Why Chain Restaurants Exist

[Odesio]

Today in Little Rock, Arkansas I decided to go to a mom & pop restaurant that came highly recommended. After checking out their menu online I was encouraged by the fact that their menu had a limited number of items and that it changed daily. It's my fault, really. I assumed that the limited and changing menu meant that they made their own food. By Emeril's ghost how could I be so wrong?

The mashed potatoes were instant, the gravy was powdered, the chicken fried steak was frozen and my pie was topped with Cool-Whip. The best part of my meal was the Coca-Cola. I should have known something was up when I could see all those chicken fried steak patties were exactly the same shape. Unfortunately, I was with someone who was really craving some fried chicken and I didn't just turn around and leave like I should have. It wasn't until I sat down to eat that I noticed 90% of the people there were over 60. I would have been better off going to Chili's. Hell, I think I would have been better off going to The Cracker Barrel.

Anyone have any bad experiences eating local?

[SmellMyWort]

You need to reevaluate your friendship with the person that gave you that recommendation.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by Odesio

Anyone have any bad experiences eating local?

Well, of course. A good number of ma & pop's just aren't any good. But if you know how to do your research (or through a lot of trial and error), it's not that hard to find a good one in any well-populated area.

[The Second Stone]

Chains exist because of quality control. Take MacDonald's. You do it there way or you lose your franchise. They have inspectors who make sure. Thus I am assured of getting the same thing in any part of the US at the golden arches. And if I am hungry, I like it. Chains that do not do some level of quality control go out of business.

[RealityChuck]

Occasionally. OTOH, my general rule -- never eat at a chain restaurant when traveling -- has served me well. I've had some wonderful food in places I never heard of (favorite example: I was looking for a place for dinner in Hazleton, PA and was driving toward town when I spotted the Beltway Diner. Which had its own left turn lane. I figured someone liked the place, so we went in, and made it a regular stopping place on our trips to and from DC).

[Incubus]

I think its about consistency. People go to chain restaurants not because they're willing to settle for bland food, but because they feel like eating at Applebees/Chili's/Denny's, probably know what the menu choices are/how the food tastes, and what specifically they want. At most chains you can at least expect the food to be consistent in quality.

[bouv]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

Occasionally. OTOH, my general rule -- never eat at a chain restaurant when traveling -- has served me well.

I travel a fair amount for work, and I try to follow this rule, but some times I just can't.

I mostly go to small, middle-of-nowhere towns in VT, NY, and NH...you'd think there could be some great, local, mom-and-pop diner in these towns with good food...you'd be wrong. Plenty of towns I go to have, near as I can tell, no good local places. All bland-as-fuck, probably made from instant/frozen/canned ingredients. So sometimes I go to a Chili's or Applebee's because while it might not be great, it will be ok at least.

I mean...these are places that fuck up burgers...a clearly frozen, pre-formed patty, no seasoning, served with those crinkle-cut fries you got in elementary school lunches, and cooked in an oven, not deep-fryer, so they're soggy as Hell.

A good example would be the town I'm in right now. Last night, I saw this local little BBQ joint...now, I should have known, BBQ in the north has, like, an 80% chance to be shit...and this was. It was supposed to be a Carolina style pulled pork sandwich...blank pork, and covered in what was clearly pre-made tomato based sauce. The fuck?!

So tonight I went to the nice-looking restaurant attached to my hotel. Got a NY strip steak...bland as Hell, and perhaps a few days passed when it should have been served. No seasoning, not even salt or pepper, cooked horribly (asked for MR, got a medium, and the outside was way too charred.) Veggies were just boiled to death, and even the baked potato was bad...their bread was pretty good, though.

[Smeghead]

Originally Posted by bouv

I mostly go to small, middle-of-nowhere towns in VT, NY, and NH...you'd think there could be some great, local, mom-and-pop diner in these towns with good food...you'd be wrong.

