound crazy and everyone says, "I can't cut into it." And I actually get mad if they don't cut into it. I'll say, "Cut it, cut it." Um, because also the cake has to see its cycle through, you know? The cake is meant to be eaten. That is the purpose of the cake. At the end of the day, you have to enjoy it. I also love seeing a slice of the cake on a plate. Just that sliver of the designed element to me is just so fun. And yeah, I I love seeing people eating it also. It's like, "I can't eat this." And they'll eat it. It's like, "Oh, my God, it's so good."
12:15 Dan Pashman? Coming up, Grace shares a sneak peek at America's birthday cake and I get to taste it. Then I go to our nation's capital to see the decorating process. Stick around.
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15:20 Dan Pashman? Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman and Father's Day is just around the corner. Need a gift suggestion? I'm glad you asked, because I have one for you. It's my cookbook, Anything's Pasta-able: 81 inventive pasta recipes for saucy people. It made the list of best cookbooks of the year in Food & Wine, Epicurious, Esquire, and Wired. And it has no traditional pasta sauce recipes. You don't need another recipe for meat sauce. Instead, it has things like shakshuka and shells, smoked cheddar and chicken manicotti, done like enchiladas, linguine with miso clam sauce, shrimp and andouille mac and cheese, and of course, spaghetti alla sassina, which is a spicy pasta that's pan-fried until charred and crispy crunchy. Get Anything's Pasta-able today wherever books are sold. And make sure you stay tuned to the end of this show
16:03 Dan Pashman? for a special segment featuring a great story about food, family, and soccer, sponsored by Miralax. All right, back now to Grace Pack and America's Birthday Cake. A few months ago, Grace got the green light to make the America 250 cake. She planned to set up in DC for the whole month of June. She'd start by making the outside decorative elements, from sugar and modeling chocolate, because those things won't go bad. She'd bake the actual edible parts of the cake in early July in preparation for the cake-cutting ceremony on July 4th at the Library of Congress. After that, she'll transport the remainder of the cake to the White House Visitor Center, where it'll be sealed with a special spray to prevent spoilage and displayed for another month. But before any of that could happen, Grace had to figure out what this cake would actually be. Did you already have ideas in mind?
16:47 Speaker 01 I... for the design?
16:49 Dan Pashman? Right.
16:49 Speaker 01 Absolutely not.
16:52 Dan Pashman? This seemed... I would've guessed... I would've guessed, yeah, that you did not, right?
16:57 Speaker 01 But I did have some elements, ideas that I had, not necessarily what the cake looked like, but I wanted this to be a gift to the nation, for the people, by the people. So I wanted as many hands as possible to make the cake with me, and that's where I came across the idea of inviting members of Congress from all 50 states and US territories to come make the cake with us. Bipartisan, bicameral, this is for our country, our people, and then also incorporate children's artwork. So, America... 250 had this artwork contest called America's Field Trip, asking children, what does America mean to you? So we're actually using the winning artwork as a base for the cake design as well.
17:38 Dan Pashman? When you say the members of Congress are gonna help you make the cake, what exactly does that mean?
17:44 Speaker 01 Members of Congress are literally going to hand finish an element of the cake that we're putting on the cake. Now, this could be as simple as putting a dot on the cake with an edible marker, or they can do extensive sculpting, however they feel comfortable. But we want some element that they are making and contributing to the cake.
18:03 Dan Pashman? But like, what if they screw it up?
18:05 Speaker 01 They won't.
18:06 Dan Pashman? How do you, I mean, your blind confidence is phenomenal, Grace. I love it. But, but you, you don't think that some congressperson who's never cooked a thing is gonna come in there and, and, you know, try to draw a flower and it's totally botching it?
18:22 Speaker 01 But, you know, even that is beautiful because I, I love, there's perfection in imperfection. And if this member of Congress is botching this flower, that's what's going on the cake. And I think that's really beautiful, you know?
18:36 Dan Pashman? But what, I mean, that's a very nice idea. But like, this thing's gonna be on display at the White House Visitor Center. Like, what if it looks like a disaster?
18:44 Speaker 01 That's why we're all there to help them, walk them through different techniques. We'll teach them how to do things.
18:49 Dan Pashman? Right, okay.
18:50 Speaker 01 And, yeah.
18:51 Dan Pashman? I mean, I have confidence in you. I'm sure it will be phenomenal. I'm just, I just can't, but I would never really let go of that much control.
18:58 Speaker 01 That's the whole fun of this cake. You don't know where it'll take you.
19:02 Dan Pashman? All right. So this isn't just a cake that Grace is gonna make and display. It's really more like an interactive art installation with participation from a bunch of folks and a dash of chaos. As Grace and I are talking, it's mid-May. She's headed to DC in a couple of weeks to start the cake construction and decorating process. She'll have help from five chefs from the Marine Corps, who'll be working with her in a volunteer capacity outside their marine duty. She's only just gotten the children's artwork that'll be featured on the cake. So now it's time to start designing.
19:30 Speaker 01 I sketch it in my sketchbook, and then the final will be done on the iPad with real color and sketches in different angles.
19:37 Dan Pashman? And like, how many cakes do you actually make trial cakes? Or once, if it's on the iPad, you know it's good to go?
