Fast Food Weakness

[fusangite]

So, it's looking like I'm the only person buying sticky rice wraps from street vendors, then.

 

[shaylon]

So, it's looking like I'm the only person buying sticky rice wraps from street vendors, then.

Heh. Yeah not a lot of that around here. Canada sounds like a fascinating place!

On a seperate note, WTH is a Chin's?

-Shay

 

[ForceUser]

When I leave work in an hour, I am going to go to McDonald's and get a double cheeseburger and an apple pie because I physically NEED it. There is absolutely no stopping this craving. I can't wait.

According to Eric Schlosser in his book Fast Food Nation, the meat in a McDonald's burger patty has--on average--beef from over 1,000 cows from 11 different countries in it. The apple pie is specifically designed by chemists working for designer-taste companies to induce the very cravings of which you speak. According to the film Super Size Me, the majority of 100 nutritionists polled believed that it was unhealthy to eat at McDonald's more than once per month, and healthier to cut it out of one's diet altogether. The McDonald's corporation itself doesn't call it's customers "customers," it calls them "users." People who visit McDonald's more than once per week are considered "heavy users." In a lawsuit filed in New York by two girls blaming McDonald's for their obesity problems, the company stated in a brief that the health risks of eating their product were "well-documented." In other words, in its own defense, the company said "Hey, you know our food is really bad for you. It's not our fault if you eat it."

Here's the amazon.com blurb on Schlosser's book.

On any given day, one out of four Americans opts for a quick and cheap meal at a fast-food restaurant, without giving either its speed or its thriftiness a second thought. Fast food is so ubiquitous that it now seems as American, and harmless, as apple pie. But the industry's drive for consolidation, homogenization, and speed has radically transformed America's diet, landscape, economy, and workforce, often in insidiously destructive ways. Eric Schlosser, an award-winning journalist, opens his ambitious and ultimately devastating exposé with an introduction to the iconoclasts and high school dropouts, such as Harlan Sanders and the McDonald brothers, who first applied the principles of a factory assembly line to a commercial kitchen. Quickly, however, he moves behind the counter with the overworked and underpaid teenage workers, onto the factory farms where the potatoes and beef are grown, and into the slaughterhouses run by giant meatpacking corporations. Schlosser wants you to know why those French fries taste so good (with a visit to the world's largest flavor company) and "what really lurks between those sesame-seed buns." Eater beware: forget your concerns about cholesterol, there is--literally--feces in your meat.

Schlosser's investigation reaches its frightening peak in the meatpacking plants as he reveals the almost complete lack of federal oversight of a seemingly lawless industry. His searing portrayal of the industry is disturbingly similar to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, written in 1906: nightmare working conditions, union busting, and unsanitary practices that introduce E. coli and other pathogens into restaurants, public schools, and homes. Almost as disturbing is his description of how the industry "both feeds and feeds off the young," insinuating itself into all aspects of children's lives, even the pages of their school books, while leaving them prone to obesity and disease. Fortunately, Schlosser offers some eminently practical remedies. "Eating in the United States should no longer be a form of high-risk behavior," he writes. Where to begin? Ask yourself, is the true cost of having it "your way" really worth it?

 

[MrFilthyIke]

So, it's looking like I'm the only person buying sticky rice wraps from street vendors, then.

I *wish* we had street vendors like that! Heck, we don't have many street vendors at all, it's f#$%in' Florida!

And We have numerous Chipotle's and Panera's near us, but for Mexican I live for, and die for, Tiajuana Flats and their awesome hot sauces (like Smack My Ass And Call Me Sally and Endorphine Rush).

 

[fusangite]

Heh. Yeah not a lot of that around here. Canada sounds like a fascinating place!

Well, Toronto and Vancouver's Chinatowns have this. I'm not so sure about the rest of the country.

I have to say I find it really weird that people consider fast food to be a modern, American thing. Your average medieval or ancient city in Europe or Asia had way more fast food available on the street than our cities do today. Hm.... I suddenly find myself wondering what the fast food scene was like in ancient Tenochtitlan.

 

[AIM-54]

Well, Toronto and Vancouver's Chinatowns have this. I'm not so sure about the rest of the country.

I have to say I find it really weird that people consider fast food to be a modern, American thing. Your average medieval or ancient city in Europe or Asia had way more fast food available on the street than our cities do today. Hm.... I suddenly find myself wondering what the fast food scene was like in ancient Tenochtitlan.

That reminds me of when I lived in Germany for a few months, one of my favorite fast food-type experiences was to go to a kebab place, run by some of the local Turks. You'd go in, watch them carve the meat off the big chunk of meat being cooked on a sort of vertical spit, then put into a pita type bread (can't remember if it actually was or not) with various garnishings and a delicious tzatziki like sauce. Very, very tasty.

 

[fusangite]

That reminds me of when I lived in Germany for a few months, one of my favorite fast food-type experiences was to go to a kebab place, run by some of the local Turks. You'd go in, watch them carve the meat off the big chunk of meat being cooked on a sort of vertical spit, then put into a pita type bread (can't remember if it actually was or not) with various garnishings and a delicious tzatziki like sauce. Very, very tasty.

Mmmm... shawarma.

 

[Queen_Dopplepopolis]

In other words, in its own defense, the company said "Hey, you know our food is really bad for you. It's not our fault if you eat it."

Wow, ForceUser. You sure know how to make a girl feel like an uncontrollable, cracked-out junkie!!

 

[Crothian]

Wow, ForceUser. You sure know how to make a girl feel like an uncontrollable, cracked-out junkie!!

make you feel good....

 

[reveal]

Wow...this thread went into odd places......even for us

What's weird is no one has said they actually EAT the fast food in question. So maybe going "into odd places" is appropriate. Ever seen that scene in Dodgeball where Ben Stiller puts a slice of pizza down his pants?