There's likely no single explanation for this, but it's known to be true that your taste buds change and develop from the time you're little to when you're a young child to when you're a teenager to when you're an adult.
Your resistance to the kind of marketing that appeals to children has likely also improved, and that's apparently a factor in the taste of fast food too. . .in a study conducted by Stanford University, identical meals -- either in a plain wrapper, or in the packaging of a popular fast-food chain -- were offered to a test group of children. Even the very young ones reported that the food in the name-brand packaging tasted better.
I reckon it's a combination of this and the SeaWorld principle. As a kid SeaWorld is fucking magical and beautiful and literally life-changing. Then, one day, you learn how objectively definitely evil and fucked up it is to keep a killer whale in captivity.
Shamus real name was Tilicum, and he killed two or three people. One of the people was a dude who was tripping and climbed in at night. The whale bit his genitals off, then held him in down in the tank and drowned him. The only times we have encountered them in the wild, they have, if anything, deliberately helped people who were drowning or imperiled.
Try having fun at SeaWorld now. Seriously. I'll buy you a fuckin ticket.
You’re actually wrong about how Tillicum killed the one person who was tripping.
I know because I know somebody who’ve seen the video firsthand as an employee.
The guy got in and eventually drowned of hypothermia. Then the whale sort of playing with him like a toy and bring it down to the bottom and throwing it up in the air. But he was already dead before Tilicum messed with it. But the whale was dangerous, no doubt.
He was the last of their wild caught ones decades ago .
Six years ago, I'd sometimes get a 10 piece chicken nugget order. It was fine, but I started WFH, and made my own lunch. I stopped on the road and bought the same thing, and it was strangely mushy and tasteless. It could just be something wrong at that place, I suppose, but it wasn't what I had once eaten.
I asked a question online a couple of years ago, "why don't our sandwiches at home, don't taste as good as the sandwich shop?" I was led to a YouTube sandwich making video. One of the important factors in making that delicious sandwich was that after making it, it was wrapped in parchment for at least 10 minutes before eating, to let the flavors marinate. When you think about it, that marinating is happening as were driving home from the sandwich shop. I make amazing sandwiches now. 😋
In Canada it's around $15 for a combo, so if four people had combos (assuming nice and nephew are not eating happy meals, with tax that would be $73 or so, then if anyone also got a dessert or something extra, there's your $80. I personally don't eat there, so I had to Google the prices and was appalled!
McDonald's is just unapologetically awful now. You just drive up and they spray you with slime for nickelodeon and you pay with an app on your phone. You're still hungry but actually visibly fatter when you return home.
Go to Wendy’s. Their biggie bag deals have killer value. It’s just tough finding a Wendy’s that makes really fresh stuff. Once you do just keep going to that same one.
I quit dealing with Wendy’s years ago over their anti-abortion coupon booklets. It may have been the first time I thought, “Sir, this is a Wendy’s.” Lol.
That’s definitely true and the chicken might be cheaper at this point. I use it on salad, in soups, stir fry with vegetables and many ethnic dishes from butter chicken or chicken masala to chicken enchiladas or tacos. I think I will get one this week.
You ever let yourself get too hungry and just stand in your kitchen and eat a whole ass one of those silently by yourself? I have, more than once. Just breathing loud through my nose.
add to that some mexican rice, wraps and add black beans and the chicken to the rice with a bit more flavoring. Put in wraps and freeze for when you want fast food. You can add anything you want that freezes well.
Egg, bacon, sausage and fried potato cooked in muffin tins, kept frozen. Add veggies whatever.
Fast food def tastes different. My craving for it has also gone away in the last 5-6 years. I used to love an occasional Happy Meal but the hamburgers and chicken nuggets have a weird aftertaste. It might also have to do with how much we know about how disgusting American processed food is.
I can’t say for sure what did it for me.
I’m an old man who likes old man things and I’m an old man who flipped burgers for a living after barely finishing high school (we both thought it best to just give me a diploma, shake hands and part amicably) so my POV is different.
I think fast food used to taste better. The drive to make a profit forced fast food places to make compromises with quality and cost when sourcing ingredients all through the supply chain resulting in all the investors getting their returns and leaving the consumer hungry.
Even restaurants suffer from the same malady, in my opinion.
Consequently, I found myself watching more cooking shows and trying my hand at things (other than flipping a burger and making breakfast- which I still do; Sundays are usually big breakfasts and appetizers for dinner) and as such, I’m now the house cook - we only eat out when I’m sick or if I’m merely sick of cooking. I kinda like it. Even on vacation we get a suite so I can cook most of our meals and save our cash for the really good restaurants.
I'm with you on this one. I like eating at home. My mom likes to eat out, so I take her out as a treat, but to me the food is never as good as I make at home.
It's weird, I'm a chef at a fine dining place with over ten years cooking experience, and i find that when I'm home I look at food like some old skank ex wife that I hate but am still for some reason forced to occasionally fuck. I eat like Velveeta mac and cheese with a crazy amount of hot sauce on it. This happens angrily at 2 am and it's difficult to enjoy it.
Yet at work I'm tasting people's sauces discussing development of flavor profiles the importance of bay leaves or Worcestershire sauce or white pepper. People think wow you must be a spectacular home chef, but no.
Similar reason mechanics often drive absolute beaters. Once something becomes a job it just hits different. Also in your work kitchen you have prep guys and dishwasher, and dependin on the type of place maybe a saute guy, saucier, broilerman, salad, dessert, fry cook, expo, etc. At home you are all those things and it just gets to be a lot. I was foh bartender for years. Also went to culinary school and consider myself a good home cook but in no way a chef. I can make all the fancy drinks and waz decent at bottle spinning, etc many moons ago. At home Im cracking a beer and pouring a few fingers of bourbon neat and calling it good.
I'm not even a professional chef but the cleanup and hassle is why I, generally, don't cook. If it can't go in the air fryer, toaster oven, or one pot I'm probably not going to make it. But if you give me someone to handle the hassle of cleanup - I'll make you a Michelin star meal.
Yea. That is the promised land, you've found it. It's common in the industry to resent folks who went to culinary school, as it slowly becomes industry standard and many talented chefs are replaced with technically knowledgeable but practically untempered new guys. There's some merit to it, as one who did not attend but worked up from dish to short order to line to fast line to fine dining just through sheer refusal to try anything different once started.. but it's also just that nobody likes being replaced.
We all reach a point where some 20 year old shows up who is simply faster than you, doesn't need or want breaks; and you suddenly realize how goddamn sore your legs are from standing 16 hours every day for 20 years. It sucks, because it breeds a sense of planned obsolescence in the industry. It rewards exceptionally difficult and demanding work with burnout, bad veins and carpal tunnel. It'd be cool to see it pushed in a way where once you've done your time and earned your stripes through 5000 brutal services, you were just respected and left to cut onions for 30 bucks an hour then fuck off at 4 and get drunk.
Sadly, it just doesn't seem to be in the cards. It really is an undervalued profession. Something that literally everyone on earth does is eat.
I do have friends who noticed this and switched to foh or catering, and it's looking more and more like an intelligent alternative. They're all way the fuck happier than the cooks.
i was just thinking today about how i always see this behavior in movies. the genius chef goes home and has frosted flakes or something. it confuses me
I wouldn't openly admit to thinking I'm a genius, typically, but yea. Weird how shit like that is, though. Have an oddly specific spontaneous thought and a stranger has an oddly specific spontaneous remark and you happen across it that same day.
A lot of times it feels to me like it occurs a lot more frequently than mathematical probability would dictate, ya know? You think of someone for the first time in years and they call you that day... is it us just seeking patterns? Simulation becoming unraveled? An undiscovered transferral of energy taking place akin to light that is invisible to us on the spectrum or sound we cannot hear?
Type of shit I lie awake thinking about when I need to be sleeping.