I LIVE in a small, middle-of-nowhere town in VT, and I can vouch for this. I'd kill for a great little mom-and-pop type place - a hidden gem no one else knows about. I've looked everywhere for one. We found a beautiful little diner up the road a ways, tucked off the main highway, right on a river, serving good old fashioned American diner fare and a large menu of ice cream products. Perfect, right? I could just picture me taking the kids there as they grew up for a special treat. They'd always have the memory of going to that little place with their dad. I was so excited that I gave it several tries before I decided my first impression was right. All their food was boring, tiny portions, way overpriced, and took too long to get to you. The ice cream was crap, too.

There's no good food anywhere near us. None at all. The (very few) chains are the best of a bad lot. We like our own cooking far more than anything we've found eating out.

[bump]

Originally Posted by The Second Stone

Thus I am assured of getting the same thing in any part of the US at the golden arches.

I think you mean "world" not "US" there. I've had McDonalds in Scotland, England , Italy and France, and the food that was common to each was identical to that in all the others.

I think it's not only the store-to-store quality control, but also the quality control over time that keeps people coming back. I mean, a Big Mac today tastes substantially if not identically to the ones from my childhood, no matter where in the world I may buy them. Couple that level of consistency with palatable food, and many people who are somewhat food risk-averse will happily choose that over a local restaurant whose quality changes depending on who is doing the cooking, or one who may not have the purchasing power to always guarantee high enough quality ingredients.

I tend to think the best compromise is the local or regional chain- something like the Pappas group restaurants in Houston and other parts of Texas maybe. Ones big enough to wield some purchasing power and exercise some pretty good quality control, but not so homogenized that they are trying to win customers in Minnesota, Kansas, Virginia, California and Texas with the same food.

[kunilou]

It's pretty much the same in the Midwest. A lot of those homey little places whip up a prepackaged entree that was in the back of the freezer way too long. The magic ingredient is salt and their vegetables came from the Hy-Vee. The pies are usually pretty good, though.

[Rushgeekgirl]

My roommate works at an old fashioned mom and pop style diner, a real hole in the wall. It's always fairly busy (24 hours a day) so I was excited a few days ago when roomie brought home some carry-out packs. He was so excited for me to taste food he "cooked".

Nasty!

Yes, the mashed potatoes were watery grainy instant with gravy I later found out is canned. The meatloaf was a charred brick, the mixed veggies were unseasoned and probably from a can. The chicken and dumplings were greasy and had an oddly high ration of hunks of cartilage to actual meat. White beans were greasy and unseasoned with little bits of what I think was Spam. The only dish I could eat more than a bite of was the corn casserole, one of my favorites. It still wasn't good, but it was good enough.

[gotpasswords]

A couple of years ago, we had a memorably bad meal at a non-chain restaurant in New Mexico. We'd have had better food if we picked whatever snack foods were available near the checkouts at Home Depot.

Strike that. Our meal would have tasted better if we bought and tried to eat pipe fittings and masking tape. However many ways there are to mess up a hamburger, this place found most of them. It was to the point of wanting to say "This is terrible. Mind if I go back and cook my own?"

[Lamar Mundane]

I've never subscribed to the mom-and-pop theory. In my experience they mostly suck. The exceptions to this rule are seafood joints on the coasts where they get fresh catch every day, and barbeque in the South.

[Lynn Bodoni]

The problem is, a lot of these places get their precooked, prepackaged foods from the same supplier. I know that many pizza places get their ingredients from the same supplier, and so do a lot of the Chinese places. And I could tell when a diner, which used to be one of my favorite places, switched from making their own mashed potatoes to using instant.

Yeah, I know that using those prepackaged foods is much cheaper. But most of those foods have had all the flavor carefully removed from them, and no amount of salt and pepper is gonna make up for that.

[RealityChuck]

Interesting. I can only remember one bad meal at a small-town restaurant in the Adirondacks, where the hamburger was indifferent and the fries mediocre. But there also was a hole-in-the-wall place a few miles away that served some very good entries, including BBQ pork.

In general, I've had very good luck just choosing places. I don't usually visit small towns, but even then, I've rarely been disappointed.

[ZipperJJ]

Y.e.l.p.

[DoctorJ]

I find that a lot of the little mom-and-pops (especially around here) will have mostly unremarkable fare off the Sysco truck, but most of them will have a few things that are genuinely homemade and tasty. Unfortunately there's not a very good way to ask what they are. You can ask the waitress what's good, but the staff in such places has almost always lost whatever passion they might have had for the food, so you're not likely to get great advice.