19:44 Speaker 01 Uh, it's, it's good to go, but a lot of times we have to change because a 2D sketch can never fully translate to a 3D element. So as we go, there's a lot of tweaking and adding and subtracting. Once we start working on the actual cake, you, I, you can't start from scratch again, just because you've spent so much time and you don't have time to. So you have to pivot. It's always a troubleshooting situation.
20:07 Dan Pashman? So Grace is still a ways from a finished design, but she does have a theme for the cake.
20:11 Speaker 01 It's going to be American made. In the beginning, I wanted to make a cake that was representative of all Americans. And then very quickly I realized that is almost impossible. So I wanted to think of something that every American could relate to. What is something that everyone can see themselves in? And I landed on American made because throughout history, throughout present, future, all these children, looking at the children's artwork. We have all made something and that could be something like a cake, the Cascatale Pasta. It could be laws, you know, but we also, America in the history, have made some painful things too. But we have overcome that and made fixes.
20:53 Speaker 01 It's a lot about making and how making is also a progress. We're not done making, we're still making and it's an ongoing, it's an active verb. So I am asking members of Congress from every state a question so that they can help us with design as well. What are the people of your state making right now that you or the state are proud of? And that could be innovation, it could be something very minimal, local, it could be something in a bigger scale. So we're going to be putting all that element into the cake too.
21:22 Dan Pashman? And how big will the final cake be? Do we know that yet?
21:25 Speaker 01 Yes. So they keep saying the size of a car.
21:31 Speaker 01 I'm like, which car?
21:33 Dan Pashman? Are we talking like an Escalade or a Mini?
21:37 Speaker 01 Exactly. It'll most likely be 11 to 12 feet long, to four to five feet wide and seven to eight feet high.
21:47 Dan Pashman? Oh, that's high.
21:48 Speaker 01 Yeah.
21:48 Dan Pashman? That just broke my brain.
21:50 Speaker 01 So our, our limitation was the doorway at the White House Visitor Center.
21:54 Dan Pashman? Okay.
21:54 Speaker 01 So whatever we could fit through the doorway was our maximum size.
21:57 Dan Pashman? Grace is still figuring out what the shape of the thing will be. In keeping with the idea that this cake is a gift to the nation, all the ingredients will be donated. No taxpayer money will be used for it. And for such a big cake, they need a lot of ingredients.
22:09 Speaker 01 So just for the fondant and modeling chocolate, I think I had it estimated to 800 or 900 pounds.
22:17 Dan Pashman? Oh my god.
22:21 Speaker 01 But I made sure to ask them, if you have any near expiring products or expired products that you can no longer sell, please donate those to us because they, no one's going to be eating that portion of the cake.
22:31 Dan Pashman? Oh, I see. Okay.
22:32 Speaker 01 Yeah, so just to reduce waste and if it's all going to dumpster anyway, we can salvage it.
22:39 Dan Pashman? Now, so far, we've mostly been talking about what the cake will look like, the size, the shape, the decorations. But I also wanted to know what this cake is actually going to taste like. Turns out, the ingredients are a whole other part of the story. For that, Grace decided to take some cues from our nation's history.
22:54 Speaker 01 I met with Paula Johnson. She's a food curator at the Smithsonian. We looked at recipe books from 1792 by Amelia Simmons. It's called The American Cookery, and it's the first American cookbook written by an American. And I really wanted to study the recipes from back in the day to create the America 250 Cake Recipe. And it was fascinating, the way recipes were written, very short. They didn't have ingredients listed on like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
23:23 Dan Pashman? Right. It's just like combine eggs and butter.
23:25 Speaker 01 Yeah. And how are they mixing all of these ingredients when they didn't have mixers? So based on these recipes, I created this America 250 Modern Heritage Cake Recipe.
23:36 Dan Pashman? So what exactly is the inspiration from that 1790 whatever cookbook?
23:40 Speaker 01 1792, yeah. So I was able to see what kind of ingredients they used. So flour, eggs, um, they used a lot of fruit soaked in alcohol. It was very boozy cakes. It was very dense because they didn't have mixers. They didn't have chemical leaveners, so everything had to be done by hand, hand whisked. And it says whisk an egg for an hour by hand.
24:01 Dan Pashman? What?
24:02 Speaker 01 Yeah, and their whisks were made out of twigs. So they were just bundles of twigs. So imagine whisking with bundles of twigs for an hour. And it's not just a tiny bowl. It's six pounds of eggs that you're whisking for an hour. I'm just like, these people must have had crazy arms.
24:19 Dan Pashman? So Grace, in order to keep your America 250 cake connected to that, to that history, are you gonna whisk all the eggs with it for an hour with a twig whisk?
24:29 Speaker 01 We, we kind of do wanna try and see how close we can get. Whisk for an hour.
24:34 Dan Pashman? But using a real whisk?
24:35 Speaker 01 No, we use, we're going to find some twigs and bundle it up.
24:38 Dan Pashman? You are gonna do that? I was joking.
24:39 Speaker 01 No, we actually wanna try, cuz we wanna see how well we can do it.
24:43 Dan Pashman? You're also sourcing 18th century flour from George Washington's grist mill?