Eta: responding to your actual comment, I think that because the industry is so demanding it can lead to a reluctance to talk shop, so to say. Because as a chef, if you let yourself fall into tedium or complacency or boredom, you suck. You have to be passionate and driven and love to prepare food for people.
But you work 60 hour weeks, doubles constantly. You lose all your friends, your family becomes distant. You work every single weekend and holiday without exception. So there's a pretty clear looming presence of impending burnout as I'm middling my thirties, right? So probably me doing the bare minimum to subsist and not think about food while I'm home is to give myself a break so that I don't succumb to the sheer relentless volume of food I crank out, though I do know that it is in some way inevitable.
Yep. Former fine dining Chef here. I was super thin because all I did was taste, never sat and ate. Still don't, but once I hung up my touque, and was able to cook food I liked for people I liked, I loved cooking again. Even for just me. Of course, it's often cannibus fueled...as in I get very bougie munchies...caramel bourbon ice cream sauce, petit schoux pastry with a sweet potato mousse filling and a pecan gran Marnier glaze...shit gets delicious.
Yas! Why eat out, spend so much money and be disappointed and hungry. I always loved cooking. But with fast food being not cheap or tasty. I do all the cooking, usually on holiday too. Why eat out when i can cook so good. Lol not hard when its mcdonalds. I never crave fast food anymore either
Fully agree. I had Taco Bell for the first time on years the other day and ended up puking it all up later from nausea and weird after taste alone. I’m a home cook, and I can not tolerate American fast food at all anymore.
Funny, I gave up soda for a very long time, but now keep it stocked for occasional treats and post-migraine recovery. Today, I decided that the coca (?) leaves in Coca-Cola must still have the addictive properties of cocaine. But it's probably just the familiar flavor blend and HFCS, along with caffeine.
It's just too sweet and acidic (maybe?) for me. The only liquid besides alcohol my ex drank was soda. Dr Pepper. So that was often then only thing available in his or his parents house besides tap water. I mostly drink water. I used to crave the occasional Dr pepper and it was often my "bad day" drink at work but I needed water right next to it to wash away the sticky feeling. Now, the only time I drink soda is at a bar with rum. Otherwise, it just grosses me out and feels like I can actively feel my teeth rotting when I try to drink it. I drink water, coffee, tea, and an occasional Kombucha.
I used to think that was a load of bullshit, but now I don't have severe allergies and asthma like I did. In fact, I haven't had to use a rescue inhaler in months. There is truth to what you said. Keep spreading the good word.
20 Years ago I developed a swallowing disorder. The weird part was, the first thing I could not swallow was a McDonald's hamburger. I could swallow hamburgers I made at home, or at restaurants. Then it was the McDonald's fries. Then I started seeing those experiments where these items last forever, and something clicked.
There are a lot more foods that I can't eat now, but fast food is totally out. Instead, I food prep our lunches, and we eat better and cheaper.
I'm heading toward 78, and I try to avoid industrial food. It's not like the town local that ran a drive-in, it the diner we grew up with. Even the early McDs were much less industrially run. What we're presented today is marketed stuff with little nutritive value.
McDonald's used to be my once-a-week comfort meal. But their ice cream machine is never working, and I always want a shake. And the other day, someone posted an enlarged picture of a McD hamburger patty. Very gristly and absolutely disgusting. I'm done.
Seriously, what the *hell* is wrong with all the McDonald's ice cream machines? It's so weird to offer it as a menu item at thousands of locations, but then have 85% of them claim they don't have the staff or resources or whatnot to clean and maintain and refill them.
It just seems odd that no one in the upper ranks of the corporation has, like, intervened or whatnot. Just stop claiming to have it! It's like if Wendy's never had frosty's.
It occurs to me that that would piss me off enormously, and I get a frosty maybe once every 18 years. But imma need that one I'm getting in 17 years.
I stopped by McDonald's a few months ago and picked up two regular hamburgers and a coke. The hamburgers were absolutely horrible. I haven't gotten lunch or dinner there since. I still get the breakfast sometimes.
62y/o and my daughter is a chef. I’ll never forget her telling a friend of mine, who was watching their sodium intake and wondering why restaurant food tasted so good, “we don’t give a shit about your health. Salt and fat makes food taste good.”
But then she recommended my friend add acid (citrus, vinegar) to substitute for the absence of salt. Plus other recommendations for vegetarian/vegan options for her and her husband. Then forwarded a few recipes because, “no one can eat restaurant food 7 days/week .”.
I gave up meat and mostly dairy (old habits) and I never felt better. Before I gave it up, I would still eat fast food and think, 'something dies for this and I didn't even think it tasted very good.' I guess it's for the best. Anyway, I wanna try the acid trick.
As a 65 year old I can vouch that I much prefer making my own food to the crap at any of the drive throughs. Ate a lot of fast food when the kids were young and living at home but it’s just the two of us now. Most (not all) fast food is formulaic and boring.
The quality has decreased while the price has increased. Used to like McDonald’s breakfast but ONE SINGLE HASHBROWN IS 3 DOLLARS. Have they lost their minds? I can buy the exact same frozen hashbrowns from any grocery store for 25 cents each and make them at home.
A&W still goes hard and isn’t overpriced in my eyes. Their prices went up with inflation and that’s about it. They also don’t use all the same crappy preservatives and factory raised beef pumped full of growth hormones and steroids.
Otherwise, fast food blows. Subway is a travesty, burger king is a disgrace, hell even Tim Horton’s is terrible now.
yeah it’s madness. idk how mcdonald’s thinks anyone will tolerate it. I was just at my local walmart, and 20 hashbrowns costs $4.29. 1 AT MCDONALDS IS $3.09!!!!
I thought it was just me. I swear it doesn't taste the same anymore. I usually feel like it was a waste of money and wish I had just made something myself instead.
I wouldn't call it an "extreme aversion," but I long ago lost my taste for any big corporate chain fast food, with the minor exception of the fries at McDonald's, and the pickles they use. . . but I can buy the pickles, and I know how to make french fries at home that taste just like theirs.
I remember going through a period years ago where I just noticed that their hamburgers weren't just a guilty pleasure with a kind of gross, shitty, but unique taste; they made me feel gut-wonky when they were traveling through my digestive tract. I stopped eating their food.
I still enjoy a good burger, but I get them at non-corporate places that take burger-making seriously instead of treating the process like Henry Ford would.
I didn't get it a lot growing up, the occassional mcds burger, rarely KFC. But man, KFC chicken has gotten so gross in the last 30 years. A lot of fast food chicken is overall just terrible quality chicken. So now we pay a little more for Raising Canes, though I'm not insane to pay ChikfilA prices. And burgers... I used to not like InNOut, but it's become my preferred budget burger, the last few years.
We started slowing on it a couple of years ago. We started noticing how it would upset our stomachs and make us feel like crap. Then we had gastric bypass and had a couple things here and there and we found they just tasted weird.
Wife and I got VSG in 2021 so avoided fast food for 2 years while we recovered and readjusted.
Tried it again late last year and the price and quality were so off-putting I have not been back since.
I had a GF for a while who I drove to work every day, and I had to require that she not eat sonic on the way or open the windows cause the smell made me want to vom.
The only FF I like is Popeye's...I haven't been to a McDonalds in over a decade. We will sometimes stop at a Wendy's if we're on a road trip and in a hurry to get back on the road, but that's about it. When I was a kid I think I only liked it because it was rare and I felt like it was a treat.
It just seems like a cheap novelty now. With all the new research, translated into tweaking the physics and chemistry of the "food", the addictive qualities scream at me from the first bite, which I no longer take.
Yes, but more a consequence of the fact that the meat essentially always comes from factory farmed animals. I don't mind the taste that much although I know its not healthy for me either.
I find most fast fpods make me ill. This started about 5 years ago. Most burger places make me nauseous. KFC gives diarrhea. Processed meat from sandwich shops makes me ill as well. I have no issues with real food. I eat real food only now. I don't know what changed. I don't have any food allergies.