The clientele at most mom-and-pop type restaurants tends to be really old. Old people don't want surprises, don't want to pay extra for quality, and don't want anything to take longer than it absolutely has to. I know I'm generalizing, but it's my experience.

I'm an adventurous eater--it's one of the great joys of my life. I have to remind myself all the time that the vast majority of people are really, really not.

[Musicat]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

Occasionally. OTOH, my general rule -- never eat at a chain restaurant when traveling --

My philosophy is: If you want to gamble in a strange town, eat somewhere you don't know. It might be good, it might be bad.

But if you are more interested in a meal you can count on and less interested in gambling, find a favorite franchise. It may not be gourmet, but it's probably consistent.

Besides, in my town, there are almost no franchises within 50 miles in any direction, so even Burger King, Wendy's or KFC is a treat to me.

"Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom's. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own." -- Nelson Algren

[Little Nemo]

People go to chain restaurants in expectation of consistency. Step away from the chains and you lose that consistency. That means sometimes you'll get better food and sometimes you'll get worse. Chalk this one up to experience and don't go back there.

My personal "bad local restaurant" story involves a place called the Pok-A-Dot in Batavia, NY. Many years ago I used to live in the area and whenever I drove by there was always a bunch of cars at the Pok-A-Dot. It didn't look like much but I figured it they always had customers, they must be doing something right.

So one day I was in Batavia and it was lunchtime and I decided to go eat at the Pok-A-Dot. Which was a mistake. Because the reason there were always customers at the Pok-A-Dot is because it was a smoker's restaurant. (This was back when it was still legal to smoke in restaurants. Some restaurants prohibited it anyway. Some allowed it but didn't encourage it. And a few made it the basis of their business.) This apparently was the place to go if you were a heavy smoker and wanted to go eat someplace where nobody was going to complain if you smoked through your meal.

I'm not a smoker but I can tolerate it most times. It does bother me if people are smoking around me when I'm eating. And this place had a solid haze. I probably should have just gone somewhere else but I was there so I decided to stay and eat.

Which was my second mistake because it turned out this place was serving the kind of food you could only get away with in a place where nobody can taste what they're eating.

I'm surprised to see online that the Pok-A-Dot is still in business. I don't know what's keeping them going now that smoking is illegal in all restaurants.

[Pai325]

Originally Posted by ZipperJJ

Y.e.l.p.

Unless you go somewhere Yelp doesn't. I'm in the second lArgest city in Illinois right now - looking for a decent bakery. No Yelp reviews here.

[Askance]

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

It's like people who drink, say, Coke and nothing else. Why? Does the 10,000th can really still taste so good you never want anything else? At least with, say, boutique wine or beer (or ginger ale or lemonade, if that's your thing) you can get brilliant while risking bad - either way you get an experience, something to talk about.

Do people really want their lives to be solely composed of such unremarkable experiences? Does anyone ever say: "I've GOT to tell you about the McD's I went to last night! It was utterly indistinguishable from every other one I've ever been to!".

[faithfool]

In east Texas where my parents live, they have at least two mom-n-pop cafes that are pretty good. All fresh made and, if you like that sort of thing, down home comfort food. Everything else though, is crap. Same goes for the smallish town I live in outside north Dallas, except we only have one that's decent. The rest that have been recommended to us have completely sucked. There's a Mexican restaurant here that makes the blandest food I've ever tastes, and that includes in school or the hospital.

So overall, we prefer cooking at home to anything else (plus, that's all we can afford these days). But back when we still ate out, I truly enjoyed the occasional Cheesecake Factory for their nice Shepherd's Pie or Olive Garden for their remarkable Ravioli di Portobello. Also, Chili's fares well on their shrimp tacos and I never complain about one of our Texas based chains, Posados. They have the best queso outside of Austin and I really enjoy their chicken fajitas, as well as the husband loving the tamales.

Are the fine cuisine? Nope, not even close to a Michelin rated dining experience. But they season their food well, it never blows like these unique places do, the service is above average, they didn't break the bank and you shouldn't have to wait forever. And I say all this as someone who'll try almost anything and looks forward to new dishes and styles. I am incredibly adventurous.

