[MUSIC PLAYING]
JON SHOOK: Hey, Larry.
VINNY DOTOLO: There's the delivery guy.
JON SHOOK: There's Lary.
This is Larry right here, Larry.
VINNY DOTOLO: That's not Larry.
That's Carlito.
JON SHOOK: No, I know, but that's his white name, bro.
His white name is Larry.
CARLITO: Thank you, sir.
JON SHOOK: Later, brother.
VINNY DOTOLO: There's just a certain philosophy here.
It's like, everybody's always looking for something to wow
you here when they come here, every time, everybody.
It's a tight crew here, too-- small staff, small front of
the house staff, small back of the house.
So it's a true family, I think.
JON SHOOK: I'm John Shook.
VINNY DOTOLO: I'm Vinny Dotolo, Animal restaurant.
We're in Los Angeles, and we're going to go
on an eating tour.
JON SHOOK: We put together a pretty good group of guys that
all love to eat.
I text Ethan.
He's a good friend of ours, loves to eat.
He of course jumped in, hit up a couple of his friends.
We had Zach McGowan, voice-over wizard,
good friend of ours.
VINNY DOTOLO: Used to cook with us.
JON SHOOK: Aziz, a buddy of ours who
we met here at Animal.
He brought some friends.
And of course, Jeff from Thrillist--
VINNY DOTOLO: He probably knows more than any of us.
We've been open a year and eight months now.
John and I have been cooking together for 10 years now.
JON SHOOK: That's a long fucking time.
We're both from Florida.
I grew up in Ormond Beach, he grew up in Clearwater, and we
met in culinary school.
VINNY DOTOLO: I think the restaurant was something we
were dying to get back into.
We had worked in some fine dining restaurants our first
couple years out of school, and then kind of fell off and
started catering and built our business up from there.
JON SHOOK: It's always been our dream, I think, to have
our own restaurant and be a chef in a restaurant.
We never were sous chefs anywhere.
We were line cooks, caterers, business owners, and now,
restaurateurs.
VINNY DOTOLO: Yeah, LA is where we've dug our feet in.
JON SHOOK: We've been here for eight years now.
VINNY DOTOLO: Yeah, the food scene, I think, has really
taken a turn in the last five years here.
There were some really solid chefs here before.
But now, it's a place where it can be considered to be a
culinary Mecca of the US.
I don't know if the rest of the US would agree with that.
But I think we want to wave that flag a little bit.
-Yeah, we're loading this bitch up.
-You can't fuck with me.
-I know.
-He knows he can't fuck with me.
He's not on my level.
JON SHOOK: Hey, we need to cut up to Willshire.
GIOVANNI REDA: Are we going for flavor or
for quantity tonight?
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
JON SHOOK: We're only eating flavor.
We're only eating flavor.
GIOVANNI REDA: Tommy, you're eating
whatever Ethan eats, right?
TOMMY: Yo, I'm going sandwich for sandwich, taco for taco
with you, head up.
VINNY DOTOLO: The first stop--
it's called Gui Rim.
John and I found it when we first moved here.
Not knowing a bunch of people that were coming with us, I
think it was a good idea to bring them there.
Because it's kind of interactive, and you're
sitting around a table grilling meat and eating
kimchis and pickled vegetables and all that stuff.
JON SHOOK: You get your hands in it, play around with it.
-Fuck yeah, I love this shit.
TOMMY: I'll eat this shit raw.
Isn't this raw beef?
You can eat that raw, right?
JON SHOOK: Yeah, you could eat it raw, but--
TOMMY: What's the point, right?
JON SHOOK: Yeah, what's the point?
In another couple seconds this shit's going to be piping hot,
and you're going to be throwing stuff on there.
-Aziz, you're getting on this shit, ay?
This shit's the bomb.
-Deep-fried.
AZIZ ANSARI: I love rabbit.
-So crazy, southern California.
JON SHOOK: You want to do one with them?
AZIZ ANSARI: Yeah, let me do a food tour.
VINNY DOTOLO: You know, it's funny because in press, too,
we always try to be considerate of what we're
doing on our menu and what people are going
to gravitate towards.
And for a while everybody's like, oh, this restaurant is
so bacon and pork.
And it is.
There is bacon on the menu, and there is pork.
But I think it was--
the bacon thing really got people, because there's bacon
in a desert.
And there was a couple things on the menu that had bacon in
them, but it's not the focus here.
I had people ask us if we put bacon in our iced tea.
It's like, who the fuck's telling you
this kind of stuff?
JON SHOOK: Yeah, it's crazy.
VINNY DOTOLO: I mean, we're always looking for
inspiration, but we kind of run within really tight
confinement here at Animal.
We try not to really do too much Asian-inspired food.