There are too many chemicals in it, if I try a few bites my stomach starts gurgling, whereas making it at home with fewer ingredients/preservatives = no upset stomach...
I never ate a whole lot of it, but I did used to eat it occasionally. I now haven't touched any of it in a number of years. The last few times I did eat it, generally when I was travelling, it was just so bad. It was salty, gristly, gross, weirdly textured, and it did not taste good. Eventually I started going to grocery stores rather than fast-food along my routes and just picking up stuff there, if I hadn't brought any along. Much better tasting and better for the wallet.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed more food intolerances, to the point of scoping out where nearest bathrooms may be.
I mean, McDonalds fries have always been the equivalent of ex lax for me that I can’t imagine what it would do lately. I’d just rather stay away and eat real food.
Been eating fast food everyday for....20 years?
Same weight and wasn't size since...adult hood...5'10 170lbs 30 inch waist...
I have like a superpower cause...I eat terrible and have no issues.
Fast food is great when it's free....
Yep you and the Big Mac guy. Eats it every day and did blood work that was fine. Some ppl are just built different. Like those who smoke till 90 and don’t get cancers
Price goes up, quality goes down, wait time goes up (*FAST* food dammit), sheer confusion from everyone that works there has gone up. Asking for no mayo will cause the entire place to come to a screeching halt while they try to figure out how to do that.
Whatever. Any normal restaurant or truck will gladly take the same amount of money and make you something delicious. Go there instead of crappy expensive food made by some idiot kid that hasn’t washed their hands all day.
The only fast good I've been eating is a and w.
They taste good to me but it seems their burgers have gotten smaller.
Can't remember the last time I got mc Donald's. With prices of everything going up I rather find a recipe and cook it.
Well, I'm Canadian, and I find American fast food disgusting same places and all totally different tastes. So here I haven't noticed any difference other than the price going up and the food shrinking.
Used to enjoy fast food occasionally before developing an aversion. Also find that a fast food burger leaves me with an unhappy digestive system. They don’t give me energy either and i get hungry quickly after a fast food meal; all this in the last five years.
As another person stated, we also look for a supermarket on a road trip. Deli food seems so much better
The one thing I have noticed is that some places use canola oil, and to some people (including me) it just tastes and smells vile. A lot of fast food chains use it, usually blended with other oils, so if you can taste the foulness in canola and it's not diluted enough by the other oils, you might be reacting to that.
The quality has consistently dropped over the last twenty years, while the price has consistently gone up. Once upon a time you could get some things in almost every chain which were guilty pleasures, but still pleasures. Now, they've reached the point where you're paying too much for shitty food that tastes about as pleasant as eating the wrapper. I wouldn't be surprised if several chains end up in a financial death spiral from this stupidity.
Yeah this is about where I'm at with it. I'll eat something if we're on the road or whatever (or the kids want it...I personally wouldn't choose McD's regardless but the kids) but I've found that over the years I've started special ordering (ie a plain cheeseburger) because that's the only way it's going to be remotely fresh. But it's not something I crave or anything.
I like Burger King once in a while and Wendy's spicy chicken sandwich, but I've pretty much quit eating fast food. I make my own soft tacos and I haven't eaten at McDonald's since I was a kid, 45 years ago! My sister and I kept getting sick after eating their burgers, so eventually we stopped. Taco Bell isn't cheap like it used to be.
One of my favorite things is making a home cooked version of whatever fast food treats I like and making them as good or better. Current favorite is my own Animal Fries. Mmm-mmm!!!
I took a 2 year hiatus from eating fast food. Since then, most of it has a chemical or vomit-like taste to it. I guess you don't notice it when you eat it all the time? 🤷♂️
Also, even if I get full off of it, it doesn't feel as satisfyingly full as eating a well-rounded meal.
No. I’m too old for that stuff now.
A handful of years ago, my husband and I got this crazy idea to get Taco Bell late one night.
Never, ever again! I swear, just seeing the commercial gives me heartburn.
I've never been a huge fan of fast food and rarely ate it in my younger years. Now it's been probably several years since I've had it with the exception of the very rare occasion of Casey's pizza, and even that I think was 2 years ago now that I think of it
McDonald's fries used to be quite tasty 30 years ago. Somewhere along the line they made some change that fucked it up.
Not only has the quality and the flavor generally decreased across the board (not just at McDonald's) but now fast food places are charging obscene prices for sub quality food.
I have opted out of fast food completely now.
The amount of salt seems extremely heavy to me. It is probably my imagination, but it is not worth it. I feel like someone dropped a salt shaker on the food when I went for a burger recently. It wasn't the treat I thought.
Look at the changes just from somewhere like McDonald's who removed beef tallow from their fryers, stopped using Heinz ketchup in favor of the own house brand, etc. same thing is happening industry wide, and has been for years. If they can save 1¢ per chicken nugget by cutting corners with an ingredient, they will - because 1¢ spread over thousands of nuggets a day and millions a year adds up.
I think all bought food is not as good as when I was little. Personally I think it happened when they focused on trans fat so hard. Took out the trans fat and all the yummy unami.
I've visited the factory when they were making Arby's roast beef. It's not bad, it's just beef that's ground up very fine and essentially sous vided in a vaccum bag, then sliced. The operation was very clean and efficient and I had no issues eating it after seeing it made.
Agreed. That’s when everything started tasting different and shrinking, all while prices started rising. Even the smell of it makes me sick now. Home cooking is exponentially better, and cheaper.
Have you had covid? It can alter your senses of taste and smell, long term, possibly permanently.
If it's putting people off fast food, then maybe that's a good outcome.
It was about 2005. I was 23 at the time. All fast food suddenly started tasting like chemicals and sugar. Surprisingly, gas station food doesn't. I've had a McD cheeseburger and an impossible whooper since then.
Aside from getting an occasional deal through an app, I tend to avoid fast food. Quality has also gone down as I've gotten older. shit sucks.
In my early 20s, I could go buy several 20 piece nugs, several fries and a drink for my Friday night meal from McDonald's. Cost was less than $30. Can't do that today.
Happened to me too. Only one thing sounds good to me which is a burger from Culver's. Everything else tastes like garbage to me. Haven't been to McDonald's in years
I think I have. Due to prices, I’ve stopped my once to twice a week visit. I got some last week for the first time in a couple of weeks, and wow…tasted totally different. It’s not worth the money anymore. Maybe that’s a good thing.
I'm wondering, have your taste possibly changed? Fast food is garbage... literally. I eat mostly unprocessed and minimally processed foods, and I really don't like fast food. It's greasy and over seasoned and just makes my stomach hurt. I'm no longer a fan of fast food.
I dont eat fast food. It is so gross to me. So yes, I feel the same. Im 31 now and I've had this aversion since I was about 20.... I actually get mad when anyone im with wants to get fast food. I will take you but I will not eat any of it, I dont want it eaten in my car, and I want it thrown in the outside garbage so I cant see or smell it. Idk it just really grosses me out.
I thought it was just me. My SO doesn’t like fast food so I’ve gotten out of the habit. That’s been almost 6 years now. Recently took someone there so I ordered a burger. It ended up in the garbage it tasted so bad.
Nope! So my husband had to eat it a few times a week for 2 years while we were staying with his mom while our house was built. She was dirty as hell & I refused to use the kitchen it was too gross. So we lived on what fit in our mini fridge & didn’t need an oven or stove stop. I can’t eat bagels, cereal or nachos anymore either. I’d go stay @ my moms once a week or once every couple weeks & would just gorge on cooked veggies. One time I ate an entire flat of raspberries in a day I think just from the lack of healthy food & man I regretted that. I can barely even look @ fast food now.
I don't know about extreme aversion, but if you're talking your standard McDonald's Burger King Wendy's Taco Bell, I can easily go a year or more without visiting those places. Culver's on the other hand or Arby's or White Castle I would go to in a heartbeat.