Regardless, since I long for something that's delicious whenever I spend our limited funds, I have no desire to waste that on mediocre, tasteless or instant, prepackaged shit. I'm not looking for it to be exactly the same the twentieth go 'round as the first, but I certainly don't want to regret I picked that place. Therefore, sometimes it's better to choose Joe's Crab Shack. Others can risk Angelina's only to be disappointed.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

It's like people who drink, say, Coke and nothing else. Why? Does the 10,000th can really still taste so good you never want anything else? At least with, say, boutique wine or beer (or ginger ale or lemonade, if that's your thing) you can get brilliant while risking bad - either way you get an experience, something to talk about.

Do people really want their lives to be solely composed of such unremarkable experiences? Does anyone ever say: "I've GOT to tell you about the McD's I went to last night! It was utterly indistinguishable from every other one I've ever been to!".

Try this line of reasoning out on your spouse, in a discussion about your sex life, and let us know how it works out.

[Odesio]

Originally Posted by Musicat

Besides, in my town, there are almost no franchises within 50 miles in any direction, so even Burger King, Wendy's or KFC is a treat to me.

If you're still in Sturgeon Bay, WI there's an Arby's, McDonald's and a Taco Bell right there in town.

[Sigmagirl]

Originally Posted by Pai325

Unless you go somewhere Yelp doesn't. I'm in the second lArgest city in Illinois right now - looking for a decent bakery. No Yelp reviews here.

Chowhound?

[Athena]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

Like everyone else in this thread said - sometimes unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge is better than the alternative.

I eat at chains while on the road, for two reasons:

- I don't have time to check the Interwebz to find the good local places, or the town is so small the Interwebz doesn't have much to offer. Occasionally I'll see a local place that I'll take a chance on, but I've been disappointed/scared more often than I've found that great undiscovered jewel. And yes, Scared. Small towns are remarkably OK with a level of filth in their local restaurants.

- I live in a small town, and I know how small-town restaurants are. Some are good, but there's plenty that either an outsider wouldn't like or are downright bad. By "outsider wouldn't like" I mean this tendency for small/medium towns to sometimes have odd tastes. I've lived in more than one where there's some restaurant that's been there forever that the locals loooooove but serves downright weird food. It's similar to the comfort food you grow up with - you spent your whole life eating XX, so even as an adult, knowing it's not really all that good of food, you still sorta like it.

One town I lived in had a semi-Italian restaurant that was known for their spaghetti. I went there once and ordered it, seeing as so may of the locals could not stop talking about how great it was. When it came, it was the weirdest thing I've ever seen called spaghetti. The noodles were thick, REALLY thick, more like long spaetzl than spaghetti noodles, and really super doughy. The sauce was thin & sweet, sort of like warm tomato juice.

I have no doubt that if I go back to that town, the locals would still tell me how great that place is. But I want nothing to do with it.

There's a handful of those kinds of places around my hometown as well. I live here now, and I grew up with these places, and I have to admit, as a local, there's a certain appeal that they have. But I'm always careful sending outsiders to these places - I can't say "Oh, it's a great Italian place!" I always say "It's a decent restaurant if you order XX or YY, but stay away from the ZZ, and if you order the BB, be warned that it's not what you'd normally expect."

[Musicat]

Originally Posted by Odesio

If you're still in Sturgeon Bay, WI there's an Arby's, McDonald's and a Taco Bell right there in town.

And two Subways and a Pizza Hut. But that's the entire list of chain fast food outlets. Hardee's and Applebee's closed down and KFC went away 20 years ago. Even some chain steak houses bit the dust.

Almost forgot...Culver's exists, but they're actually good.

[DCnDC]

Originally Posted by Lynn Bodoni

Yeah, I know that using those prepackaged foods is much cheaper. But most of those foods have had all the flavor carefully removed from them, and no amount of salt and pepper is gonna make up for that.

It's not cheaper. These places use prepackaged food because they don't have or can't get anyone who actually knows how to cook. A properly run kitchen using fresh ingredients will always be cheaper than one that simply reheats pre-prepared packaged food.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

It's like people who drink, say, Coke and nothing else. Why? Does the 10,000th can really still taste so good you never want anything else? At least with, say, boutique wine or beer (or ginger ale or lemonade, if that's your thing) you can get brilliant while risking bad - either way you get an experience, something to talk about.