24:47 Speaker 01 Yes, it was so cool. So George Washington, I never knew, besides being the first president and the general during the war, was a crazy entrepreneur. And he was an innovator. So he has his own grist mill in Mount Vernon that is still operating today. So they make small batch flour the same way they used to make it in 18th century and how George Washington used to make his flour. It's stone ground water mill. So everything's powered by water. And they were so generous enough to donate their flour to make our America 250 Modern Heritage Cake.
25:24 Dan Pashman? But this flour isn't what most of us are used to seeing in cakes today.
25:28 Speaker 01 This is whole wheat flour. It is not fine grain flour. So, which is very different from the cake flour that I use normally. I actually loved the whole wheat texture because it felt really real. It felt like a homemade cake. And in terms of history too. So back in the day, they had really superfine grain flour, but that was really for, you know, the governor. So someone in high class had the fine grain. Everyone else had mixed grains because it was really, it was expensive also. And they would add things. They even added potato and beans just to make more substance. And like cornmeal and corn flour. And this heritage cake, the, the whole wheat, it's grittier. It's not as fine as cake flour.
26:11 Speaker 01 But I experimented with different ingredients that they used back in the day. And how does it all fit together? So just in terms of the texture and flavor, it really helped bring other flavors out. And you'll, you'll taste that soon. I actually brought you. The cake, I want you to taste it and I want you to tell me what you taste before I tell you anything about it.
26:32 Dan Pashman? Oh, wow. This is a fun game. I've been to be honest with you, I'm not great at that in general. People expect me because I host a food podcast, really taste something and be like, oh, it it has turmeric and whatever like.
26:45 Speaker 01 You can tell me how you feel when you eat it.
26:51 Dan Pashman? So should we open the box?
26:53 Speaker 01 Yes, let's do it.
26:58 Dan Pashman? Grace and I opened the box. She's brought a whole round layer cake, frosted, but not decorated beyond that. There's just a thin layer of white buttercream, a crumb coat, for those of you who watch Bake Off.
27:08 Speaker 01 You're the first person to taste this outside of our household.
27:12 Dan Pashman? Wow, I'm very honored.
27:14 Speaker 01 You're special.
27:15 Dan Pashman? I feel very special. Wow, look at this. You want me to try to guess what the flavoring is?
27:20 Speaker 01 Yeah, or just like what you feel when you eat it.
27:23 Dan Pashman? I'll try, but I'm not great at guessing flavors, but okay. I start cutting through the cake to get my slice. Oh, I already love how dense it feels. I like a dense cake. I don't need a fluffy situation. Oh, I see a, is that a fruit? Is that a raisin that just popped out? Oh, I just look at apples. I mean, as Americans, apple pie makes sense, raisins. I take my first bite and try to guess the different components. It's a whole wheat style flour, orange.
27:52 Dan Pashman? Okay, I mean, it's really good.
27:56 Dan Pashman? And then the froth, is this buttercream? I love buttercream.
27:59 Speaker 01 Swiss meringue buttercream.
28:00 Dan Pashman? Is that vanilla or is there something else going on?
28:02 Speaker 01 Vanilla bean.
28:04 Dan Pashman? Did I miss anything?
28:06 Speaker 01 Yep.
28:09 Dan Pashman? Turns out the cake has ginger, nutmeg, and cardamom. It's flavored with orange blossom water because historically that was more available than vanilla. The apples are sauteed and what I thought were raisins are actually black currants macerated in Kentucky bourbon. Then the cake gets a honey time soak, giving it all an herby vibe that cuts the sweetness just right. You've got the apples, the currants, and then cake and the frosting. It's like every bite is different. Well, I think you've done some great work here, Grace.
28:36 Speaker 01 Thank you.
28:37 Dan Pashman? I can't wait to see the finished product.
28:40 Dan Pashman? Happy birthday.
28:41 Speaker 01 Happy birthday, America.
28:45 Dan Pashman? Coming up, I head to DC to see a member of Congress do his part to decorate the cake. Then we get a sneak peek at another exciting summer food event when we go behind the scenes of the Great Nosh Picnic. Stick around.
29:03 Speaker 02 It's time to open up a can of advertisements.
29:11 Speaker 03 Time for a quick break to talk about McDonald's. It's the tangiest time of the year. For a limited time, head to McDonald's and get a McRib sandwich. Make it a meal by adding a medium fries and a soft drink like an ice cold Diet Dr. Pepper. So grab a McRib sandwich and embrace the tang. Save time by ordering ahead on the app. Participate in McDonald's for a limited time. Dr. Pepper is a registered trademark of Dr. Pepper, 7-Up Inc.
29:36 Dan Pashman? Hey, it's Dan here. Thank you so much, first of all, for tuning into this podcast every week. We really appreciate it. And I want to let you know, if you want to hear new episodes ad-free, subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts Plus on Apple Podcasts, or visit siriusxm.com/podcastsplus to listen with Spotify or another app of your choice. Thanks.
29:57 Dan Pashman? Welcome back. A few weeks after my chat with Grace, we meet up in DC.
30:03 Dan Pashman? All right, Grace, set the scene. Where are we? What's happening?
30:06 Speaker 01 We're in the Cannon Building, which is one of the house buildings on the Hill. And we're in the rotunda with all this marble, beautiful decor.