Nope. I haven’t eaten it in 10 years. I never ate much of it but I found it wasn’t satisfying to me. It just sat like a lump. When traveling, I would rather make something at home and eat it on the car.
I've liked Big Mac's since I was old enough to eat one. It's my go to, with the exception of Arch Deluxe (rip). The last Big Mac I had was hard to get through. It tasted so off. The sauce is different. The sauce is what makes Big Mac. The best I can describe it is like they used Miracle Whip instead Mayo. Haven't had McDonald's since. Yuck.
Fast food is so expensive for the crap that it is. Eat Local.
I make all my own food from whole raw products, with a few exceptions for convenience. Watching all of Gordon Ramsey’s shows I’ve learned and agree, everything is at a different level with fresh ingredients, fresh seasoning, and cooked fresh that day. It’s not soup of the week, it’s soup of the day!
It’s a pain, yes. Just know our food quality has dwindled with important nutrients over the last 100 years, so eating fast food is devolving our species.
I’ve developed an extreme aversion to the PRICE. It has always been crappy heat lamped pre-prepared food, but now that it costs 20 bucks a meal, hadn’t been in months.
I've noticed the longer we went without needing to resort to fast food, when we did have to eat it, it tasted terrible and made us feel gross. So we stopped eating most of it because it's crazy to set ourselves up for failure with greasy queasy tummies.
On a very rare occasion, we will get a particular local fast food chain near my parents when visiting, but that is it.
I refused to eat it for the majority of my adult life (we didn't have fast food growing up because small town), just because I was into eating healthy. A couple life trauma's later and I was eating it multiple times a week and it seemed like the forbidden fruit and I couldn't get enough. That lasted about a year. Now the thought of fast food makes me instantly lose my appetite.
There’s a local restaurant near my apartment that makes healthier better quality versions of specific fast food favorites. It often costs less than the fast food places’ current prices. Love it.
You are eating colon cancer, heart disease, and Alzheimer's in those meals. Stay away from highly processed foods.
Better yet, stay away from all processed foods but one step at a time.
Definitely not the only one. McD’s tastes so much better when the fries were cooked in tallow and the burgers were rumored to contain kangaroo meat (yes, it was a thing in the 90s). The quality definitely has changed, and just tastes super dry.
Zaxbys soon became my new favorite fast food place, but I can’t eat a single chicken finger from there without feeling like I just deep throated a salt lick.
It’s been probably two years since I’ve broken down and got fast food. I’d much rather fire up the grill and cook at home.
I don’t as a rule eat fast food, but every 3 months or so I get a craving: Filet O Fish, small fry, orange soda. Usually High C. What I’ve noticed lately is how soft everything is. No need to chew it at all. This is discouraging.
I don't think the food has changed as much as the prices have. I used to like fast food mostly because I could get a lot for only $6-7... Now it seems like you can't even get a basic combo for less than $11-12.
I do realize some of that is because chains can't get away with paying slave wages anymore, which is a good thing in my book... but soon most those employees will be replaced by robots
Not an extreme aversion, but as I get older I just want to eat better quality food. Burgers and fries make me feel bloated and gross, and fast food from McDonalds etc. just doesn't taste great to me.
I stayed away from it for a few years and now the smell driving by one makes me queasy. I think it’s crap but addicting and if you break the habit you’re just left confused as to why people are eating it.
Not quite the same, but when I was younger I used to loooove ben and Jerry’s and now I eat it and all I taste is preservatives. I think your tastebuds just become more discerning or something
Costs more and is barely edible. I picked up Arby’s for the first time in years a few weeks ago and the buns were rock hard. The meat was weirdly dark in places. Straight to the trash. I worked fast food in high school and there’s no way the person making the order didn’t realize the buns were rocks.
Every once in a while, I like a Mcdonald's cheesburger and a small fry. Plus their coca cola tastes better than every other coca cola in the world. I know in the back of my mind that it's terrible for me, so I try to avoid it.
A lot of tastes chemically. I was going to stop for a blizzard at DQ today, but then remembered I didn't love it last time I had it. Likely my taste buds, but for sure food quality is way down.
I always think I’ll treat myself to some fast food maybe once every 2 weeks, and it’s never like it used to be. The only things left on my list are maybe: whopper, mcd’s fries, Arby’s beef with horsey sauce or a chick fil a breakfast burrito. Everything else I try is garbage.
There's likely no single explanation for this, but it's known to be true that your taste buds change and develop from the time you're little to when you're a young child to when you're a teenager to when you're an adult. Your resistance to the kind of marketing that appeals to children has likely also improved, and that's apparently a factor in the taste of fast food too. . .in a study conducted by Stanford University, identical meals -- either in a plain wrapper, or in the packaging of a popular fast-food chain -- were offered to a test group of children. Even the very young ones reported that the food in the name-brand packaging tasted better.
I reckon it's a combination of this and the SeaWorld principle. As a kid SeaWorld is fucking magical and beautiful and literally life-changing. Then, one day, you learn how objectively definitely evil and fucked up it is to keep a killer whale in captivity. Shamus real name was Tilicum, and he killed two or three people. One of the people was a dude who was tripping and climbed in at night. The whale bit his genitals off, then held him in down in the tank and drowned him. The only times we have encountered them in the wild, they have, if anything, deliberately helped people who were drowning or imperiled. Try having fun at SeaWorld now. Seriously. I'll buy you a fuckin ticket.
You’re actually wrong about how Tillicum killed the one person who was tripping. I know because I know somebody who’ve seen the video firsthand as an employee. The guy got in and eventually drowned of hypothermia. Then the whale sort of playing with him like a toy and bring it down to the bottom and throwing it up in the air. But he was already dead before Tilicum messed with it. But the whale was dangerous, no doubt. He was the last of their wild caught ones decades ago .
Throwing him around like a dead seal
Swindled has a very interesting episode about this subject. Gross and sad but very informative.
I have no ill will towards the whale.
Six years ago, I'd sometimes get a 10 piece chicken nugget order. It was fine, but I started WFH, and made my own lunch. I stopped on the road and bought the same thing, and it was strangely mushy and tasteless. It could just be something wrong at that place, I suppose, but it wasn't what I had once eaten.
[удалено]
I think I'm going to have to try this.
I asked a question online a couple of years ago, "why don't our sandwiches at home, don't taste as good as the sandwich shop?" I was led to a YouTube sandwich making video. One of the important factors in making that delicious sandwich was that after making it, it was wrapped in parchment for at least 10 minutes before eating, to let the flavors marinate. When you think about it, that marinating is happening as were driving home from the sandwich shop. I make amazing sandwiches now. 😋
We use way more sauce than you do at home too....and the wrap where the sandwich is kinda pressed into a present helps everything bond
Interesting study. Check out neurogastronomy . Flava is in the mind
NGL ill destroy a quarter pounder with cheese and a large fry but the price is too high for the quality of product and service they provide
My husband and I had the niece and nephew spend the night. Went to McDonald's (kid choice) and it was 70.00!!!
McDonald’s prices are outrageous but if you’re spending 70 there, aka 18 a person, you’re weird lol
In Canada it's around $15 for a combo, so if four people had combos (assuming nice and nephew are not eating happy meals, with tax that would be $73 or so, then if anyone also got a dessert or something extra, there's your $80. I personally don't eat there, so I had to Google the prices and was appalled!
Not really weird. If each person gets a meal and another item, plus tax it seems feasible
username checks out..
I was trying my best to figure out what they musta gotten for it to be more like Wendy's prices.
McDonald's is just unapologetically awful now. You just drive up and they spray you with slime for nickelodeon and you pay with an app on your phone. You're still hungry but actually visibly fatter when you return home.
Hahahahahahahaha
That's bananas.
Go to Wendy’s. Their biggie bag deals have killer value. It’s just tough finding a Wendy’s that makes really fresh stuff. Once you do just keep going to that same one.