Do people really want their lives to be solely composed of such unremarkable experiences? Does anyone ever say: "I've GOT to tell you about the McD's I went to last night! It was utterly indistinguishable from every other one I've ever been to!".

It's just a personal preference. Some people like routine and consistency, eating what they know they like, and some people like exploration and variety, with the occasional bum meal, when they go out to eat.

No matter where I go, I almost always research the local food; I look for interesting food stops along the way; I walk into random restaurants that look interesting. But that's because that's fun to me, and I place a priority on it. I'm also an adventurous eater, and while I can be critical, I'm not picky and will find some enjoyment from the food, no matter what is put in front of me. I can totally understand those who don't give a shit or want something predictable, which is what chains are good at. It's just food, right?

[RealityChuck]

Originally Posted by pulykamell

It's just a personal preference. Some people like routine and consistency, eating what they know they like, and some people like exploration and variety, with the occasional bum meal, when they go out to eat.

No matter where I go, I almost always research the local food; I look for interesting food stops along the way; I walk into random restaurants that look interesting. But that's because that's fun to me, and I place a priority on it. I'm also an adventurous eater, and while I can be critical, I'm not picky and will find some enjoyment from the food, no matter what is put in front of me. I can totally understand those who don't give a shit or want something predictable, which is what chains are good at. It's just food, right?

That's my philosophy, too. I've rarely been disappointed and often been delighted.

[BigT]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

For me, it's because, in my experience, chains are better. Not all chains, but the more expensive ones usually are, as they don't shoot the bottom of the barrel to get lower prices. Give me Applebee's steak over any mom-and-pop steakhouse. The fact that it's more expensive and still actually able to become a chain means the food is of a fairly high quality.

In fact, when I hear people claim that chains universally suck, I honestly wonder, if they got the chain stuff from a restaurant that pretended to be a mom-and-pop, would the food suddenly taste better? Did they get their idea about chains from places like McDonald's, which really is just about the cheapest possible food?

I'd honestly say your best bet is not the mom-and-pop stores but the small chains, followed by the more expensive large chains I mentioned above, like Applebees or Outback or similar. Only go to a mom-and-pop's if you have other data--like a word-of-mouth from a friend or praise from an Internet site--or if you are so bored with the other available offerings that you don't mind the high risk.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by BigT

I'd honestly say your best bet is not the mom-and-pop stores but the small chains, followed by the more expensive large chains I mentioned above, like Applebees or Outback or similar. Only go to a mom-and-pop's if you have other data--like a word-of-mouth from a friend or praise from an Internet site--or if you are so bored with the other available offerings that you don't mind the high risk.

That's probably a fair assessment. The other thing I like is to eat food that a region is known for, or that is hard to find where I live. For example, when I go visit my friend in Iowa City, I try to pop into the Quad Cities for some Quad City style pizza (although Chicago did just get its first Quad Cities pizza restaurant.) In Iowa in general, I'm always on the lookout for a good pork tenderloin sandwich, among other things. If I head on south, I explore barbecue and southern-style cooking. Detroit? Lebanese, Detroit-style pizza, coney dogs, etc. Ohio? If I'm in the area, pop into Barberton for some of their local fried chicken, or stop into Tony Packo's if I'm near the Toledo area. Or check out various styles of Cincinnati Chili in that area. Find a Hungarian restaurant in Cleveland. On the coasts, I look for fresh seafood. That sort of thing. Every region seems to have a food they're known for, and that's part of how I like to learn a little bit about various parts of the country.

Of course, doing this does require some time, effort, and research, and, like I said, not everyone gives a damn. Oddly enough, I generally only find myself at chains when I'm in the Chicago area (usually, because I just want a beer and a burger), or when I'm in the middle of nowhere late at night when little else is open.

[Long Time First Time]

I once read that Louisiana is the only state where you can reasonably expect to eat good food at ANY Mom and Pop place you go. The other 49 states - not so much.