30:15 Dan Pashman? Grace is in DC for the whole month constructing the cake. She's running from one congressional office to another in pursuit of her goal of getting at least one member of Congress from every state to help with the decorating. She's wearing a chef's coat with an America 250 seal on it, and she's got a collapsible cart on wheels with all of her cake decorating supplies.
30:31 Speaker 01 One thing is, you can't bring sharp items here, so I had to be really creative because we use X-acto knives a lot for these detailed items.
30:38 Dan Pashman? Oh.
30:39 Speaker 01 So yeah, I've been bringing wooden skewers. I brought a pizza cutter, which has been great.
30:43 Dan Pashman? And how's it going so far?
30:44 Speaker 01 Great. It's been really fun. Everyone's been having, like, everyone's really excited for this cake, and it's something that they don't get to do, especially in their offices on the Hill.
30:52 Dan Pashman? Right. There was like laws, laws, laws.
30:53 Speaker 01 Exactly.
30:54 Dan Pashman? Laws, laws, laws.
30:55 Speaker 01 Yep.
30:56 Dan Pashman? Cake!
30:57 Speaker 01 Cake, yeah. And everyone's happy and smiling.
30:59 Dan Pashman? Right, right. What is the status of the overall design? What's the larger concept?
31:04 Speaker 01 Do you want to see the design?
31:05 Dan Pashman? Oh my god, yes.
31:06 Speaker 01 I have it, okay.
31:07 Dan Pashman? Wow. Grace rummages in her cart to find her iPad. Okay, so, oh.
31:11 Speaker 01 Here's the design. It's large, as you remember.
31:15 Speaker 04 Right.
31:16 Speaker 01 So, the theme of the design is "American-made." So, we're going to have all these painted elements kind of in the center of chocolate starbursts, and they're going to be scenes from history.
31:26 Dan Pashman? She points to a different section of the cake, which is the future part. This is where she's incorporated the children's artwork from the nationwide contest. Then, there's a wavy bronze ribbon, which is where the members of Congress will come in. Each state will have a small sculpted item that represents it, and the congressperson will decorate that item. Even though Grace is showing me the design, I can't tell you more about it right now. It's highly classified. And it's all happening right now, and Grace is feeling the time crunch.
31:51 Speaker 01 But it's okay, I just won't sleep.
31:55 Dan Pashman? Grace and I leave the rotunda and head to the office of Congressman Tom Swasey, who represents New York's 3rd District, part of Long Island and a little bit of Queens.
32:03 Speaker 04 How are you guys doing? Good.
32:05 Speaker 01 Grace, how are you?
32:07 Speaker 04 What am I doing, Grace? Am I decorating a cake?
32:10 Speaker 01 You are.
32:11 Speaker 04 Do I have to have any artistic ability?
32:13 Speaker 01 Maybe. No, I'm just kidding.
32:15 Dan Pashman? Grace sets up a small folding table and lays out her equipment.
32:18 Speaker 04 I have no idea what's about to happen. I'm getting a little worried. She's got all these different devices and...
32:24 Dan Pashman? Grace has set up a little pop-up table. There's a pizza cutter, there's containers.
32:28 Speaker 04 It's not really... Is it a pizza cutter, though? Is it called a pizza cutter when you're...
32:31 Speaker 01 It is. It's a pizza cutter.
32:32 Speaker 04 Why is it a pizza cutter for a cake?
32:34 Speaker 01 Because I couldn't bring in any sharp objects here.
32:37 Speaker 04 They don't want anything sharp in the halls of Congress, including members of the Congress.
32:41 Dan Pashman? How about elbows?
32:44 Speaker 01 Um, I am going to first present you with an apron.
32:48 Speaker 04 Ooh, am I supposed to wear this?
32:50 Speaker 01 Yes, please.
32:50 Speaker 04 All right, thank you very much.
32:51 Speaker 01 Just so you can protect your jacket.
32:54 Speaker 04 I feel very, very bakery right now.
32:58 Dan Pashman? Grace shows the congressman her cake design and explains all the elements, like she did for me. Then, she breaks out her Empire State Building that she sculpted for modeling chocolate. That will represent New York.
33:07 Speaker 01 Yeah, so we actually have the Empire State Building here.
33:12 Speaker 04 My grandfather put the lights on top of the Empire State Building. He's an electrician.
33:15 Speaker 01 Oh, my gosh.
33:16 Speaker 04 At IBEW Local 3.
33:18 Dan Pashman? Grace wants the congressman to add some parts to the lower level of the building and some texture to the windows.
33:24 Speaker 04 I would like to have done something a little more creative than a little block of the Empire State Building.
33:28 Speaker 01 We can do an impromptu sculpt.
33:30 Dan Pashman? Grace is a master improviser, Congressman. I'll have you know.
33:33 Speaker 04 How about we put a little... Like, we paint this yellow and put a yellow taxi passing in front of the Empire State Building.
33:39 Speaker 01 That's so cute. I love that idea.
33:43 Speaker 05 Oh my god, look at this!
33:45 Dan Pashman? He's actually sculpting a taxi.
33:46 Speaker 05 Wait, he's actually sculpting a taxi.
33:48 Dan Pashman? It looks really good.
33:49 Speaker 05 What?
33:50 Speaker 04 Gotta do some wheels on it now.
33:52 Dan Pashman? I love how into it the congressman is.
33:53 Speaker 05 Yeah!
