Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) — aka the eponymous “Lincoln Lawyer” — has all sorts of quirks. For one, there’s the eccentricity that gives the series its title: his propensity for working from his Lincoln SUV because it’s the only place where he can think clearly. But Haller’s most endearing quality is his seemingly constant need to snack. According to showrunner Ted Humphrey, that’s no mere quirk — it’s a key part of who he is.

Food is also a major element of the Michael Connelly novels on which The Lincoln Lawyer is based, and it was important for Humphrey to feature snacks and restaurants in the series. “It's striking how much attention to detail Michael pays to food — even the specific pork chops that [Mickey] orders at a Chinese restaurant,” Humphrey tells Tudum. “There's something really warm and inviting and fun about the food aspect of the book. It makes the character very relatable — we all love to eat.”

Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) and Lorna (Becki Newton) having lunch.

It’s not just Mickey’s snacking preoccupation that makes audiences connect with him. It’s also the kind of food he chooses — and avoids. In Episode 8, Lorna (Becki Newton), Mickey’s office manager and “second ex-wife” gets him a quinoa salad with beets, referring to it as “brain food.” Mickey clearly doesn’t think he needs the help. “[He]’s like, ‘Yeah, no way,’ and there's a great shot from inside the trash where he dumps it,” Humphrey says. “Then, the next thing you see, he's munching a burrito, driving down the street. Who can't relate to wanting the junk food instead of the super healthy salad from Whole Foods or whatever?”

Doughnuts are another Mickey staple that communicate his everyman status. “Who doesn’t love doughnuts? Everybody loves doughnuts,” Humphrey says. “It wasn’t just Mickey — Izzy (Jazz Raycole) and Cisco (Angus Sampson) were getting in on the doughnuts, too.”

The immediately recognizable communal experience of co-workers coming together over a box of treats isn’t just for the benefit of viewers; the food is also a tool for the actors. “Those [doughnuts] are real,” the showrunner explains. “It’s always very important to me to get the actual food from an actual place and to honor the verisimilitude of that. So, that was a real box of gourmet doughnuts from this particular downtown LA doughnut shop. It helps the actors get into character. If you are supposed to be a lawyer in downtown LA, get a box of the real doughnuts.”

Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) eating doughnuts at the office.

Props that are grounded in reality, Humphrey explains, give actors freedom in their creative process. “We snack and drink coffee all day long,” he says, taking a sip from his own coffee cup. “It helps actors to get into the mindset that this is a real person [they’re portraying], so there’s nothing stilted and stage-manner-y about it.”

In The Lincoln Lawyer, food doesn’t just help bring characters to life, it also does the same thing for Los Angeles, the show’s setting. Iconic LA restaurants and their most noteworthy dishes, like French dips from Philippe's, are featured heavily in Connelly’s books, and Humphrey brought that into the show. He says the choice to include iconic LA spots like Pink’s Hot Dogs was meant to “honor” the city, which is practically its own character on the show.

Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) chows at Pink’s Hot Dogs with his client Trevor Elliott (Christopher Gorham).

Just as Mickey’s various meals around LA deepen the audience’s understanding of the city, each dish also speaks to the complexity of Mickey as a character and the struggles he’s endured, including the fact that he’s a recovering addict. Humphrey points out that his snacking habit may be one way he’s coping with that. “Better to be snacking all the time than to be doing maybe other things that are less savory,” he says, pointing out that Mickey’s constant eating isn’t just a casual impulse. There’s a fervency behind it.

“To quote Iggy Pop, this is a guy who really has a lust for life," Humphrey explains. “He’s cynical — defense attorneys have to be cynical to get through their day — so he says things like, ‘Everybody lies.’ And he believes that, but, at the same time, if he completely believed that, he couldn’t keep doing what he does. The guy really does, on some level, love his life, love what he does, love the people around him.”

That lust for life is most strongly illustrated through his love of food. Humphrey, for one, gets it. “I grew up in a very Italian community, and food is an expression of love… of love of life, diving into things with gusto.”

Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) introduces his driver Izzy Letts (Jazz Raycole) to birria tacos.

That cultural connection to food is also true for Mickey, whose Mexican heritage is evoked through the food he enjoys and shares with others, like the birria tacos he introduces Izzy to in Episode 3. Humphrey says that special attention was paid to making sure they featured authentic Mexican and Mexican-American dishes and food establishments, and he and Garcia-Rulfo worked closely together to make sure it was as authentic a gustatory experience as possible — and a delicious one at that. 

These Tacos Will Change Your Life | The Lincoln Lawyer S1E3