I also like to try eating at non-chain places, and travel quite a bit in Indiana. So far, I've hit 3 really good places (one, in Portland, Indiana, had the best fried chicken I have ever tasted - by a mile) and countless numbers of mediocre to horrible.

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by Long Time First Time

I once read that Louisiana is the only state where you can reasonably expect to eat good food at ANY Mom and Pop place you go. The other 49 states - not so much.

I don't know about Louisiana as a whole (although it wouldn't surprise me), but the couple of times I've been to New Orleans, it seemed like every restaurant I ate it had very good food. I would gain about forty pounds if I lived there.

I also like to try eating at non-chain places, and travel quite a bit in Indiana. So far, I've hit 3 really good places (one, in Portland, Indiana, had the best fried chicken I have ever tasted - by a mile) and countless numbers of mediocre to horrible.

Yeah, Indiana is a bit of a toughie. There's a few places I like on I-94 along the lake, but the interior is a mystery to me. Though I do remember a wonderful breakfast at some place in Goshen, whose name is forever lost to me.

[Ferret Herder]

Originally Posted by Pai325

Unless you go somewhere Yelp doesn't. I'm in the second lArgest city in Illinois right now - looking for a decent bakery. No Yelp reviews here.

Unless you disagree with Google on what the second largest city in Illinois is (Aurora), Yelp turns up over a half-dozen.

[pulykamell]

By the way, roadfood.com is another good resource for travelers who like the food hunt. It's hardly exhaustive, but along with chow.com and a local message board called lthforum.com which has a forum for areas beyond Chicago, it gives one a good idea of what to look out for. Yelp can be good, but you really do have to read through all the reviews to get a sense of whether it's a place worth exploring. Some places are inexplicably rated highly (at least to my tastes), and some places that I think are among the best in the US rate at 3.5-4 stars (like Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, rated 4 stars over 652 reviews, which has the best pizza I've had in America. When you read the reviews, the negative ones seem to be from people expecting a different style of pizza than what Pizzeria Bianco serves, which is basically a Neopolitan style.)

[Ferret Herder]

Originally Posted by BigT

In fact, when I hear people claim that chains universally suck, I honestly wonder, if they got the chain stuff from a restaurant that pretended to be a mom-and-pop, would the food suddenly taste better? Did they get their idea about chains from places like McDonald's, which really is just about the cheapest possible food?

Not always. The one and only time my husband and I went to the Cheesecake Factory, we were thoroughly unimpressed. My husband had a pasta dish that I think was called "Spicy Chipotle Pasta" (or something along those lines), and afterwards, he got to quote The Simpsons by saying, "I can think of two things wrong with that title."* It wasn't spicy and didn't taste of chipotle.

That's not to say you can't get crappy food at mom-and-pop or even "upper scale" restaurants. The last place I just stopped eating my food because I didn't find it that appealing was at a new gastropub that was charging me ~$15 for maybe 1 cup worth of a roasted root vegetable shepherd's pie. I told the waiter I didn't want it comped, I just didn't find it interesting. It tasted bland and dried out.

*Nelson, after seeing "Naked Lunch"

[astorian]

Originally Posted by Long Time First Time

I once read that Louisiana is the only state where you can reasonably expect to eat good food at ANY Mom and Pop place you go. The other 49 states - not so much.

I also like to try eating at non-chain places, and travel quite a bit in Indiana. So far, I've hit 3 really good places (one, in Portland, Indiana, had the best fried chicken I have ever tasted - by a mile) and countless numbers of mediocre to horrible.

New Orleans is the only Louisiana city I've ever been to, so I can't and won't speak to the state as a whole.

But Louisiana-born conservative writer Rod Dreher (who's normally a HUGE advocate of localized shopping and dining) says that visitors to small towns in Louisiana tend to be VERY disappointed by the food, because actual blue collar Cajuns are more likely to eat at McDonald's than at the kinds of quaint, down-home joints you'd expect.

It's counterintuitive, Rod says, but nowadays you're unlikely to get quality Cajun or Creole food in rural Louisiana, because locals don't appreciate that cuisine nearly as much as outsiders and tourists.