33:54 Dan Pashman? Cancel the rest of his meetings.
33:57 Speaker 04 What do you think?
33:58 Speaker 05 I love it!
33:59 Dan Pashman? I think it looks great. This is a real team effort.
34:00 Speaker 05 This is like totally collaborative.
34:02 Speaker 04 If only Congress was like this, then we would work together.
34:05 Speaker 05 Maybe they will!
34:06 Dan Pashman? Yeah. This is gonna turn everything around.
34:08 Speaker 05 You know, we are all working on this cake together, which is amazing.
34:11 Dan Pashman? Yeah. Can I put a wheel on?
34:13 Speaker 05 Oh yeah! Oh my god, please!
34:15 Dan Pashman? How big should the wheel be? The Empire State Building is about seven inches tall, and the little taxi isn't quite to scale, but it looks surprisingly good for someone who's never even touched modeling chocolate before. I think we can all have a lot of confidence in Grace that she's gonna make it look amazing.
34:28 Speaker 04 Yes, I have great confidence.
34:29 Speaker 05 Thank you!
34:30 Dan Pashman? Before we leave, I have a few questions for Congressman Swazi. I know that you were a teenager in 1976.
34:37 Speaker 04 Yes.
34:37 Dan Pashman? When we celebrated our bicentennial.
34:39 Speaker 04 Yep, I was 14 years old.
34:40 Dan Pashman? What are some of your memories from that?
34:42 Speaker 04 Everybody in the town was involved. It was such an exciting time. There was a great parade that we had. We had a festival in our downtown, and people were dressed up in colonial costumes. And I just remember how excited I was about being an American.
34:58 Dan Pashman? How would you compare this upcoming celebration to that one?
35:02 Speaker 04 I feel like we're a lot more fractured than we were back then. I think that because a lot of it has to do with the media is fractured, so we're not kind of all on the same page, getting the same information. And I don't feel like it's as much of a community effort as it was back then. It would be great if we could get to that point as we get closer to the 4th of July, to get more people unified, celebrating the history of the greatest country in the history of the world.
35:30 Dan Pashman? Yeah, and it's interesting, looking back, you know, the couple of years leading up to 1976 were also rough years in American history. There was a major recession, there was an oil embargo. We've had rough times before.
35:41 Speaker 04 It was Watergate, was right before.
35:42 Dan Pashman? Right, we were coming out of Watergate, we were coming out of Vietnam. There's always been, there have been struggles in American history before. I guess I'm optimistic that the issues you're talking about will hopefully be just a period of time, as some of those rough issues were.
35:56 Speaker 04 Well, I couldn't stay involved in politics unless I was optimistic. I mean, it would be impossible. And I'm very optimistic because I have faith in people. So we have to get back to a place where we're kind of sharing some common interests. And I think that the 250th anniversary could be the start of that because it's something we all share in common.
36:13 Dan Pashman? Thank you so much, Congressman.
36:15 Speaker 04 Thank you, buddy.
36:16 Dan Pashman? Some people leave Congress and go into lobbying. I think this congressman might have a future in baking. My thanks to Congressman Tom Swasey, and extra big thanks to Grace Pak. Her cake company is called Duchess of Cameron. The cake-cutting ceremony will happen on July 4th at the Library of Congress. The only people who actually get to eat the cake are one young person, a first-grader tiger scout, and one senior, probably a veteran. You'll be able to go to the White House Visitor Center to see the America 250 Birthday Cake on display starting July 6th through the end of the month. Now, America 250 isn't the only big thing happening this summer. In fact, this weekend, many people will head to a small island off Manhattan called Governor's Island for the Great Nosh. It's hosted by the Jewish Food Society. We featured them in an episode a couple of years ago.
37:00 Dan Pashman? The Great Nosh has become one of JFS's signature events, a giant picnic with music, arts, and, most importantly, some incredibly exciting food collabs. Usually, the Nosh tries to pair a Jewish restaurant with a non-Jewish one, and the results are extremely exciting and delicious. In anticipation of this epic food fest, we got the stories of two of these collabs to understand how they came to be. One is a pastrami taco. The other is a chicken tikka stuffed bagel. We'll start at Santo Taco, a small tacoery in Manhattan that's gotten a big following.
37:30 Speaker 06 I'm Santi, Chief Taco Officer of Santo Taco.
37:33 Dan Pashman? Jake Till, I'm the fifth-generation owner at Katz's Deli. Jake basically grew up at Katz's. It's a New York institution. It's been around since 1888. At six years old, little Jake was handing out order tickets to people in line. Now, he runs the place, trying to balance tradition with the need to change.
37:51 Speaker 06 But I think I quickly realized how special and how amazing this place is and what it means to so many people, where, you know, I... Changed the bathrooms to make them bigger and more accommodating. And that was met with backlash.
38:03 Dan Pashman? People were upset that you made the bathrooms work better for customers?
38:07 Speaker 06 A hundred percent. I think any sort of change is met with skepticism at a place like Katz's Deli. That has so much history in it and means so much to people. It's more than just food, right? There's nostalgia and an atmosphere component to that experience.
38:20 Dan Pashman? But Jake isn't afraid of change, which is why he's paired up with Santo Taco for the Great Nosh. Santi Perez grew up in Mexico City. He came to New York and founded the fine dining restaurant, Cosme, which earned a Michelin star. Last year, he turned his focus to Santo Taco.
