Hi, friends! I had a crunchwrap supreme for lunch and I just think they’re the best fast food item created in recent years.
Which got me thinking, what do you think is the best fast food and why? I feel like convenience, flavor, and ease of eating matter most to me. Hence the crunchwrap. That tostada shell layer holds the internal structural integrity, the flour tortilla encases everything, and the layers inside are delicious. I can eat it one-handed and typically there’s no mess.
Honorable mention are bollos sold by the bollo ladies in buckets when I was in Belize. Bollos are the Belizean version of tamales and they’re wrapped in banana leaves instead of corn husks. Women would make them and load ’em up in buckets and go house-to-house selling them and it was a great way to get an easy meal. Sanitary? no. Delicious? Fuck yeah it was!
Okay, I’ll bite. Mcdonald’s hash browns. I usually order 5 at a time. When they did breakfast all day, I was so overjoyed that thought I had wasted a wish on a genie. But perhaps it was our combined prayers and wishes that made it so. At some point during the pandemic, I drove out to McD’s in the middle of the night (25min away) and was crushed to find out that they cancelled breakfast all day.
I love Wendy’s spicy chicken burgers too.
The hash browns are excellent and I also think fast food places should replace french fries with tater tots.
Yessss this should always be an option. There’s a place here that makes a tater tot dish topped with gochujang, green onion, and a fried egg. Now that’s all I can think about.
Gochujang is the best.thing.ever.
Oh I disagree – I think Burger King’s hash browns are better than Mickey Ds!
You could be right. I don’t eat a lot of fast food any more. About 8-10 years ago I took my kids to Mickey Ds for what I thought was a treat (they had liked it, they sang songs about it), only to find out soon after they thought it was kind of gross.
In a way I was proud, but I also felt some regret, because I knew my days of going there were numbered….
It’s been a while since I’ve had them (I don’t live near a BK anymore), but theirs are little bite-size hash brown medallions. It’s like a tator tot and hash brown had a love child.
I still eat at McDonald’s, though I keep it to a minimum. It was a treat in my rather large lower-middle-class family, so I still get a kick out of it, even though I know it’s a. bad for me and b. decidedly not the best fast-food option.
The carnivore likes Arbies because of roast beef. A million years ago there were Roy Roger’s (better than Arbies, iirc). I’ve not had meat or fast food meat in decades. I am interested to know if anyone has found a tasty fast food fish sandwich?
https://thetakeout.com/the-best-fast-food-fish-sandwiches-ranked-filet-o-fis-1846298788
Not fish, but if you’re in the St Louis or Kansas City areas and see a Lion’s Choice, it’s definitely waaaaaay better roast beef than Arby’s.
@Elliecoo Culver’s used to have a walleye sandwich in February. It was pretty good.
Only in Canada City. A&W Cod Sandwich
not a sandwich…but if you are ever in the netherlands you should try a lekkerbek (or as i call them fried fishy from the fishy man in his fishy van)
they are delicious (and probably fattening)
My question is what do you define as fast food? Does it have to be a National chain? Have drive thru? Fast food growing up was what we called plate lunches, 2 scoops rice, 1 scoop Mac salad & meat entree. Some are chains, some mom & pop but that’s my go to. We have a few here that do it & some are excellent. Growing up, Korean ones were best cause you also got 3 veggies & kim chee too. Of worldwide burger chains, BK Is only one I can stomach. Here my go to is teriyaki, ironically also run by Koreans but more Americanized.
The post includes Belizean tamales, so national chains aren’t required.
In that sense, I would have gone with these fish sandwiches, but it sounds like they are gone after centuries of doing business:
https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2019/nov/01/istanbul-golden-horn-fish-sandwich-boats-balik-ekmek-close
Korean street food (which I’ll insist counts) is so damn good.
I’m lucky in that I have a lot of other options near me. About the only time I eat fast food is when I was about to go get drunk at a bar that didn’t have food, and wanted to get some fat/protein in my gut to help pace things, then I would get a basic fast food cheeseburger or two. I guess I’m partial to Wendy’s Jr. Bacon cheeseburger if it’s available, or the Jack-in-the-Box equivalent.
If we’re including anything cheapish/fastish, and street food… There is this thing called a “california burrito” where instead of rice, they put french fries in it. I used to see it all the time in SoCal, but only recently started seeing it up here in the SF Bay Area. that’s pretty good drunk/hungover food. I was in a port in Korea once (forget the name…), and the street vendors were selling these little paper pockets of like grilled/buttered squid tentacles that were really good. As long as they were still warm, once they went cold, they were not very appealing. And I think it was some takoyaki? on skewers with some sauce… in Okinawa, i think?
side tangent on McDonalds, did they ever sell a bacon, egg, and cheese mcmuffin? I asked for one in a McDonalds a few years back or so, and got a bunch of blank stares, and then someone got the manager, who started doing a bout of tv-computer-hacking button punching on their computer, and came up with like a ~15 dollar bill for two. I think they were going to make two egg and cheese mc muffins, two of something else with the bacon, transfer the bacon to the mcmuffins, and discard everything else, or something along those lines. I thought bacon-egg-cheese was a pretty basic, common breakfast combo, but maybe not everywhere? Is this what makes me loose it and go all-in on the mandela effect stuff and qanon?
I don’t eat McMuffins, but I could have sworn bacon-egg-and-cheese was an option? Maybe I’m confused because they have “Canadian bacon” on them?
