- [Keith] This is Henry, and this is me, Keith.
And today we're calling cabs and Ubers
until we find someone who isn't native to the U.S.
to tell us about their life and take us to the restaurant
in L.A. that reminds them the most of home.
(electronic music)
We start with Uber.
And while we wait, we ask our sound guy Chris
a very important question.
- Who do you like better, me or Keith?
- Uh...
- [Keith] The Uber arrives and we load in.
- [Henry] Where are you from, Arjen?
- [Henry] You're from Iran?
- [Keith] While we head to Echo Park,
we pitch him our idea.
He's interested and has a great story,
but doesn't have time this afternoon to be in the video.
So we part ways.
- Been great talking to you, man.
- He was sneaking across borders
to get to America, essentially?
- [Henry] Yeah, and like the food he was describing,
I was like fuck, just come on, agree to it.
- [Keith] We call a cab using the app Curb.
- This app is terrible.
- [Keith] We take a moment to appreciate the beauty
of Echo Park, and we get in the next cab.
This cabbie is literally the most
crotchety old man to ever drive a car.
He takes us to Chinatown
and we get out as quickly as possible.
We decide to stretch our legs before calling another Uber.
During our walk, Henry finds a truck filled with grapes,
and immediately gets a grape seed stuck in his front teeth.
We call another Uber.
We get in and meet Thomas,
who thinks we're making a student film.
Thomas does not fit our specifications,
but he was awesome all the same.
We continue toward downtown and we passed a building
that sells ink, copies, storage and waffles?
We get out, stretch our legs again,
and then we foolishly entered an intersection
without enough time to cross.
- [Henry] (singing) Running across the street.
- [Keith] We're getting very hungry and a little bit crazy.
- I'm about to call an Uber.
He's in a Honda Odyssey.
- [Keith] An Odyssey is a good sort of metaphor
for what we're doing here.
The Uber arrives and we hop in, hoping this is the one.
- [Keith] He seems awesome.
So we ask if he wants to be a part of our video.
- Well how come you came to America?
- [Keith] The more we talked with him,
the more we loved Milan.
So to see if he's a true Angelino,
I ask him one more important question.
Whats his favorite fast food?
- [Henry] Perfect.
- [Keith] We arrive at Aroma Cafe, where Henry, Chris,
and I will eat Balkan food for the first time.
Henry and Milan proceed to order way too much food
and our waitress kindly acts like it's normal.
First we have kefir, a milk and yogurt drink.
- Cheers! - Cheers, guys.
- Uh, it's really interesting.
It is not sweet at all, which I really like.
It just tastes like, wholesome.
- What do you think of it, Chris? (Chris laughs)
- It's really tart but I really like it.
- I prefer normal milk.
Kefir is normally paired with burek,
a savory pastry.
- It's like, um, spanikopita. - Exactly.
Very, very similar to Greek.
- I love how warm it is.
- It's very simple, but very delicious.
Next up sarma, which is smoked ground lamb
with rice wrapped in cabbage and grape leaves. - Wow.
We don't have anything...
Like the meat tastes like really,
sort of fatty taste to the meat.
- So much flavor.
- It tastes like I'm coming home for the holidays. - Yeah.
- Yeah, get that. - I can't get enough of this.
- You don't find many dishes like this in other countries.
- No, no-- - This is typical Yugoslavian, or Balkan, food.
Little bit of vegetables, and meat, and bread.
Bread is really common with everything.
- [Keith] At one point in our feasting,
Milan has to go take a call
while we continue to eat so much food. - Woah!
I know she said it was lamb, but it tastes like bacon.
- I get with this bread, 'cause the bread's made here...
- It's like the kind of bread I feel bad
making a sandwich with too, because the bread itself
is like so delicious on its own.
- [Keith] This was just a plate of meat.
- [Henry] A plate of meat on a bed of onions.
- [Keith] Yeah.
- [Henry] Like pretty smokey, which is really like...
I guess I never even thought that the Balkans
had their own cuisine, which is super ignorant of me.
- [Keith] It's like smokey, but the taste
is a lot like a gyro meat.
- [Keith] Milan comes back, only to let us know
that he needs to get to a meeting downtown.
So we say our goodbyes, and then we continue
to demolish all the food we ordered.
As well as Turkish coffee with a piece of Turkish delight,
a sugar-soaked and baklava-stuffed apple,
this sweet, cake-like pastry, and baklava.
- Oh, man! - Is it hot, or delicious?
- No, it's so good!
What the fuck is happening?
- [Keith] This is candy.
- Right now I feel like I could fight
like seven donkeys at once.
- [Keith] It was time to go.
We thanked our server, and the owner of Aroma Cafe,
and headed into our last Uber home.
The day was a success,
and we'd like to thank Milan one more time.
He helped us experience food that was foreign to us
after he spent 30 years raising a family
in a culture foreign to him.
Every driver has a story,
and today we got to experience one.
- [Henry] Can i just say that Milan is like
the coolest fuckin dude I've ever met.
- [Keith] He's so cool.
- He just like wants to talk about food,
which is what I want to talk about all the time. - Yeah.
- It's amazing.