"Fast food"

is not part of my diet. You know the sort of thing I mean - those strange "chain" places where you can buy something called a "burger".

I am prompted to write about these this morning because someone posted a picture this morning of what she was given when she ordered something - and what, according to the picture, she should have been given. To both her and to me there is a vast difference between a roll filled with cheese, tomato, lettuce etc and a roll filled with a single slice of cheese and a sliver of onion.

It is not the first time I have seen and heard of such complaints. I have never eaten from that particular chain. The bread there is soft and squashy. It has no substance. I suspect it has far more sugar in it than is good for any living creature. (Don't get me wrong. I do like some things made with sugar or honey!)  I have sometimes wondered whether the reality matches up to the pictures. Apparently not.

That chain has a shop not far from two other shops (restaurants?) where I live. All three are on the main road along with.... well wait a moment.

There is that chicken place on the corner. I am sure you know which chicken place I mean. The "colonel" must have been a very wealthy man when he died. I was once given a piece of the chicken to "try". I didn't like it. Perhaps I am a fussy cat but it just didn't appeal to me. I have never been in to the shop.

Right next door to that is a place which sells "whoppers". Now, in this country, a "whopper" is also a lie. I have not investigated this place either. 

Both places seem to be busy. You don't even have to get out of your car to get your lunch. You just "drive through". They also do a roaring "after school" trade. High school students have a lot more pocket money now than anyone in my peer group ever had.

 Then there is the place which sells cakes, mostly cheese cakes, next door - but that seems to be a place for adults. Yes, I've been in there a couple of times when there have been family celebrations but I have more fingers on one paw than that. 

Then we come to an Italian place which is more like a restaurant. It is reputedly the centre of the local drugs trade but we have eaten there  a few times. 

Tucked away in a corner is a tiny Thai place. It seems to keep going so I assume the food is good. It certainly seems able to compete with the place that sells the soft squashy rolls. That's only about thirty metres away.  

The "pizza" place comes next but that only opens late in the day and stays open well into the night. It is next door to the "other chicken" place - an independently owned shop where the owner sells not just chicken but more "burgers", chips and the like. At lunch time that place is crowded with work men who don't mind getting out of their vans to get their lunch. Some of them are so regular that the owner can ask "the usual?" He gets a nod and that is the end of the conversation.  

There are other chicken, pizza, burger places dotted around. 

And then there is the fish and chip shop. It is part of a chain. The place is very, very clean. (I've been shown the kitchen.) Middle Cat knows the owners. She had one of them as a patient when she was working. One of my nephews made a commercial with the now grown up daughter. The family worked with Middle Cat's father-in-law too. (When he was alive he owned an independent fish shop which had queues which quite literally and without exaggeration stretched around the corner into the next road. It had a reputation all over the city. He trained a few people in his time.)

The fish and chip shop is on another road, some distance away. It is worth the extra effort of going there. It's actually cheaper. The food is much better. 

I am beginning to think there is no such thing as good "fast food". Food needs exploration and effort.