38:34 Speaker 02 Twelve years have been primarily focused on fine dining. And I really wanted to take some of those elements from fine dining and apply it to a fast food setting. So the attention to detail, the quality of the ingredients, you know, like caring about the design and the hospitality. And that's how Santo Taco was born last year. I just learned this morning from the team at the Great Nosh that Katz is the oldest brand or collaborator in the festival and we're the youngest. So like we carry a one-year history, whereas you guys carry a 138-year history. It's a lot of responsibility, you know?
39:11 Dan Pashman? What were some of the early ideas that you were throwing back and forth?
39:14 Speaker 06 I think there was a Reuben taco.
39:16 Speaker 02 Yeah.
39:16 Dan Pashman? Okay.
39:16 Speaker 06 And that, we transitioned to more just, let's keep a classic, the pastrami.
39:22 Dan Pashman? I'm very happy that you went with pastrami over corned beef. Because this is my hot take.
39:26 Speaker 06 People have a lot of feelings on that.
39:27 Dan Pashman? I know. Listen, you know, shots fired, I get it.
39:30 Speaker 06 Shots fired, yeah.
39:30 Dan Pashman? But I really, look, I'm not against corned beef. I like a Reuben, corned beef is good. But I just feel like pastrami, in general, in the world, is running circles around corned beef.
39:42 Speaker 06 I happen to agree with you. I will say there are a lot of people who would disagree with you. I mean, we do about 18, 20,000 pounds of corned beef every week. So there are a lot of...
39:51 Dan Pashman? And how many pounds of pastrami then?
39:53 Speaker 06 Double, like 40,000 pounds.
39:54 Dan Pashman? Okay, all right, all right.
39:55 Speaker 06 So, yes.
39:55 Dan Pashman? Santi, what's your take, pastrami or corned beef?
39:58 Speaker 02 Pastrami.
39:58 Dan Pashman? All right.
39:59 Speaker 02 For me, there was no doubt.
40:01 Dan Pashman? While Jake brings the culture and history of Katz's Deli to this collab, Santi will bring the culture and history of the taco.
40:07 Speaker 02 I mean, Mexico is a giant country and the fact that there are so many types of tacos is just a function of how rich and large the land is, right? But I would say there is a common denominator across all tacos. There are three elements. One, it needs to have a tortilla. It needs to have a protein or, you know, like a filling. And it needs to have a great salsa. I think the most important part that people often overlook is the salsa, because it adds a lot of personality and distinction to the taco. Part of what makes this collaboration so exciting is that the base of the idea is,
40:49 Speaker 02 okay, pastrami on a tortilla, but like actually what's going on on top of that is even more interesting. Because there's like a juxtaposition of flavors.
40:58 Dan Pashman? So what do they land on?
41:00 Speaker 02 First, you have a tortilla. It's an earlum corn tortilla. Then we put a spoonful of avocado salsa, two slices of pastrami. Then we add a red salsa inspired by the Russian dressing.
41:13 Dan Pashman? By Katz's Russian dressing?
41:15 Speaker 02 The hint of habanero to add a little bit of kick. And then our escabeche, which has carrot, jalapeños, and their pickles. So yeah, all together, it's an explosion of flavors. We'll get to test it.
41:30 Dan Pashman? Yeah. But like this is one of the things that I think makes the Great Nosh such a fun and special event. They're always unexpected collabs.
41:39 Speaker 02 Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
41:41 Dan Pashman? Oh, is this it?
41:42 Speaker 02 Thank you.
41:43 Dan Pashman? Oh my goodness, here we go. You guys are gonna eat with me, right?
41:46 Speaker 02 Yeah, of course.
41:50 Dan Pashman? All right, here we go. First bite.
41:51 Speaker 02 All right, let's do this.
41:56 Dan Pashman? Oh, man.
41:57 Speaker 02 See what I'm saying? Like each bite, you kind of like it just keeps growing on you.
42:00 Dan Pashman? Because right off the bat, the pastrami hits you.
42:02 Speaker 02 Yes.
42:03 Dan Pashman? But then comes like...
42:04 Speaker 02 Everything else.
42:05 Dan Pashman? The pickling and the acid and then the spice. Like I'm still figuring out what I just ate. I love this. Oh my goodness.
42:14 Dan Pashman? That was honestly one of the best tacos I've ever had in my life. Next, we head to Moonrise Bagels in Manhattan. I'm Jeremy Rhodes from Moonrise Bagels.
42:25 Speaker 02 I am Chintan Pandya from Unapologetic Foods.
42:28 Dan Pashman? Moonrise is not your traditional bagel shop. They make stuffed bagels, which is pretty unique in the New York bagel scene. There's a bacon, egg, and cheese bagel, buffalo chicken bagel, and pizza bagel. All the fillings are sealed and wrapped inside the bagel before it's cooked. For the great Nosh, Moonrise is teaming up with Unapologetic Foods, the folks behind the hit restaurants Damaka, the Michelin-starred Semah, and Rowdy Rooster.
42:50 Speaker 02 It's two different cultures coming with one of their signature dishes and making it one dish. So it's gonna be a fun Jewish Indian dish, which is a stuffed chicken tikka bagel. So it's basically barbecue chicken, has got a little kick to it, little spice to it, and then we have a little tomato-based sauce going along with it to dip in and eat it. And what fun than having it inside a bagel.