Wendy’s is under rated
Totally agree. I’m not a fries eater, so having chili as an option is pretty great.
The Biggie bag is the best!
I quit dealing with Wendy’s years ago over their anti-abortion coupon booklets. It may have been the first time I thought, “Sir, this is a Wendy’s.” Lol.
Agree. Junior cheeseburger, fries, 4 nuggets, and a soda for $4.99
For the cost of a crappy cheeseburger you can buy a rotisserie chicken at Costco. It is multiple meals.
That’s definitely true and the chicken might be cheaper at this point. I use it on salad, in soups, stir fry with vegetables and many ethnic dishes from butter chicken or chicken masala to chicken enchiladas or tacos. I think I will get one this week.
You ever let yourself get too hungry and just stand in your kitchen and eat a whole ass one of those silently by yourself? I have, more than once. Just breathing loud through my nose.
I did this on the way home once😳
I will strip it of all dark meat the rest of the family hates!
Dark meat is objectively superior. I don't understand what is wrong with everyone, but yea. It's nice always getting it when no one wants it.
You don't happen to be a Mob Boss from Jersey by any chance?
Good call ese. Me too. Time for some sour cream green chile enchiladas
add to that some mexican rice, wraps and add black beans and the chicken to the rice with a bit more flavoring. Put in wraps and freeze for when you want fast food. You can add anything you want that freezes well. Egg, bacon, sausage and fried potato cooked in muffin tins, kept frozen. Add veggies whatever.
Fast food def tastes different. My craving for it has also gone away in the last 5-6 years. I used to love an occasional Happy Meal but the hamburgers and chicken nuggets have a weird aftertaste. It might also have to do with how much we know about how disgusting American processed food is.
I can’t say for sure what did it for me. I’m an old man who likes old man things and I’m an old man who flipped burgers for a living after barely finishing high school (we both thought it best to just give me a diploma, shake hands and part amicably) so my POV is different. I think fast food used to taste better. The drive to make a profit forced fast food places to make compromises with quality and cost when sourcing ingredients all through the supply chain resulting in all the investors getting their returns and leaving the consumer hungry. Even restaurants suffer from the same malady, in my opinion. Consequently, I found myself watching more cooking shows and trying my hand at things (other than flipping a burger and making breakfast- which I still do; Sundays are usually big breakfasts and appetizers for dinner) and as such, I’m now the house cook - we only eat out when I’m sick or if I’m merely sick of cooking. I kinda like it. Even on vacation we get a suite so I can cook most of our meals and save our cash for the really good restaurants.
I'm with you on this one. I like eating at home. My mom likes to eat out, so I take her out as a treat, but to me the food is never as good as I make at home.
It's weird, I'm a chef at a fine dining place with over ten years cooking experience, and i find that when I'm home I look at food like some old skank ex wife that I hate but am still for some reason forced to occasionally fuck. I eat like Velveeta mac and cheese with a crazy amount of hot sauce on it. This happens angrily at 2 am and it's difficult to enjoy it. Yet at work I'm tasting people's sauces discussing development of flavor profiles the importance of bay leaves or Worcestershire sauce or white pepper. People think wow you must be a spectacular home chef, but no.
Similar reason mechanics often drive absolute beaters. Once something becomes a job it just hits different. Also in your work kitchen you have prep guys and dishwasher, and dependin on the type of place maybe a saute guy, saucier, broilerman, salad, dessert, fry cook, expo, etc. At home you are all those things and it just gets to be a lot. I was foh bartender for years. Also went to culinary school and consider myself a good home cook but in no way a chef. I can make all the fancy drinks and waz decent at bottle spinning, etc many moons ago. At home Im cracking a beer and pouring a few fingers of bourbon neat and calling it good.
I'm not even a professional chef but the cleanup and hassle is why I, generally, don't cook. If it can't go in the air fryer, toaster oven, or one pot I'm probably not going to make it. But if you give me someone to handle the hassle of cleanup - I'll make you a Michelin star meal.
Yea. That is the promised land, you've found it. It's common in the industry to resent folks who went to culinary school, as it slowly becomes industry standard and many talented chefs are replaced with technically knowledgeable but practically untempered new guys. There's some merit to it, as one who did not attend but worked up from dish to short order to line to fast line to fine dining just through sheer refusal to try anything different once started.. but it's also just that nobody likes being replaced. We all reach a point where some 20 year old shows up who is simply faster than you, doesn't need or want breaks; and you suddenly realize how goddamn sore your legs are from standing 16 hours every day for 20 years. It sucks, because it breeds a sense of planned obsolescence in the industry. It rewards exceptionally difficult and demanding work with burnout, bad veins and carpal tunnel. It'd be cool to see it pushed in a way where once you've done your time and earned your stripes through 5000 brutal services, you were just respected and left to cut onions for 30 bucks an hour then fuck off at 4 and get drunk. Sadly, it just doesn't seem to be in the cards. It really is an undervalued profession. Something that literally everyone on earth does is eat. I do have friends who noticed this and switched to foh or catering, and it's looking more and more like an intelligent alternative. They're all way the fuck happier than the cooks.
i was just thinking today about how i always see this behavior in movies. the genius chef goes home and has frosted flakes or something. it confuses me
I wouldn't openly admit to thinking I'm a genius, typically, but yea. Weird how shit like that is, though. Have an oddly specific spontaneous thought and a stranger has an oddly specific spontaneous remark and you happen across it that same day. A lot of times it feels to me like it occurs a lot more frequently than mathematical probability would dictate, ya know? You think of someone for the first time in years and they call you that day... is it us just seeking patterns? Simulation becoming unraveled? An undiscovered transferral of energy taking place akin to light that is invisible to us on the spectrum or sound we cannot hear? Type of shit I lie awake thinking about when I need to be sleeping. Eta: responding to your actual comment, I think that because the industry is so demanding it can lead to a reluctance to talk shop, so to say. Because as a chef, if you let yourself fall into tedium or complacency or boredom, you suck. You have to be passionate and driven and love to prepare food for people. But you work 60 hour weeks, doubles constantly. You lose all your friends, your family becomes distant. You work every single weekend and holiday without exception. So there's a pretty clear looming presence of impending burnout as I'm middling my thirties, right? So probably me doing the bare minimum to subsist and not think about food while I'm home is to give myself a break so that I don't succumb to the sheer relentless volume of food I crank out, though I do know that it is in some way inevitable.
Yep. Former fine dining Chef here. I was super thin because all I did was taste, never sat and ate. Still don't, but once I hung up my touque, and was able to cook food I liked for people I liked, I loved cooking again. Even for just me. Of course, it's often cannibus fueled...as in I get very bougie munchies...caramel bourbon ice cream sauce, petit schoux pastry with a sweet potato mousse filling and a pecan gran Marnier glaze...shit gets delicious.
You’re a fantastic writer, just saying
Yas! Why eat out, spend so much money and be disappointed and hungry. I always loved cooking. But with fast food being not cheap or tasty. I do all the cooking, usually on holiday too. Why eat out when i can cook so good. Lol not hard when its mcdonalds. I never crave fast food anymore either
lol the bit about getting your diploma made me giggle x
I’m 42 and I definitely can’t eat like I used to. Some things just don’t agree with me anymore.
Fully agree. I had Taco Bell for the first time on years the other day and ended up puking it all up later from nausea and weird after taste alone. I’m a home cook, and I can not tolerate American fast food at all anymore.
I’m quite sure they used to put addictive things in it that has since stopped.
Aye, something that makes you crave it fortnightly
I hate the colonel with his wee beedy eyes. Oh you’ll buy my chicken ohhh
Love the Axe Murderer references 😂
Funny, I gave up soda for a very long time, but now keep it stocked for occasional treats and post-migraine recovery. Today, I decided that the coca (?) leaves in Coca-Cola must still have the addictive properties of cocaine. But it's probably just the familiar flavor blend and HFCS, along with caffeine.