[obfusciatrist]

There are people who eat like those audiophiles who will claim their ears are bleeding unless the sound is at the highest possible quality. Every morsel that goes into the mouth is a quest for heaven.

Most people don't eat that way. I know people who don't actually even particualrly enjoy eating. It is just something they have to do to stay alive. They'd prefer it not suck, but they don't particularly notice the different between middling and pretty good and it isn't worth effort.

Plus, when I was a kid we ate out at a real restaurant maybe once a month. The joy of eating out was not finding great food as opposed to ok food, it was for my parents in not having to clean up and deal with at least one kid every night whining about whatever had been made. For us kids it was about being able to pick what we wanted and not having to eat the same thing as everybody else, and then not having to clean up afterward.

In that type of situation there is a lot more value placed on the food not sucking than on it being great. With a chain (or the local restaurant they'd been going to for 30 years) you knew sucking wasn't going to happen (or how to avoid the suck on the menu).

When we're traveling, we do try to avoid known entities since that is the fun of traveling for us (I don't understand people who take the same vacation every year). And the modern technological age has really helped with that. But back in the day, on day 4 of driving through the rural midwest, not having had a decent restaurant meal in that whole time, the certainty of a basic middling breakfast at Denny's takes no a certain appeal.

[DrDeth]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

It's like people who drink, say, Coke and nothing else. Why? Does the 10,000th can really still taste so good you never want anything else? At least with, say, boutique wine or beer (or ginger ale or lemonade, if that's your thing) you can get brilliant while risking bad - either way you get an experience, something to talk about.

Do people really want their lives to be solely composed of such unremarkable experiences? Does anyone ever say: "I've GOT to tell you about the McD's I went to last night! It was utterly indistinguishable from every other one I've ever been to!".

Well, for example, when I was on a road trip years ago, we stopped in a little local burger joint. Got sick as a dog, spent most of the rest of the trip with either our asses or our heads in a toilet bowl. Made the trip living hell. Now, if we had stopped at a chain (our local fave is In&out) we would have gotten nice tasty fresh food, no food poisoning. Now sure, sometimes we have found treasures, too. But on some trips the risk is not worth the possible reward.

[Scumpup]

This area is loaded with mom and pop places. Just the borough I live in has about 10 or so. Some are restaurants only, others also offer alcohol. A couple of them are remarkably good. Most of them are entirely unmemorable. More than a few, also, are simply awful. They all stay in business, though, and all of them have customers at any given time.
So, if you came here to eat, and chose one of the mom and pops over one of the chains, you'd most likely get a mediocre meal that had nothing to recommend it over one of the chains. You'd also stand a pretty good chance of getting a meal worse than Applebee's or TGI Fridays. Bottom line? Mom and pop places, because of a pervasive nostalgia for a past that never existed, tend to be greatly over-rated as places where you can get these fantastic meals like the chains will never have.

[DrDeth]

Originally Posted by Ferret Herder

Not always. The one and only time my husband and I went to the Cheesecake Factory, we were thoroughly unimpressed. My husband had a pasta dish that I think was called "Spicy Chipotle Pasta" (or something along those lines), and afterwards, he got to quote The Simpsons by saying, "I can think of two things wrong with that title."* It wasn't spicy and didn't taste of chipotle.

Yeah, the Cheesecake factory makes good (but overpriced) cheesecake, but their entrees are only OK and also overpriced. What I really hate about that place is their corporate policy of making people wait- even when there’s no need to- to give the impression of high demand. Yes, dudes- when you see and wait in that long line a TCCF, you are being used for advertising.

[LavenderBlue]

Originally Posted by DrDeth

Yeah, the Cheesecake factory makes good (but overpriced) cheesecake, but their entrees are only OK and also overpriced. What I really hate about that place is their corporate policy of making people wait- even when there’s no need to- to give the impression of high demand. Yes, dudes- when you see and wait in that long line a TCCF, you are being used for advertising.

Is that really true? We have a Cheesecake Factory around here in the local mall. We rarely eat there because there's always a very long wait. A pity because I sort of like their burgers. But the same mall has excellent Chinese complete with really good dim sum on weekends. I'm in NJ. Good local pizza is also generally always an option around here. I've never run into a national chain that can beat a local NJ slice.