43:14 Speaker 07 Yeah, so Chintan's team did all the really hard stuff by making this lovely filling for us. So then we took that and we rolled it into our bagels using our bagel dough, you know, very New York style. It's high gluten and flour. We then roll it, we hand-roll everything, and then we boil it and bake it.
43:34 Dan Pashman? As we meet them, Chintan and Jeremy are not 100% set on their dish. There's three variations they have to choose from: a hand-pulled chicken tikka, a chopped one, and one with extra sauce inside. Today, they're making all three, tasting them, and deciding which will make it to the great Nosh. First, the bagels get boiled.
43:50 Speaker 07 So when we're boiling our bagels, we're looking for the lovely shape to take place. We're looking for a certain texture. It's like a little tackiness to the dough. And we kind of go for like a specific color. So it's anywhere from 30 seconds to two minutes.
44:04 Dan Pashman? After boiling, the bagels go into the oven for 15 minutes. Once they're out of the oven, Jeremy adds a sprinkle of masala powder.
44:10 Speaker 02 So it's just a, you know, spice blend that we have that we put on our kebabs, actually. So there's a red chili powder, then there is dried mango powder, cumin powder. So it's a blend of multiple things.
44:21 Speaker 07 Yeah, I think for us, we really like to expand people's minds in a way, have them think about a bagel a little differently. And, you know, I don't think there are many people out there who would say, "Indian, bagel, let's have it." But I think after today, they definitely won't.
44:37 Dan Pashman? The bagels are done, but there's one more element to this dish.
44:40 Speaker 02 There's a quintessential butter-masala sauce. It's good tomato, some butter, cream.
44:44 Speaker 07 Everything that is good and that people love to eat. That's it.
44:48 Dan Pashman? A dipping sauce for the bagel. You know I love sauce on the side, which allows you to manage your dip ratio on a per bite basis. I'm very, very into this concept. But now it's time for Jeremy and Chinton to decide between the three bagels. Chop chicken, pulled chicken, extra sauce. After taking their tastes, they debate the merits of each one.
45:07 Speaker 07 I've seen the bagel just kind of get a little soggy in the past. If there's a little too much sauce in there. But what did you love about this flavor? I thought it's got a, it's got more punch to it. The sauce actually took it to the next level. That's what I felt. Okay. Yeah. I was looking at it from a bagel perspective, which is so funny.
45:27 Dan Pashman? In the end, they decide on a compromise. Jeremy likes the pulled chicken one. Chinton liked the pulled chicken with extra sauce. So they split the difference and go with a little more sauce. A dish is born.
45:37 Speaker 07 All right. L'chaim. L'chaim.
45:47 Dan Pashman? That's Jeremy Rhodes of Moonrise Bagels and Chinton Pandya of Unapologetic Foods. Before that, we heard Santi Perez of Santo Taco and Jake Dell of Katz's Deli. The Great Nosh is this Sunday, June 21st on Governor's Island in New York. Get info and tickets, if they're still available, at greatnosh.com. Next week on the show, we're back in the salad spinner with Washington Post restaurant critic Elizahar Sontag and Bloomberg News reporter Dina Shankar. We'll talk about the quirkiest and most surprising food news of the moment. That's next week. While you wait for that one, check out last week's episode where I visit the 1970s test kitchen for Ebony magazine, which had a huge influence on the way we understand black American food. And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the Sirius XM app? Yes, the Sirius XM app, it has all your favorite podcasts,
46:32 Dan Pashman? 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 Sirius XM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful. This episode was produced by me along with managing producer.
46:56 Speaker 01 Emma Morgenstern.
46:57 Dan Pashman? And senior producer.
46:58 Speaker 04 Andres O'Hara.
46:59 Dan Pashman? It was edited by. Camille Stanley. Our engineer is. Jared. O'Connell. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sparkle is a production of Sirius XM Podcast. Our executive producer is Camille Stanley. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman. And I'm Scott Dieter from Cleveland, Ohio, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.
47:27 Dan Pashman? This segment is brought to you by Miralax. So Julie, tell me about the first time you accompanied Aiden to watch a soccer game.
47:36 Speaker 01 OK, so Aiden and I had met and we were both living in New York City. This would have been 2012 and we were in grad school. We were dating. He woke me up at like 6:00 AM to say, I have to go to Midtown to watch a football game, which he means soccer, but he would never say the word soccer.
47:58 Dan Pashman? That's right.
47:59 Speaker 04 Still dumb.
48:00 Dan Pashman? So you're right, we'll respect your wishes for this segment, Aiden. We'll call it football. So we gotta go watch the football match. And what are you thinking, Julie?
48:08 Speaker 01 Well, I was confused. I was like, it's 6:00 in the morning. There's no football on, like surely. And I was a little annoyed because I love sleep.
48:18 Dan Pashman? This is my coworker, Julie Booth, and her husband, Aiden. Aiden is English, so to him, we're in the midst of the world's biggest football tournament, which is why here on the show, we're talking with soccer, uh, football fans about their love of the game and the foods and drinks they associate with it. When Aiden woke Julie up that morning, it was to go see his favorite team, Leeds United.