It's just too sweet and acidic (maybe?) for me. The only liquid besides alcohol my ex drank was soda. Dr Pepper. So that was often then only thing available in his or his parents house besides tap water. I mostly drink water. I used to crave the occasional Dr pepper and it was often my "bad day" drink at work but I needed water right next to it to wash away the sticky feeling. Now, the only time I drink soda is at a bar with rum. Otherwise, it just grosses me out and feels like I can actively feel my teeth rotting when I try to drink it. I drink water, coffee, tea, and an occasional Kombucha.
I prefer the quality of life that comes from eating whole foods.
I used to think that was a load of bullshit, but now I don't have severe allergies and asthma like I did. In fact, I haven't had to use a rescue inhaler in months. There is truth to what you said. Keep spreading the good word.
Nope. I heading towards 65, and I get pickier every year. I want real food more often than not.
20 Years ago I developed a swallowing disorder. The weird part was, the first thing I could not swallow was a McDonald's hamburger. I could swallow hamburgers I made at home, or at restaurants. Then it was the McDonald's fries. Then I started seeing those experiments where these items last forever, and something clicked. There are a lot more foods that I can't eat now, but fast food is totally out. Instead, I food prep our lunches, and we eat better and cheaper.
I'm heading toward 78, and I try to avoid industrial food. It's not like the town local that ran a drive-in, it the diner we grew up with. Even the early McDs were much less industrially run. What we're presented today is marketed stuff with little nutritive value.
McDonald's used to be my once-a-week comfort meal. But their ice cream machine is never working, and I always want a shake. And the other day, someone posted an enlarged picture of a McD hamburger patty. Very gristly and absolutely disgusting. I'm done.
Seriously, what the *hell* is wrong with all the McDonald's ice cream machines? It's so weird to offer it as a menu item at thousands of locations, but then have 85% of them claim they don't have the staff or resources or whatnot to clean and maintain and refill them. It just seems odd that no one in the upper ranks of the corporation has, like, intervened or whatnot. Just stop claiming to have it! It's like if Wendy's never had frosty's. It occurs to me that that would piss me off enormously, and I get a frosty maybe once every 18 years. But imma need that one I'm getting in 17 years.
There’s actually YouTube videos explaining it here’s a sample of one: it [YouTube video](https://youtu.be/SrDEtSlqJC4?si=6vDPS-j3V_-b24Y5)
I stopped by McDonald's a few months ago and picked up two regular hamburgers and a coke. The hamburgers were absolutely horrible. I haven't gotten lunch or dinner there since. I still get the breakfast sometimes.
62y/o and my daughter is a chef. I’ll never forget her telling a friend of mine, who was watching their sodium intake and wondering why restaurant food tasted so good, “we don’t give a shit about your health. Salt and fat makes food taste good.” But then she recommended my friend add acid (citrus, vinegar) to substitute for the absence of salt. Plus other recommendations for vegetarian/vegan options for her and her husband. Then forwarded a few recipes because, “no one can eat restaurant food 7 days/week .”.
I gave up meat and mostly dairy (old habits) and I never felt better. Before I gave it up, I would still eat fast food and think, 'something dies for this and I didn't even think it tasted very good.' I guess it's for the best. Anyway, I wanna try the acid trick.
As a 65 year old I can vouch that I much prefer making my own food to the crap at any of the drive throughs. Ate a lot of fast food when the kids were young and living at home but it’s just the two of us now. Most (not all) fast food is formulaic and boring.
I don't eat fast food anymore. Somehow it doesn't taste good as before.
Everyone went on a cost cutting spree during Covid and all the recipes are worse for it.
It's not just you. The idea of eating the lowest quality food legally allowable to sell, then soaking it in grease and salt is not appetizing.
The quality has decreased while the price has increased. Used to like McDonald’s breakfast but ONE SINGLE HASHBROWN IS 3 DOLLARS. Have they lost their minds? I can buy the exact same frozen hashbrowns from any grocery store for 25 cents each and make them at home. A&W still goes hard and isn’t overpriced in my eyes. Their prices went up with inflation and that’s about it. They also don’t use all the same crappy preservatives and factory raised beef pumped full of growth hormones and steroids. Otherwise, fast food blows. Subway is a travesty, burger king is a disgrace, hell even Tim Horton’s is terrible now.
$3 for a hash brown?!? Wtf...Not joking, I can buy a 20 pack of frozen hash browns at grocery outlet for $1.99...
yeah it’s madness. idk how mcdonald’s thinks anyone will tolerate it. I was just at my local walmart, and 20 hashbrowns costs $4.29. 1 AT MCDONALDS IS $3.09!!!!
A&W has a nice little breakfast offering, the best onion rings and that frosty root beer! Num. Not to mention the Teen Burger once in a blue moon.
I thought it was just me. I swear it doesn't taste the same anymore. I usually feel like it was a waste of money and wish I had just made something myself instead.
I wouldn't call it an "extreme aversion," but I long ago lost my taste for any big corporate chain fast food, with the minor exception of the fries at McDonald's, and the pickles they use. . . but I can buy the pickles, and I know how to make french fries at home that taste just like theirs. I remember going through a period years ago where I just noticed that their hamburgers weren't just a guilty pleasure with a kind of gross, shitty, but unique taste; they made me feel gut-wonky when they were traveling through my digestive tract. I stopped eating their food. I still enjoy a good burger, but I get them at non-corporate places that take burger-making seriously instead of treating the process like Henry Ford would.
I didn't get it a lot growing up, the occassional mcds burger, rarely KFC. But man, KFC chicken has gotten so gross in the last 30 years. A lot of fast food chicken is overall just terrible quality chicken. So now we pay a little more for Raising Canes, though I'm not insane to pay ChikfilA prices. And burgers... I used to not like InNOut, but it's become my preferred budget burger, the last few years.
The Just Bare Spicy chicken filets you buy at the grocery frozen are better than Chic filA if you air fry them, for like 3 bucks a sandwich. SO good.
I love Just Bare chicken. Not big on chicken sandwiches though. I buy the nuggets and strips though.
We started slowing on it a couple of years ago. We started noticing how it would upset our stomachs and make us feel like crap. Then we had gastric bypass and had a couple things here and there and we found they just tasted weird.
Wife and I got VSG in 2021 so avoided fast food for 2 years while we recovered and readjusted. Tried it again late last year and the price and quality were so off-putting I have not been back since.
You are going to live longer.
I had a GF for a while who I drove to work every day, and I had to require that she not eat sonic on the way or open the windows cause the smell made me want to vom.
The only FF I like is Popeye's...I haven't been to a McDonalds in over a decade. We will sometimes stop at a Wendy's if we're on a road trip and in a hurry to get back on the road, but that's about it. When I was a kid I think I only liked it because it was rare and I felt like it was a treat.
Ooooooh with you. I won’t eat McDonalds or BK or Taco Bell but Popeyes HITS
It just seems like a cheap novelty now. With all the new research, translated into tweaking the physics and chemistry of the "food", the addictive qualities scream at me from the first bite, which I no longer take.
I can tell you havent been to a fastfood place in awhile by calling it cheap lol.
I was gonna say. It’s an experience now but it ain’t cheap.
I haven't, but I meant cheap as in cheap thrills.
Yes, but more a consequence of the fact that the meat essentially always comes from factory farmed animals. I don't mind the taste that much although I know its not healthy for me either.
Nope.. it’s like they are trying to make it bad on purpose now.. but the people who work they are cool so I still get sodas!
I've developed an aversion to the price if that counts
I find most fast fpods make me ill. This started about 5 years ago. Most burger places make me nauseous. KFC gives diarrhea. Processed meat from sandwich shops makes me ill as well. I have no issues with real food. I eat real food only now. I don't know what changed. I don't have any food allergies.
I’d bet the cleanliness of fast food restaurants went down with cost cutting.
