My Dad, Famous Amos

Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Radio

Milk Street Radio

Food, Arts

4.2 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 17 December 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Today, we're sharing an episode from our friends at Tough Cookie: The Wally ”Famous“ Amos Story.

Meet Wally Amos. He founded the ubiquitous Famous Amos Chocolate Chip Cookies in 1975, turning the brand into an overnight sensation and himself into a pop-culture fixture in the 1970s and 1980s. But there’s a darker side to Wally’s seemingly sweet story. One filled with five marriages to six women and a string of bad business decisions that led him to lose the empire he had created. When he passed away in 2024, host Sarah Amos set out to untangle her father’s complicated past and finally face the life and legacy she had been avoiding.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Did you ever wonder what it's like to live alone, hidden in the woods not speaking to a single soul for 30 years?
0:13.0	Or wander to the desert, uncover a hidden well, and die to the bottom of the deepest waterhole for 2,000 miles.
0:22.5	The Snap Judgment podcast takes you there with amazing stories told by the people who live them,
0:27.9	with an original soundscape that drops you directly into their shoes.
0:32.7	Snap Judgment, listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcast.
0:45.5	Which brand of chocolate should I buy for my kitchen?
0:49.6	Well, I've been asked that a million times over the years, and here's my answer, Gattard.
0:53.1	It's been around since 1868 and it's family owned.
0:59.0	They have over 150 years experience in making chocolate for pastry chefs, artisan bakers,
1:00.7	chocolatiers, and, of course, home bakers.
1:04.1	Gattard prioritizes flavor and quality.
1:05.1	Now, what does that look like? Well, preserving the uniqueness of each origin from which they source,
1:09.5	Gattard invests in flavor preservation on cocoa farms
1:12.2	through local partnerships, as well as in the gentle ways in which they craft the chocolate from
1:17.1	bean to bar. Now, what's left is chocolate in its purest form, delivering flavor and quality.
1:23.3	Plus, they are always innovating, as with their coconut sugar sweetened baking chips. And by the way, I love their wafers. You don't need to chop them. And the added cocoa butter means they melt evenly and consistently. And I also love their milk chocolate chips and chocolate chip chunks. So here at Milk Street, we use Gattard for all the same reasons I love it. It's our go-to brand. So please check out Gattard Chocolate. You can find
1:45.6	Gart at most specialty and local retailers or on Gattard.com. Hey, it's Christopher Kimball. Does the name
1:53.0	famous Amos ring a bell? Maybe you remember those bite-sized cookies that were in your school
1:57.7	lunchbox. But for Sarah Amos, the name isn't just a brand, it's her father.
2:03.0	Today we're sharing the first episode of Tough Cookie, the Wally Famous Amos story.
2:08.3	This Tribeca Fest award-winning series tells the story of a black pop culture icon and cookie mogul.
2:15.1	Famous Amos became an overnight sensation, bringing Wally a whirlwind of glamour
	...

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