One of my favorite food blogs once tried every cheesecake there with good results:

http://sweets.seriouseats.com/2011/0...tire-menu.html

[DrDeth]

Originally Posted by LavenderBlue

Is that really true? We have a Cheesecake Factory around here in the local mall. We rarely eat there because there's always a very long wait. A pity because I sort of like their burgers. ]

Yes, many years ago there was a article in a magazine for restaurateurs suggesting this. It was said it creates a illusion of demand. TCCF was interviewed and said it had worked very well for them.

I tested this one time at one CCF when the restaurant was almost empty. They still made us wait. I will not longer eat there. My time is too valuable to give it up for free to give then advertising.

[LavenderBlue]

Originally Posted by DrDeth

Yes, many years ago there was a article in a magazine for restaurateurs suggesting this. It was said it creates a illusion of demand. TCCF was interviewed and said it had worked very well for them.

I tested this one time at one CCF when the restaurant was almost empty. They still made us wait. I will not longer eat there. My time is too valuable to give it up for free to give then advertising.

That's disgusting. It presumes that a customer's time is of no value at all. I'll never go to any CF ever again. We have lots of good choices around here so it's not exactly a sacrifice.

[DrDeth]

http://blog.prosper.com/2008/03/10/creating-demand/

"Many people are often of the opinion that you should always look for the busiest restaurant in an area on the theory that people go there because it’s good. A less crowded restaurant must not be as good. If you follow this line of thinking, you may pat yourself on the back for identifying a great restaurant where people are waiting in lines to get in, but you may just be playing right into their hands. The Cheesecake Factory is a brilliant example of this. They do not advertise. They count on word of mouth to bring in new customers. One of the ways they encourage people to come in is by intentionally making the restaurant too small for expected crowds. If you drive by a Cheesecake Factory, it always looks crowded. Once you go in, the menu is crowded, too, making your head spin with the endless possibilities. Chocolate vanilla cheesecake and vanilla chocolate cheesecake? This place is out of control! People feel they need to go there. The evangelism of a Cheesecake Factory fan can be overwhelming."

[Labrador Deceiver]

Originally Posted by bouv

A good example would be the town I'm in right now. Last night, I saw this local little BBQ joint...now, I should have known, BBQ in the north has, like, an 80% chance to be shit...and this was. It was supposed to be a Carolina style pulled pork sandwich...blank pork, and covered in what was clearly pre-made tomato based sauce. The fuck?!

I take it you've never had barbeque in western NC, where tomato-based sauce is king.
/hijack

[shiftless]

When I go into a chain restaurant I know how the food is going to taste (often good), how much it will cost me and how long it is going to take. That said, I have a rule that I try to not use chains when I travel. In general the food is rarely better in the local places, just different, which isn't a bad thing. Sometimes a local place will serve food that is exceptional and that is the point of trying such places. BBQ in North Carolina or Texas, for example, or freash local seafood. These things the chains can't do that well. But, if you just want a hamburger and fries in a hurry, why not go to the experts (Burger King, IMO?)

[pulykamell]

Originally Posted by Labrador Deceiver

I take it you've never had barbeque in western NC, where tomato-based sauce is king.
/hijack

Yes, to go over the styles:

Eastern NC style: sauce is vinegar, pepper flakes, and often black pepper and perhaps a bit of sugar to cut some of the sharpness. It is very thin, since it's vinegar.

Western NC/Lexington style: Basically, take Eastern NC style and add a bunch of ketchup or tomato-based product to it. Still pretty thin by middle American barbecue sauce standards, but it has some viscosity to it, and the sweetness of the ketchup mellows it out a good bit.

South Carolina mustard style: Lots of mustard + vinegar + sugar + spices. Sometimes with a splash of ketchup or tomato sauce-type product.

[gazpacho]

Originally Posted by Askance

What I don't get is why go to a chain at all. Yes, they are safe in that you get exactly the same old unexciting fatty salty sweet stodge you got last time you went there. Why is that a good thing?

Unfortunately they server fatty salty sweet stodge at the vast majority of mom and pop places as well. And a lot of the mom and pop places the stodge is not prepared as well as a chain restaurant. Some time it is better but a lot of time it is crap.