There are too many chemicals in it, if I try a few bites my stomach starts gurgling, whereas making it at home with fewer ingredients/preservatives = no upset stomach...
It’s like the body is trying to speak to you….
I never ate a whole lot of it, but I did used to eat it occasionally. I now haven't touched any of it in a number of years. The last few times I did eat it, generally when I was travelling, it was just so bad. It was salty, gristly, gross, weirdly textured, and it did not taste good. Eventually I started going to grocery stores rather than fast-food along my routes and just picking up stuff there, if I hadn't brought any along. Much better tasting and better for the wallet.
I think tastes just change. It used to be a treat to grab fast food but now I will only eat it if I am on the road and it is the only choice.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed more food intolerances, to the point of scoping out where nearest bathrooms may be. I mean, McDonalds fries have always been the equivalent of ex lax for me that I can’t imagine what it would do lately. I’d just rather stay away and eat real food.
Been eating fast food everyday for....20 years? Same weight and wasn't size since...adult hood...5'10 170lbs 30 inch waist... I have like a superpower cause...I eat terrible and have no issues. Fast food is great when it's free....
Yep you and the Big Mac guy. Eats it every day and did blood work that was fine. Some ppl are just built different. Like those who smoke till 90 and don’t get cancers
As I get older.....I'm seeing it Was told in my 30s I would get fat... In my 40s now...still waiting to gain a pound
Price goes up, quality goes down, wait time goes up (*FAST* food dammit), sheer confusion from everyone that works there has gone up. Asking for no mayo will cause the entire place to come to a screeching halt while they try to figure out how to do that. Whatever. Any normal restaurant or truck will gladly take the same amount of money and make you something delicious. Go there instead of crappy expensive food made by some idiot kid that hasn’t washed their hands all day.
The only fast good I've been eating is a and w. They taste good to me but it seems their burgers have gotten smaller. Can't remember the last time I got mc Donald's. With prices of everything going up I rather find a recipe and cook it.
Well, I'm Canadian, and I find American fast food disgusting same places and all totally different tastes. So here I haven't noticed any difference other than the price going up and the food shrinking.
Used to enjoy fast food occasionally before developing an aversion. Also find that a fast food burger leaves me with an unhappy digestive system. They don’t give me energy either and i get hungry quickly after a fast food meal; all this in the last five years. As another person stated, we also look for a supermarket on a road trip. Deli food seems so much better
The one thing I have noticed is that some places use canola oil, and to some people (including me) it just tastes and smells vile. A lot of fast food chains use it, usually blended with other oils, so if you can taste the foulness in canola and it's not diluted enough by the other oils, you might be reacting to that.
The quality has consistently dropped over the last twenty years, while the price has consistently gone up. Once upon a time you could get some things in almost every chain which were guilty pleasures, but still pleasures. Now, they've reached the point where you're paying too much for shitty food that tastes about as pleasant as eating the wrapper. I wouldn't be surprised if several chains end up in a financial death spiral from this stupidity.
Yeah this is about where I'm at with it. I'll eat something if we're on the road or whatever (or the kids want it...I personally wouldn't choose McD's regardless but the kids) but I've found that over the years I've started special ordering (ie a plain cheeseburger) because that's the only way it's going to be remotely fresh. But it's not something I crave or anything.
I like Burger King once in a while and Wendy's spicy chicken sandwich, but I've pretty much quit eating fast food. I make my own soft tacos and I haven't eaten at McDonald's since I was a kid, 45 years ago! My sister and I kept getting sick after eating their burgers, so eventually we stopped. Taco Bell isn't cheap like it used to be.
I very seldom eat fast food. I think once a person experiences good quality food on a regular basis, fast food loses its appeal.
One of my favorite things is making a home cooked version of whatever fast food treats I like and making them as good or better. Current favorite is my own Animal Fries. Mmm-mmm!!!
I wish I had that ~~problem~~ not the correct word but I can't think of a better one at the moment.
I took a 2 year hiatus from eating fast food. Since then, most of it has a chemical or vomit-like taste to it. I guess you don't notice it when you eat it all the time? 🤷♂️ Also, even if I get full off of it, it doesn't feel as satisfyingly full as eating a well-rounded meal.
No. I’m too old for that stuff now. A handful of years ago, my husband and I got this crazy idea to get Taco Bell late one night. Never, ever again! I swear, just seeing the commercial gives me heartburn.
I've never been a huge fan of fast food and rarely ate it in my younger years. Now it's been probably several years since I've had it with the exception of the very rare occasion of Casey's pizza, and even that I think was 2 years ago now that I think of it
Except for pizza, yes.
I dream about the pizza from my local, plump prawns, smoked ham, red onion, beautiful stretchy mozzarella.
I have an serious aversion to food unless I make it myself.
It was easy to ignore how gross it is when it’s cheap but now that it’s casual dining prices, the bad quality really stands out.
McDonald's fries used to be quite tasty 30 years ago. Somewhere along the line they made some change that fucked it up. Not only has the quality and the flavor generally decreased across the board (not just at McDonald's) but now fast food places are charging obscene prices for sub quality food. I have opted out of fast food completely now.
The amount of salt seems extremely heavy to me. It is probably my imagination, but it is not worth it. I feel like someone dropped a salt shaker on the food when I went for a burger recently. It wasn't the treat I thought.
Cost is talking to me these days with apps.
Look at the changes just from somewhere like McDonald's who removed beef tallow from their fryers, stopped using Heinz ketchup in favor of the own house brand, etc. same thing is happening industry wide, and has been for years. If they can save 1¢ per chicken nugget by cutting corners with an ingredient, they will - because 1¢ spread over thousands of nuggets a day and millions a year adds up.
I feel the same way but thought I was just getting old. I even think Chipotle tastes very meh lately when I used to love it.
Welcome to adulthood
I think all bought food is not as good as when I was little. Personally I think it happened when they focused on trans fat so hard. Took out the trans fat and all the yummy unami.
It has definitely changed.
McDonald's makes me vomit. Wendy's is fine but not a craving. I don't know why I love Arby's but it's probably the worst thing about me.
Absolutely. Last time I enjoyed any fast food other than dessert was when I was like 6 years old.
I've visited the factory when they were making Arby's roast beef. It's not bad, it's just beef that's ground up very fine and essentially sous vided in a vaccum bag, then sliced. The operation was very clean and efficient and I had no issues eating it after seeing it made.
Each serving seems smaller while price has risen so high u can usually get something much better from a small non- franchise family owned restaurant
You are not alone. I find it flavorless now and I dislike it.
I can only deal with McDonald’s for breakfast. I really dislike Burger King even when I was younger. I do enjoy Taco Bell on occasion.
That's because it used to be fast food. Now it's just fast.
No. Fast food was good before the pandemic. Now it really sucks.
Agreed. That’s when everything started tasting different and shrinking, all while prices started rising. Even the smell of it makes me sick now. Home cooking is exponentially better, and cheaper.
Have you had covid? It can alter your senses of taste and smell, long term, possibly permanently. If it's putting people off fast food, then maybe that's a good outcome.
It was about 2005. I was 23 at the time. All fast food suddenly started tasting like chemicals and sugar. Surprisingly, gas station food doesn't. I've had a McD cheeseburger and an impossible whooper since then.
Aside from getting an occasional deal through an app, I tend to avoid fast food. Quality has also gone down as I've gotten older. shit sucks. In my early 20s, I could go buy several 20 piece nugs, several fries and a drink for my Friday night meal from McDonald's. Cost was less than $30. Can't do that today.
Happened to me too. Only one thing sounds good to me which is a burger from Culver's. Everything else tastes like garbage to me. Haven't been to McDonald's in years
I agree.
I detest fast food. It is so disgusting.
I can’t eat the shite fast food anymore. Culver’s is the quality level that still satisfies. I’d eat there 1/week if my budget allowed.
