For example: A mass produced scotch-egg (for those who don’t know it’s a boiled egg wrapped in sausage-meat wrapped in breadcrumbs) A homemade scotch-egg has a semi-runny yolk, sausage meat that tastes properly like sausage, and an utterly devine taste.
A mass produced scotch-egg is cold, un-runny, and has a taste that is typical of a mass produced snack - savoury and tasty, but not devine. Nothing like a homemade scotch-egg.
So post your examples of local or semi-local foodstufs that are bland when they are mass-produced.
Pizza. The quality of the pizza is inversely proportional to the size of the chain. Single restaurant: can be great. Chain restaurant: prepare for mediocre. Pizza Hut: prepare for mediocre and a case of the runs.
Hand dipped cone vs. Nutty Buddy. (Nutty Buddys were once a popular pre-fab cone with hard chocolate topping and peanuts, in a paper wrapper. They’re now sold only regionally.)
Hamburgers. Sorry guys, I don’t care if you claim that it is 100% Sirloin or Angus beef. It still sucks hard. I can get the cheapest meat and blow that away and I’m a marginal cook at best.
Does false advertising mean anything to you?
Yes I am bitter because I wasted Eight dollars on six all beef patties that I am pretty sure any self respecting dog would turn its nose up and rather go hungry.
Not necessarily. For simple age-related hearing loss, cheap non-custom “hunter’s aids” will do a perfectly fine job, at one-tenth to one-twentieth the price of custom. Anyone who needs hearing help should check out this very inexpensive alternative first. They are analogous to the cheap “reading glasses” sold in every drug store that work fine for normal age-related far-sightedness.
Mass-produced and department store-bought bikes can be absolutely great, but you will have a lot fewer troubles (in terms of bike durability and your own comfort) if you go to someone who knows what they’re doing to (a)assemble the bike, or at least make sure everything’s on properly, and (b)adjust everything to properly fit your body and riding style. That last one in particular requires face-to-face service that a factory can never provide.
I seem to recall several threads involving posters who have to #2 as soon as they enter a Barnes & Noble…
It’s not a local foodstuff, but I nominate cotton candy. The only brand that ever came close to getting packed cotton candy right was Charms, with their “Fluffy Stuff”…and even that was really too thick and grainy. Most other kinds – particularly the cotton candy sold in plastic tubs – has a horrible chemical taste. Good, fresh cotton candy (particularly specialty varieties, like those made with honey or maple syrup) is the only reason for me to go to the state fair.
I wish I had thought of this. Several foods available at fairs are pretty much impossible to get right via mass production - corn dogs and funnel cakes as well as cotton candy.
This kinda applies to a lot of medical stuff. Dentures/Glasses/Hearing Aids/Prostethics all need to be built to suit a certain person’s requirements.
Can you find cheap mass-produced versions of these things? Sometimes (reading glasses/cheapy hearing aids). But if you want it done right it has to be built for the individual.
My eyes suck so bad that I had to get my lenses custom-ground, because no lenscrafters in the region kept them in their inventory. Luckily, they did a good job, but I had to pay around $450 by the end of it. That’s a lot of $$ for me.
Luckily, they did a good job, but I had to pay around $450 by the end of it. That’s a lot of $$ for me.