48:36 Speaker 02 I always say that if you don't experience the lows, of which being a Leeds fan, there are many, then you're never going to experience the highs when they do come. So that's what I keep telling myself in order to be a Leeds fan.
48:49 Dan Pashman? Despite his commitment to Leeds United, Aiden knew Julie wasn't quite so enthusiastic.
48:53 Speaker 01 So he wakes me up and says he's going. And he said, do you want to come with me? And I said, no. Why would I want to do that at 6:00 in the morning? And he said, well, if you come, I'll buy you breakfast. And I was kind of like, OK, sure.
49:06 Dan Pashman? Aiden brought Julie to a New York sports bar called Legends, where a lot of British football fans gather to watch games.
49:11 Speaker 02 I mean, the great thing about that place is, you know, there's, there's people from all over that come and join. So, you know, I, I met those folks within the first week that I came to New York City. And it was just like a, a group of Leeds fans. Then they just all welcomed you in and it was like, yeah, this is where we go watch the games. So come on down. And you've kind of got a, a home away from home, which is awesome.
49:35 Speaker 01 So yeah, so we get on the subway, we go down to this bar in Midtown Manhattan, and it's full, by the way, of Leeds fans, whoever they were playing that day fans. There's like scarves and everyone is drinking beer at 7:00 a.m. And I said, can I get a coffee? And the bartender was like, uh, if you wait for me to make it for like 10 minutes. He had to brew a pot, even though it was 7:00 a.m.
50:04 Dan Pashman? So Julie, you finally get your coffee.
50:06 Speaker 01 In a pint glass.
50:09 Dan Pashman? And what did all these Leeds fans make of you? Were there other non-Leeds fans who had come along as friends and guests?
50:16 Speaker 01 I got a lot of brownie points for showing up. There was men and women, but a lot of the guys had American girlfriends who didn't go. Everyone was very welcoming.
50:26 Dan Pashman? And Julie, Aiden said he was gonna buy you breakfast. What'd you get?
50:29 Speaker 01 So this is the thing that started it all. So I'm looking at the menu and Aiden says, you have to order a bacon buddy.
50:35 Dan Pashman? That's B U T T Y.
50:37 Speaker 01 Yes.
50:37 Dan Pashman? Which is basically like a butter sandwich. Is that right, Aiden?
50:40 Speaker 02 Yeah, a bacon sandwich, but like not the bacon that you get over here. Not the streaky kind, right? It's like the, the proper, well, I'd call it proper back bacon. So it's like a, a real sandwich that you can get into.
50:54 Dan Pashman? It's meat, it's meatier, less fatty.
50:56 Speaker 02 There you go. Yeah, exactly.
50:57 Dan Pashman? So Julie, how was it?
50:59 Speaker 01 It was so good. So this is the thing. He says, get the bacon buddy. And I did, I said, what is that? He said, it's a bacon sandwich. And that sounds really boring. But I got it, a bacon buddy with hot sauce. And it comes and it's so good. Like Aiden said, the bacon is very thick. It's very crisp. The roll they put it on is buttery. It's kind of like a roll you would get at a bodega. It's hot. It's very filling. It's great when you're hungover. I wasn't that day, but I have since learned it's great when you're hungover. And so that was our tradition. So anytime Leeds would play, he would be like, come to the bar with me. I'll buy you a bacon sandwich.
51:36 Speaker 02 And another point is it lines your stomach, right? So you get that started and then you have your pint and you're good to go. You're set up for success.
51:47 Dan Pashman? Julie, have you gotten to the point where you can switch from coffee to beer at some point at that hour?
51:53 Speaker 01 No, I, I really cannot drink beer at 7 a.m. still.
51:57 Dan Pashman? So what did you think, Aiden, when Julie started becoming a regular at these games?
52:02 Speaker 02 Proud and yet, you know, there was a part of me that also just felt inherently sad for her. That, um, you know, she has to go, go through this.
52:12 Dan Pashman? You mean go, go through the experience of watching Leeds struggle, not the experience of coming to the pub and eating a bacon sandwich. Got it. Okay. Through the best of Leeds and the worst of Leeds, Julie and Aiden's relationship has blossomed. They're now married with two kids. And with all the nations of the world facing off right now, the household is pulling for the U.S. and England. Well, Aiden's mostly pulling for England.
52:33 Speaker 02 The last time we won, it was 66. And growing up, you're always like, yeah, I want my team to be the ones that go ahead and win it. So there's a lot of pressure and you're kind of like, okay, well, what we're gonna do.
52:45 Dan Pashman? Julie, what are England matches like for you these days?
52:48 Speaker 01 I don't get as stressed as Aiden, but I definitely feel a kinship. My husband and now my kids are British. I want them to win and to do well. Actually, I grew up kind of on the periphery of sports. Like no one in my immediate family was big in sports. There just wasn't a lot of like sports stuff. And then I met Aiden and he had this huge love for Leeds and, and football. And, um, it's been really fun to like be part of a big fandom and have our schedule work around Leeds games and England games.
53:23 Speaker 02 It's funny, I thought you, your first reaction when, when you got asked that question was just gonna be loud.
53:31 Speaker 01 It is loud, but I'm, you say that, but like, I've embraced the loud. I take a cowbell now to sporting events.
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