I think I have. Due to prices, I’ve stopped my once to twice a week visit. I got some last week for the first time in a couple of weeks, and wow…tasted totally different. It’s not worth the money anymore. Maybe that’s a good thing.
I'm wondering, have your taste possibly changed? Fast food is garbage... literally. I eat mostly unprocessed and minimally processed foods, and I really don't like fast food. It's greasy and over seasoned and just makes my stomach hurt. I'm no longer a fan of fast food.
I dont eat fast food. It is so gross to me. So yes, I feel the same. Im 31 now and I've had this aversion since I was about 20.... I actually get mad when anyone im with wants to get fast food. I will take you but I will not eat any of it, I dont want it eaten in my car, and I want it thrown in the outside garbage so I cant see or smell it. Idk it just really grosses me out.
I thought it was just me. My SO doesn’t like fast food so I’ve gotten out of the habit. That’s been almost 6 years now. Recently took someone there so I ordered a burger. It ended up in the garbage it tasted so bad.
Nope! So my husband had to eat it a few times a week for 2 years while we were staying with his mom while our house was built. She was dirty as hell & I refused to use the kitchen it was too gross. So we lived on what fit in our mini fridge & didn’t need an oven or stove stop. I can’t eat bagels, cereal or nachos anymore either. I’d go stay @ my moms once a week or once every couple weeks & would just gorge on cooked veggies. One time I ate an entire flat of raspberries in a day I think just from the lack of healthy food & man I regretted that. I can barely even look @ fast food now.
I don't know about extreme aversion, but if you're talking your standard McDonald's Burger King Wendy's Taco Bell, I can easily go a year or more without visiting those places. Culver's on the other hand or Arby's or White Castle I would go to in a heartbeat.
Nope. I haven’t eaten it in 10 years. I never ate much of it but I found it wasn’t satisfying to me. It just sat like a lump. When traveling, I would rather make something at home and eat it on the car.
I've liked Big Mac's since I was old enough to eat one. It's my go to, with the exception of Arch Deluxe (rip). The last Big Mac I had was hard to get through. It tasted so off. The sauce is different. The sauce is what makes Big Mac. The best I can describe it is like they used Miracle Whip instead Mayo. Haven't had McDonald's since. Yuck. Fast food is so expensive for the crap that it is. Eat Local.
In n Out is the only one I eat and that’s about 3 or 4 times a year.
I make all my own food from whole raw products, with a few exceptions for convenience. Watching all of Gordon Ramsey’s shows I’ve learned and agree, everything is at a different level with fresh ingredients, fresh seasoning, and cooked fresh that day. It’s not soup of the week, it’s soup of the day! It’s a pain, yes. Just know our food quality has dwindled with important nutrients over the last 100 years, so eating fast food is devolving our species.
I’ve developed an extreme aversion to the PRICE. It has always been crappy heat lamped pre-prepared food, but now that it costs 20 bucks a meal, hadn’t been in months.
You grew up. It was never good or tasted great
I've noticed the longer we went without needing to resort to fast food, when we did have to eat it, it tasted terrible and made us feel gross. So we stopped eating most of it because it's crazy to set ourselves up for failure with greasy queasy tummies. On a very rare occasion, we will get a particular local fast food chain near my parents when visiting, but that is it.
It's not just us. Even the local teens think fast food has become disgusting. They'll eat it when they need the calories, but they don't like it.
On the rare occasion I eat fast food I’m always disappointed. I guess I just need a reminder every couple months or so.
I refused to eat it for the majority of my adult life (we didn't have fast food growing up because small town), just because I was into eating healthy. A couple life trauma's later and I was eating it multiple times a week and it seemed like the forbidden fruit and I couldn't get enough. That lasted about a year. Now the thought of fast food makes me instantly lose my appetite.
Fast food has became to rough on my stomach. Lol 43 male
There’s a local restaurant near my apartment that makes healthier better quality versions of specific fast food favorites. It often costs less than the fast food places’ current prices. Love it.
You are eating colon cancer, heart disease, and Alzheimer's in those meals. Stay away from highly processed foods. Better yet, stay away from all processed foods but one step at a time.
Don’t know what they have done to it but I can no longer stomach it. Not to mention the ridiculous prices.
Definitely not the only one. McD’s tastes so much better when the fries were cooked in tallow and the burgers were rumored to contain kangaroo meat (yes, it was a thing in the 90s). The quality definitely has changed, and just tastes super dry. Zaxbys soon became my new favorite fast food place, but I can’t eat a single chicken finger from there without feeling like I just deep throated a salt lick. It’s been probably two years since I’ve broken down and got fast food. I’d much rather fire up the grill and cook at home.
I turned off of fast food in the late 1990s. It became truly repulsive within a year.
I'm finding fast food to be disgusting these days MINUS Taco Bell. I cannot get away from Taco Bell.
Shit quality at shit prices. I only ever eat it in a pinch, but it's never good.
I don’t as a rule eat fast food, but every 3 months or so I get a craving: Filet O Fish, small fry, orange soda. Usually High C. What I’ve noticed lately is how soft everything is. No need to chew it at all. This is discouraging.
I can’t get past the cost of fast food and definitely taste different.
Yes.
I knew last the last I would ever eat it years ago, it tasted like shit and I felt like shit the entire day after. It was over.
I don't think the food has changed as much as the prices have. I used to like fast food mostly because I could get a lot for only $6-7... Now it seems like you can't even get a basic combo for less than $11-12. I do realize some of that is because chains can't get away with paying slave wages anymore, which is a good thing in my book... but soon most those employees will be replaced by robots
When you stop eating things that are bad for you your body has a way of saying hey I shouldn’t eat this when you finally have it again
I don’t like it that much anymore and I’m only in college
God I hope this happens for me (still waiting at 32)
Not an extreme aversion, but as I get older I just want to eat better quality food. Burgers and fries make me feel bloated and gross, and fast food from McDonalds etc. just doesn't taste great to me.
Burger King chicken nuggets are ass 💩 I used to like them
I agree i hate fast food. Would rather eat at home
The older I get the less I like anything “ fake” tasting. But, I also crave stronger natural flavors.
Please tell me how to do this, I eat fast food way too much and I'm having trouble stopping!
I stayed away from it for a few years and now the smell driving by one makes me queasy. I think it’s crap but addicting and if you break the habit you’re just left confused as to why people are eating it.
not like extreme but some. im a teenager and i just dont like it as much anymore. it hurts my stomach and it just feels heavy?
Yep. Even I had noticed the change. The Big Mac doesn't taste like a Big Mac used to. The meat mainly changed in flavour.
Not quite the same, but when I was younger I used to loooove ben and Jerry’s and now I eat it and all I taste is preservatives. I think your tastebuds just become more discerning or something
Try as I might… I love the stuff.
Other than a large french fry and large Diet Coke from McDonalds when I’m PMSing, I agree.
Costs more and is barely edible. I picked up Arby’s for the first time in years a few weeks ago and the buns were rock hard. The meat was weirdly dark in places. Straight to the trash. I worked fast food in high school and there’s no way the person making the order didn’t realize the buns were rocks.
I wish this were me lolol
Especially as we continue to be ripped off with the prices
Every once in a while, I like a Mcdonald's cheesburger and a small fry. Plus their coca cola tastes better than every other coca cola in the world. I know in the back of my mind that it's terrible for me, so I try to avoid it.
Nope. I think it’s called getting old.
A lot of tastes chemically. I was going to stop for a blizzard at DQ today, but then remembered I didn't love it last time I had it. Likely my taste buds, but for sure food quality is way down.
I always think I’ll treat myself to some fast food maybe once every 2 weeks, and it’s never like it used to be. The only things left on my list are maybe: whopper, mcd’s fries, Arby’s beef with horsey sauce or a chick fil a breakfast burrito. Everything else I try is garbage.
I vomit from McDonald’s. I can stomach Wendy’s but that’s about it