Ceres (The Bear)

The episode opens with a flashback set in a home kitchen: Mikey (Jon Bernthal) and Carmy prepare Mikey's braciole while Carmy, Sugar (Abby Elliott), and Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) listen to Mikey tell a story.

In the present timeline, Sydney develops a cola-braised short ribs and risotto meal for an upcoming dinner menu. Carmy says it is tremendous but not ready yet, and that she's talented but impatient. Sydney serves it to a customer anyway. Natalie comes to the restaurant to figure out the restaurant's unpaid taxes and she and Carmy search for the missing documents. Marcus continues to work hard on developing donuts, but finds himself behind on restaurant work. Carmy and Natalie fight about how they're dealing with their grief and agree they want consistency from the restaurant. The restaurant has its windows shot out by stray gunfire, and Richie asks the local gangsters to find out who did it. Later, the gangsters get into a scuffle, which Sydney breaks up by offering them leftovers. All the Beef staff are feeling motivated and organized but Richie is still being chaotic and distracting. Tina tells him he needs to get with it and he considers quitting. Richie feels left out and unneeded because of Sydney's success and it's implied that he calls the police on the gangsters.

• The name of the episode refers to the statue of the Roman goddess of agriculture that tops the Chicago Board of Trade Building, and to Ceres Cafe, a cocktail bar in the lobby.^[1] The bar is known for "strong drinks" and "heavy pours."^[2]
• When talking about the statue, both Mikey and Richie refer to "architect John Storrs" although Ceres was the work of sculptor John Storrs.^[3] The Chicago Board of Trade building was designed in the Art Deco style by architects Holabird & Root; the statue "sits atop the building's pyramidal roof. The straight lines on her garment and her machine-made appearance make her the quintessential...ornament for this completely stylized structure."^[4]
• Mikey tells Richie, Natalie, and Carm that the statue has her back to the east; Ceres faces north, up LaSalle Street, her back is to the south.
• In Mikey's story he and Richie stumble into 6 a.m. rager where they encounter hockey players Denis Savard, Chris Chelios, and Ed Belfour, and actor Bill Murray.^[2] Savard played centre for the Chicago Blackhawks from 1980 to 1990, and from 1995 to 1997.^[5] Savard was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto on Monday, November 13, 2000.^[6] Savard was also an assistant coach for the Chicago Blackhawks during the 2000–01 NHL season.^[7][a]
• While Mikey is talking, he prepares the braciole that Carmy mentions in the season-one finale, assigning Carm to finish the work ("Carmy, do some parm") and rejecting Sugar's proposal that they include raisins, which is how their mom would have done the dish.^[11][3]
• The gentrification of Chicago is the thematic foundation of the episode. "Logan...Wicker...Pilsen" likely refers to the neighborhoods of Pilsen, Wicker Park, and Logan Square.^[12] The "bar next door" is the real Green Door Tavern, but it has not actually closed.^[13] It persists, as it has done since 1921.^[13] A Sweetgreen gourmet-salad restaurant, marketed to working professionals, is opening soon in The Bear's fictionalized version of the River North neighborhood.^[14] Richie is correct that Pilsen, Wicker Park, and Logan Square have "undergone significant changes in recent years. Regarded as 'up-and-coming neighborhoods', the three mentioned neighborhoods are historically Latino but have seen an increase in 'hip' new restaurants and bars. In the case of Pilsen, John Betancur, a professor of urban planning, explains that not only do 'residents get displaced' but also 'Pilsen increasingly becomes home to other groups and also a destination for tourists'... Given the fact that a Sweetgreen is built in River North indicates a shift towards catering to an entirely different demographic—the middle class...Sweetgreen, a healthy salad restaurant chain, is a reflection of the shifting tastes and a representation of class in the changing neighborhood of River North, which is starting to favor bourgeois taste...Consequently, 'residents feel out of place in many of the new shops and restaurants where the food, music, drinks, décor, and customers' behavior reflect whiteness and class privilege.'"^[15]
• Crooked John asks for drinks to go with the beef sandwiches that Syd hands out: "RC, Green River, whatever we're dealing with." The Sprecher-bottled Green River and other sodas appear throughout season one.^[16] Green River is a soft drink first bottled locally in 1919.^[17] By the 1960s Green River was "a nationally known Chicago icon."^[18]
• Carmy uses the "cake-tester method" to check "by touch" if the chicken is cooked.^[19][20]
• A VIP guest at the Beef in this episode is local weatherman Tom Skilling from WGN-TV.^[20]

"Ceres" was written by Catherine Schetina & Rene Gube.^[21]

Ebon Moss-Bachrach was largely responsible for Jon Bernthal agreeing to play the role of Mikey, who makes his first onscreen appearance in "Ceres". Moss-Bachrach asked nicely, and the two actors are old friends, having first worked together during the production of an off-Broadway play, Lanford Wilson's Fifth of July, in 2003.^[22][23]

For the flashback, designer Courtney Wheeler put Carmy in a "gray long-sleeved henley to signal relaxed, happier times for the family [because] 'Michael is cooking this meal every Sunday, and maybe the Bears game is on.'"^[24] Richie wears a gray-and-maroon "Chicago tracksuit."^[24]

Richie retells the Ceres statue story to Sydney, and "As described by Richie, the fact that the Goddess has no face is only recognized when other buildings began to supersede the Board of Trade in size, emphasizing how fast urban development takes place. Before he can finish his anecdote, he is cut short by the bullet flying through the shop window, which acts as a metaphor for Richie's general predicament. Just as the bullet cuts Richie's story short, so too are his opinions seemingly cut down or ignored amidst the changes in the restaurant and the neighborhood."^[25]

