The French hate McDonald's. The notion of "fast food" clashes with their belief that meals should be long and leisurely; that they should be cooked carefully, with prized ingredients. It couldn't be further from the notion of terroir. But mostly they hate it because it is as shamefully hip-packed and loud-talking as those god-awful Americans, and Americans don't know how to eat. Have you heard this before? Did you believe it? Well, then you might want to sit down for this one: In the first half of this year, combined sales at the chain's 6,400 European restaurants rose 15 percent, to $4.1 billion, compared with a 6 percent increase in the United States, where McDonald's has 13,800 restaurants and where...
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Photographs by Robyn Lee Craig LaBan, restaurant critic at the Philadelphia Inquirer, recently reviewed the first Legal Sea Foods restaurant to open in Philadelphia. He liked much of the food he ate there (the raw bar, chowder, fried clams, fish and chips) but was left cold by other dishes (the "leaden" stuffed shrimp, desserts, "odd" "everything" tuna). What's interesting is that he decided to review it at all. Serious restaurant critics in cities with vibrant independent restaurant scenes like Philly typically thumb their noses at chain restaurants and don't deign to review them. But places like Legal Sea Foods, Houston's, and The Cheesecake Factory, to name three, are in fact decent restaurants that should be taken seriously. I have...
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Rasa Malaysia confesses a weakness for Red Lobster's Cheddar Bay Biscuits so compelling she keeps going back to have them despite her feeling very strongly that chain restaurants are wrong. Her guilt drove her to Googling recipes, and she ended up baking biscuits she says are "about 80% close to the original in terms of taste". Not bad, but I bet she'll still end up at Red Lobster! What are your chain restaurant guilty pleasures?...
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Tina Danze visits the newly-reopened Trader Vic's in Dallas for the Morning News: "Sealed like a tomb for nearly 20 years after its closing in 1987, the lounge has been restored to its old Polynesian-pop glory. Mismatched lanterns and fishing floats hover over the dimly lit room; tiki heads and accessories salvaged from other closed locations abound; and the festive cocktails are back, along with vintage barware and over-the-top garnishes." Trader Vic's is so deliciously retro and camp in Dallas that even Tom Selleck, himself a legend of much the same stature, has visited in the last month! If like me you've never been to one, or you're yearning to relive an experience of old, their website lists all...
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Nick Gray recently posted this amazing photo of a Waffle House Grill Cook's Cheat Sheet—the position of each condiments on each plate are a code that allow the chain's cooks to visually keep track of multiple orders without having to refer to paper tickets. [via kottke.org]...
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The Center for Science in the Public Interest is pointing the finger at chain restaurants for the proliferation of X-treme Eating: "[The Cheesecake Factory's] Chris' Outrageous Chocolate Cake combines brownie, pie, and cheesecake into 1,380-calorie pudding. The CPSI says this is "the equivalent of eating two [McDonald's] Quarter Pounders plus a large fries - for dessert". "Since those chains make almost zero nutrition information available on menus, their customers don't have a clue that they might be getting a whole day's worth of calories in a single dish, or several days' worth in the whole meal," the centre says." One item mentioned in their press release is Uno Chicago Grill's Pizza Skins, but come on, if the menu says "We...
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Consumerist's finally gotten around to posting their Really Big Guide To Secret Menu Items—a list of fifteen big chain restaurants and the secret items you can order from them. Caveat emptor, they say: "Before reading this please note that this article has not been fact-checked. This report is based purely on reader suggestions. We are posting them entirely without confirmation and are not going to try to order any of this crap in order to confirm its existence. We would die of heart disease, be broke, and our ass would be the size of Texas."...
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The Ultimate Chain Restaurant Nutrition Guide: Who Is Hiding Information About The Food, And Who Isn't. Fantastic spot of research from the crack team over at Consumerist, who checked out 51 of the largest chain restaurant websites and rated them on the availability of their nutritional information (or lack thereof)....
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