I like refried beans. That’s why I wanna try fried beans, because maybe they’re just as good and we’re just wasting time. You don’t have to fry them again after all.

This line comes from Mitch Hedberg’s stand-up act in the late 1990s–early 2000s, part of the deadpan, one-liner style that made him a cult-favorite comedian. Hedberg often built jokes by taking everyday phrases literally and then following the logic to an absurd conclusion. Here he riffs on the common menu item “refried beans,” treating the prefix “re-” as if it indicates the beans have been fried twice. The humor depends on his persona—curious, slightly bewildered, and methodically logical—applied to mundane food terminology.

Hedberg’s joke exposes how language can smuggle in assumptions that collapse under literal scrutiny. “Refried” in English suggests repetition, so he pretends to worry that we’ve been inefficiently frying beans twice when once might do. The bit is funny because it treats a settled convention (a loan-translation from Spanish usage) as an unresolved practical problem, and because the proposed solution—seek out “fried beans” as a time-saving alternative—mimics consumer rationality applied to something trivial. It’s a miniature example of Hedberg’s broader comic method: logical precision used to reveal the absurdity hidden in ordinary words.

1) “I like refried beans. That’s why I wanna try fried beans, because maybe they’re just as good and we’re wasting time.”
2) “I like refried beans. I wanna try fried beans, ’cause maybe they’re just as good and we’re just wasting time.”
3) “I like refried beans. I wanna try fried beans, because maybe they’re just as good and you don’t have to fry them again.”