The flashback with Mikey was filmed in California, in the kitchen of one of the producers of the show.^[22] According to Moss-Bachrach, "Jon's scene was the last thing we shot, so we were able to change our appearance a little bit...Jon was in the middle of doing American Gigolo and we could only really get him for a day. A few of us went out to L.A., and we shot it there, so the whole temperature was quite different, the light was different. It felt not so dark, in a way."^[26]

Sydney's increasingly secure position in the "delicate ecosystem" of the family restaurant is suggested when she resolves the gangster turf crisis with communication and sandwiches: "Having resolved a conflict between the members of the same gangs, Sydney walks back to the restaurant when her gaze lands on Richie. 'It's handled', is all she says, as an eye-line match reverses the shot back to Richie standing away, his help unwanted."^[27]

The songs included in the episode were "Call the Police" by LCD Soundsystem, "Beat City" by the Flowerpot Men, "Peace Blossom Boogy" by Babe Rainbow, "Aphasia" by the Budos Band, and "Last Train Home" by John Mayer.^[28] The LCD Soundsystem song plays while Mikey tells the Bill Murray story in the opening flashback scene.^[29]

Sydney presents the cola-braised short ribs and risotto dish she conceptualized at the end of "Sheridan." Carmy rejects Sydney's proposed addition to the dinner menu as "not ready."^[3] Short ribs are a cut of beef, usually derived the chuck and short plate cuts, which consists "of layers of fat and meat and contain pieces of the rib bone. They're very tough and require long, slow, moist-heat cooking."^[30] According to Food & Wine, "On television and in real life, nothing is cozier than a Dutch oven filled with braised, fall-off-the-bone tender short ribs served over risotto. Here, per Sydney's creativity, classic wine and stock braising liquid get a surprising addition from cola, which balances the savory with a touch of complex sweetness to create a smooth, rich sauce."^[31] Braising is a cooking technique in which meat is "first browned in fat, then cooked, tightly covered, in a small amount of liquid at low heat for a lengthy period of time" which develops flavor and makes the protein tender.^[32] Risotto is a labor-intensive, delectable, creamy "Italian rice specialty made by stirring hot stock into a mixture of rice (and often chopped onions) that has been sautéed in butter. The stock is added 1⁄2 cup at a time and the mixture is stirred continually while it cooks until all the liquid is absorbed before more stock is added."^[33] Sydney's risotto recipe uses an étouffée stock as a flavor base; this is what she was working on when she asked Carmy to help her strain her stock in the "Sheridan" episode.^[34]

Vulture rated it five out of five stars.^[20]

Den of Geek hailed Bernthal's debut appearance a crucial to the long-term overall emotional impact of The Bear: "The Bear has been great from its first episode on. But it didn't fully become the best version of itself until season 1 episode 6 'Ceres,' in which Mikey is first introduced via flashback. As Mikey attends to the Berzatto family dinner and enthralls his siblings with a story that they've all heard a thousand times, the melancholy at the center of the story firmly locks into place and is never dislodged. Every character on The Bear makes more sense when you remember what they've lost. Even Syd, who never knew Mikey, has to confront his shade within Carmy's baby blue eyes every day."^[35]

In 2024, the Hollywood Reporter ranked "Ceres" 16th-best out of 28 episodes produced to that point, commenting "Bernthal instantly infuses Mikey with so much life, making the audience feel the character's absence almost as much as the loved ones he left behind."^[37] Screen Rant ranked "Ceres" 15th out of the 28 episodes produced through the end of season three, calling it one of the "more interesting" episodes of season one and saluting the introduction of the "brilliant" Jon Bernthal as Mikey.^[38]

In 2024, Variety listed "Ceres" at number 10 on a list of top 10 episodes of The Bear.^[39]

In 2025, Vulture ranked "Ceres" as 20th-best out of 38 episodes of The Bear, describing it as "quite a good episode" that is especially "lovely if you've spent any time in Chicago."^[40] Esquire magazine listed "Ceres" at number 8 on its 2025 list of top 10 best episodes from the first three seasons of The Bear, with the goddess of the harvest serving as "a marker of change for The Bear as its characters transition from their old world of meat slop into whatever Carmy has cooking in his head. Of greatest concern is Richie, whose pathetic boorishness is reinforced before his great metamorphosis in season 2."^[14]

A BuzzFeed writer who watched season one for the first time in 2025 commented, "Richie is not enjoying the breakaway from the system. Everyone in this show is so good with the subtle expressions. So much character crammed into little 30-minute episodes."^[41]

• Johnny Cakes (The Sopranos) – season 6, episode 8 (2006) – "Two members of Tony's crew, Burt Gervasi and Patsy Parisi, go to a chain coffee shop nearby, claiming to be from the North Ward Merchants Protective Cooperative, offering round-the-clock security in exchange for weekly payments—a classic protection racket disguised in more sanitized language...The scheme finally clear to the manager, he levels with them, almost sympathetically. 'Look, every last coffee bean is in the computer and has to be accounted for. If the numbers don't add up, I'll be gone, and somebody else will be here.' Disoriented, Patsy walks out onto the street and says, with complete and utter sincerity: 'It's over for the little guy.'"^[42]
• Richard Hart – baker mentioned by Marcus
• Bad News Bears – film franchise mentioned by Carmy and "Richie Bad News"
• List of The Bear episodes
• The Bear season one
• Previous episode: "Sheridan"
• Next episode: "Review"