Lately I’ve noticed that large gas station chains, that aren’t necessarily on the interstate, have pretty good ready meals. I mean the aren’t the usual wieners on the Farris wheel and warm up sandwiches. There are some places have healthy choices, too.
Which chains and where? I haven’t seen what you see.
I have long been saying that the first US convenience store chain to imitate Japanese convenient stores would be able to print their own money. Clean stores, polite people, fresh food, varied goods for sale. There were weeks when I lived on nothing but fresh food and snacks from Seicomart.
Maybe Chik-Fil-A could get in on this (though closing on Sunday wouldn’t be terribly convenient).
Maverick and Jackson’s in western US, Casey’s , Midwest also Quick Trip Midwest., Stop and Go,
Kwik Trip (headquarters in La Crosse, WI) now sell heat and eat meals. They have sold eggs and such for quite a while. Thier hot food offerings are OK IMHO. They have their own bakery.
some have a restaurant
Brian
Stewart’s in upstate NY has some very good food items. They have delicious hard rolls for breakfast and some decent sandwiches (tuna and egg salad are as good a home made). They also make their own ice cream, which is always first class, and have the best milk in the area.
Gas station food has improved greatly over the last 20 years or so, many have decent offerings and variety and work out good for a family where everyone likes something different and also very budget friendly. At a local ski area I try to stop there to pick up lunch for the family, much cheaper then the ski lodge prices and I find it just as good and sometimes better. The above mentioned Stewards is among them, Cumberland Farms also has a good selection, but many others as well.
My daughter does half of her grocery shopping at the aforementioned Kwik Trip. Their milk, eggs, bananas, bread, and even meat prices are often 30% lower than local grocery stores prices. Some offer a good deal on take- and- bake pizza, and some now carry fried chicken.
I’ve seen sushi on display round these parts. Seriously. I can just see someone going to the register and saying, “I’ll take a pack of Kools, two scratch-offs and, hey, look at that Sashimi!”
Gas station sushi are three words that should never be seen consecutively. Just like toilet wine.
Gas station pizza generally isn’t bad, but its hard to screw up pizza.
The slushies are good too as long as theres no mold in there. I think I got bad food poisoning from gas station slushies before.
Also the packaged sandwiches and individual donuts are good too.
As long as they remember to take them out of their packaging every few days and give them a rinse to freshen them up.
Italian motorway gas stations are another planet - they are set up to promote regional produce, so a decorative wall of different salamis and hams and cheeses leads to a proper espresso bar. I think I saw a hot dog on the cover of a satirical magazine, but that was it.
We’ve been consistently impressed with the equivalent offerings along motorways in France, too. They’re not all excellent, but the French take their food (and supply chain) very seriously, so the quality range is reliably “good or better.”
The food offerings at rest stops and gas stations along German autobahns, by contrast, are frequently pretty dire.
It’s been a year at least since I’ve gone inside at a gas station. Pay-at-the-pump means I don’t have to go in.
I have now lived in the South for 20 years, but I still miss the Wawa’s up in New Jersey from my youth (though I do hear that there are Wawa’s in Florida now). That’s how you do a gas station convenience store.
^ Yep, Wawa’s all over Florida; not bad, at all, but Buc-ee’s is working its way into the area and it should be an interesting battle.
Kind of sad that the best hotdog offerings in Dallas are sold at a gas station. (QTs)
(There are exceptions but few)
“What’s that black cracker?”
“A tomato”
I have heard actual food critics say that the best fried chicken is found at gas stations in the South.
Barbecue also.