I haven’t had McDonalds in years but seem to remember a biscuit w/ egg cheese & bacon. Don’t remember if they did that w/ McMuffin.
This is correct. It’s a Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Biscuit. That’s not a McMuffin option, largely I think because the egg is a disc that fits an English muffin, but the egg in the biscuit is folded over into sort of a square.
I think you’re right, but I’ve also been drinking 100 proof rye tonight.
One of the best arguments for raising the minimum wage is all of the poor employees at KFC and Burger King who have to deal with maskless drunken customers insisting that they be sold Chalupa McRib Egg and Bacon sandwiches at 3 a.m.
I just want to say, another reason I tend to avoid fast food chain places, is they almost universally have a no tipping policy, and as long as tipping and minimum wage is a thing, I try to tip decently. Although I think it’s a shitty system, I just consider it an unlabeled cost of eating out, and feel kinda bad when I can’t help compensate some underpaid worker for putting up with my dumb ass for ~5 minutes by dropping a couple dollars in a tip jar or similar…
My wife and I used to like the hot dog trucks in D.C.
I second this.
Downtown Toronto is well-known for its hot dog trucks. It’s considered blasphemous to go and not pay one of those saints for the Godly service they provide the community.
If you want to be the insider in DC, go for the half smokes:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-smoke
When I had a CostCo membership, once in a while I would just go there to eat hot dogs and $5 Montreal Smoke Meat Sandwiches.
Blake’s Lotaburger in New Mexico. They’re technically fast food, but you do place your order and wait for them to cook it. Their green chile cheeseburgers are to. die. for.
oohh green chile cheeseburgers sound fucking amazing
This reminds me that Texans insist Whataburger is the best. (Beto was also known to eat Whataburger often on the campaign trail.)
All of my food views are mine alone:
As for Breakfast sandwich, I miss the McD Canada City’s Egg McBiscuit (RIP) with sausage and egg. Tim Horton’s makes one, but the biscuit is tough as a hockey puck and the rest of the sandwich is garbage (based on what it does to my stomach.)
McD’s must have stolen Popeye’s biscuit recipe and used it for their sandwich. Excellent soft buttery biscuits are one of the things I miss about the US.
A&W Canada makes nice hashbrowns (rectangle.)
As for non breakfast items…
A&W Canada City Burgers are pretty good, but pricey alternative to most of the other chains.
Worst: BK. It doesn’t matter what they make it kills my stomach.
Fav US chain: In’N Out. Would like to try Whattaburger and Shake Shack ones because I want to.
Favorite Drink: A&W Root Beer (Canada City)
Favorite Side: Onion Rings (Harveys). I would have said A&W but they changed the recipe and I don’t really like them as much.
Favorite Dessert: Dairy Queen Chocolate Dipped Cone or (if I’m glutton) Skor Bar Blizzard.
Yesss Harvey’s onion rings! That takes me back.
I’m pretty sure that it can be scientifically proven that the best three fast-food options are as follows:
Gyros from The Parthenon in Greektown, Chicago
Italian beef sandwich from Mr Beef, Wells St, Chicago
Hot dog w/everything & sport peppers, Jimmy’s Red Hots, Grand Avenue, Chicago
The #4 runner-up is the homemade street tamales that the lady with prison tattoos sells out of a cooler on Milwaukee Ave near the Logan Square el stop.
I’m with you on the crunchwrap. It’s wonderful. I make them at home sometimes, but they’re slightly high effort when a tostada gets you to about the same place for a third of the effort.
Taco Bell is absolutely my go to fast food place (true fast food – I’m not counting fast casual), though I’m still mad at them over the potatoes. I know they finally caved and are bringing them back, but they play with my emotions way too often with their constant menu changes. A black bean crunchwrap and two spicy potato soft tacos were my order. I miss the fiery Doritos Locos tacos, which were top notch junk food.
febo!
the food is okay..standard snack fare
but damn is it convenient to just be able to pluck food out of the wall on the go
Is it an automat?
not exactly..they are usually attached to a snackbar..snacks made inside get put inside the wall of pay to open holdy warm cabinets
but same basic idea i guess…cept the food is freshly made (depending on how busy the location is that could mean fresh on the day or within an hour tho)
basically its snackbars earning a penny or two off people who wouldnt have come in to wait for an order
There’s a Mexican street food truck nearby that I like, I get the Al Pastor Torta.
Do deli sandwiches count? My neighbor and I were just talking about this place in the rough side of town where they make giant subs out of whole italian loaves sourced locally and super fresh ingredients, you can buy one on Saturday and meals are taken care of for the weekend!
Mostly I don’t eat fast food, but I did have a bibimbap bowl yesterday that was pretty good.
Okay, I’m classifying “fast food” as “places where you order at a counter or window.” With that in mind:
1. Probably my favorite hamburger option is Burger Fi, with Five Guys behind that. Yes, I posted about McDonald’s above, but I know damn good and well it’s not the best option.
2. Faux-Mexican is Chipotle.
3. Chicken is Chik-fil-A, though their politics are deplorable. I’m not sure where corporate management stands on all that currently. I haven’t been near the place in a while because every location here has lines that stretch for blocks.
4. For subs it’s Firehouse, with Subway in second place.
5. Mediterranean I go with Olea.
6. Chinese is Pei Wei.
If we’re counting Chipotle (I feel like that leans more fast casual), that might take the crown for me.
That’s why I noted my criteria. There’s about a billion definitions of fast food and fast casual.