We have such a large community of Chinese people here, Korean
people here, Japanese people here, and they
all do it so well.
JON SHOOK: Cheers.
-Food tour.
JON SHOOK: Food tour.
Guys, I got to say, I don't know if
we're pacing ourselves.
TOMMY: You know what's fucked up?
You know what-- because the fact that that
was a sit-down meal--
ETHAN SUPLEE: Wasn't the way to start the night.
TOMMY: You gotta be moving.
JON SHOOK: You just spit your fucking thing all over me.
TOMMY: I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
ETHAN SUPLEE: Where are you going?
AZIZ ANSARI: We gotta roll.
I gotta go meet somebody.
TOMMY: What do you mean?
AZIZ ANSARI: I can't stay.
I told someone I'd meet them at--
TOMMY: Spirit?
Fuck Spirit, are you kidding me or what?
-And the biggest loser is--
AZIZ ANSARI: I told someone I would meet them for a drink at
10:00, and I gotta go.
TOMMY: Is it a business meeting, or is it a girl?
AZIZ ANSARI: It's a woman.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
GIOVANNI REDA: Wait now, you're not going.
-Yeah, I'm with him.
GIOVANNI REDA: What do you mean, you're with him?
He's going to meet a chick.
What kind of crap is this?
How many chicks are going to be there?
Is it a gangbang?
VINNY DOTOLO: Down in that rough neck of the woods,
there's a place Dino's Burgers and Chicken, which pretty much
only serves chicken.
That's the cool thing with the name.
But it's this dirty $5 box of red-orange
chicken that's marinated.
I became a fan of it.
Whenever you tell people, they'd never
really heard of it.
And it's pretty damn tasty.
I don't know what it is.
It's scary, but it's good.
JON SHOOK: You know what it is?
It's probably like chili oil.
VINNY DOTOLO: This vinegar shit that they're putting on
it right there, it's fucking-- look how
fast this guy's moving.
You wish you had a guy this fast in your restaurant.
Bam, bam, boom--
look at the size of those chickens.
ZACH MCGOWAN: He's just putting
half chickens in there.
VINNY DOTOLO: Look at-- just however the fuck
he wants to do it.
ZACH MCGOWAN: Whoa, look at that.
ETHAN SUPLEE: Whoa, what is that?
What is that?
I need a side cup of that stuff.
VINNY DOTOLO: Chicken time.
It's good.
And how much was each one of these, like $7?
-$5.
VINNY DOTOLO: Five fucking dollars.
-I want to know how they get this so red.
JON SHOOK: It's pigeon.
-What is that?
How do they do that?
JON SHOOK: You guys, we're eating pigeon.
-I don't have a problem with that.
JON SHOOK: Look--
-That's so gnarly, dude.
-Pigeon's good, dude.
JON SHOOK: Let's get the fuck to the next place.
ZACH MCGOWAN: What's next up on the menu?
VINNY DOTOLO: I think some taco truck
Johnny's got lined up.
JON SHOOK: See, we figured that we might as well also try
to hit a couple taco trucks when we're out on the street.
[CAR HORN]
-Whoa, oh my god, oh my god.
GIOVANNI REDA: Yo, you should have fucking ran that
piece of shit over.
Yo, we're trying to find a taco truck right now.
You're going to let some little car get in our way of a
taco truck?
TOMMY: Call them now and tell them to heat up the donuts.
-Whoa, look out for this taxi.
Time to make the donuts.
JON SHOOK: We decided to stop back at the restaurant, too,
for a donut.
Donuts are almost out of season here,
believe it or not.
Because donuts only really work when the temperature's
right here in LA.
Yeah, I'd say we'll probably only have another month or two
left on the donuts.
And then they'll be done.
-Oh, my stomach's on fire.
JON SHOOK: Yep, mine is too.
I got a good case of bubble gut right now.
GIOVANNI REDA: You know what's good to put the fire out in
your stomach.
JON SHOOK: PediaSure.
GIOVANNI REDA: A donut.
-This is what we do in Hollywood, kids.
We drive around and binge eat.
VINNY DOTOLO: I think there's many things that come into
play in why it's so busy.
I think the food speaks for itself, you know?
Obviously you can tell by looking around, there's not
much decor here--
it's not really that bringing you in.
It's not the music, you know what I mean?
It's just not that type of LA quintessential restaurant
where people are doing coke in the bathroom.
They might be doing it, but people are here to
eat, so I doubt it.
GIOVANNI REDA: I'm going for the fork.
VINNY DOTOLO: We only had a short amount of
time to hang out.
And we were just trying to get as many new experiences for
everyone tied into one night, and I think we
accomplished that.
JON SHOOK: I think as much we love cooking
we also love eating--
big time.
Eating's I guess a reward for all the work, right?
[MUSIC PLAYING]