I have heard that the Caesar salad has more fat then the big mac.
I could be wrong.
He lied, Sauce Maltaise is ancient in foodie terms. Though it is supposed to be blood orange which is not a sweet orange. Probably the sweet of regular OJ is what made it suck.
Contrary to rumor, there actually is a real cheese called “American cheese”, tasting very much like a bland version of cheddar. It is an authentic cheese, not a “cheese product” or a “cheese food”.
The “cheese product” and “cheese food” are not true cheese (though cheese is used in their making) whose chief virtue seems to be cheapness and melt-ability, thus, they are commonly found on cheese burgers or in dips and sauces. Also found in “institutional food” like school cafeterias. Regrettably, due to their lower price people have gotten into the habit of buying them instead of real cheese (of any sort) and thus the myth that American cheese isn’t cheese - it is cheese, but the single-slices aren’t.
As a general rule, if the individual slices also need to be individually wrapped lest they melt together it’s not cheese. If they can exist as slices lying next to each other without spontaneously merging it’s actual cheese.
Yep we have them too - useful and cheap but nothing like real cheese
You are wrong.
Big Mac: 29g fat
Premium Caesar Salad with Grilled Chicken: 5g fat.
The fattiest salad I could find in their list is the Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Crispy Chicken, at 22g fat. And it contains both bacon and deep fried chicken.
http://nutrition.mcdonalds.com/getnutrition/nutritionfacts.pdf
Also, we have regular cheese, I don’t know where you get the impression that we don’t. A few states, including Wisconsin, New York State, and Vermont, are known for their top quality cheese production, especially of cheddars. (to where “Aged Vermont Cheddar” is a thing you see on a menu as a selling point).
What it looks like to me is that the Australian took several elements that are truly present in several different regions, and hodgepodged them together into a conglomerated impression of “America” that’s wrong as a whole.
For example, the way garbage is stacked in NYC. You really do see stacks of garbage on the street, especially late at night. Some places do use cans but many large residential buildings and food businesses do not, because there’s no place to store a container suitable to the volume without permanently blocking the street. As noted, the garbage is picked up within hours of being put out (landlords can be ticketed for putting garbage out too early), but, as garbage is picked up on different days in different areas, you are likely to see some stacked garbage on any given day. So that item is true for NYC.
On the flip side there are actually relatively few chain fast food places in NYC. Times Square is the exception but its not true generally of touristy areas. Within two blocks of the 9/11 museum, for example, I could name one fast food outlet (a Burger King), and 8 places to get a fresh salad. In fact, chopped salad is getting so ubiquitous, it’s news. The BK, moreover, is directly across the street from a park where high quality, cheap food carts congregate. I can’t think of a chain fast food place near Rockefeller Center, the Metropolitan Museum, or in SoHo, to name a few places tourists tend to go.
Maybe in LA or Hawaii, there are a lot of fast food outlets (I don’t know, I’ve never been). But Garbage-stacked-on-streets and only-fast-food-available and can’t-find-a-salad are not existing side by side in one place.
I was born ‘in L.A.’ (which is to say, what they call ‘Greater L.A.’ and not The City of Los Angeles, but for all intents and purposes, it’s L.A.). I lived in The City of Los Angeles (or ‘Los Angeles proper’) starting in my 20s for 17 years. What people see on TV and in the movies isn’t what the reality is. Hollywood? Pretty sleazy. (Of course, I like sleaze!) Santa Monica? I remember when what is now the Third Street Promenade was a run-down stretch of stores like Woolworth’s. And the movies never show the homeless people. TV shows are always showing people living in places they can’t possibly afford, and they often fail to show the kinds of places most people live. Location A is depicted as being just a short distance away from Location B, when the two places are miles apart. (Malibu is 20 miles from the beaches of Santa Monica, for example.) As a native, I like to pick out locations I know when I’m watching a movie or TV show; and I’m frequently amused by their depiction’s.
Many visitors to the U.S. live in tourist destinations themselves. Syndey, London… wherever. These visitors should think about their own cities, and how they are portrayed. They’ll probably laugh at the difference between fiction and reality. So it is with the U.S. tourist destinations. The locals there are much like the locals elsewhere. (And with 16 million people in the greater L.A. area, not everyone can be driving a convertible down PCH!)
I came in to say this. I have no idea where one could go around here to get fresh fish and steamed veggies. But I do know you can make them the best at home. Probably for cheapest too. To me restaurants aren’t for your day to day fresh, healthy options they’re for indulgences.
Since Australia is mostly all coastline (population wise)…if you take away fish, what else is serves in Aussie restaurants?
Totally off-topic…
Years ago Peter Russell-Clarke recounted a story about a recipe he shared on his TV show of the time. It was basic scrambled eggs, but with orange juice instead of milk for the liquid.
A very disgruntled lady rang to give him a good dressing-down, complaining that the scrambled-eggs were totally inedible. Poor Peter was most dismayed as he thought the recipe was bonzer, so he thought to ask the lady about her method to see where she may have made a mistake.
Turned out that there was no fresh orange juice in her fridge, so she substituted that vital ingredient with FANTA.
Stui, having spent a couple of weeks in LA a few years ago, I have to say to your friend “not right”. I was traveling with a friend who is a vegetarian, and we were also on a tight budget. We vowed to eat healthily so we wouldn’t get, you know, “clogged up” and not enjoy our holiday.
We found PLENTY of places to eat, and pretty cheap too, compared to Aussie prices. We ate at some great Korean places, little eateries in malls, cafes on the side of the road, and ok, I had a couple of hamburgers and hot dogs too (proper hot dogs with German sausage and the works -the best I’ve ever had).
I’m ashamed to admit I did expect to see fat people - sorry, that’s the rep Internet USA has, but that’s just another myth - the people were oh so friendly, and pretty good-looking, on the whole.
Didn’t notice any particularly bumpy roads.
That’s not true. People have been complaining about the shitty infrastructure in the USA for as long as I can remember.
In all fairness, if I went to Australia with no prior knowledge other than what I’ve seen in films and tv, I might be disappointed that I did not get into a knife fight with a crocodile, meet aborigines with magic tracking powers, feed a baby to a dingo, watch a prisoner get booted, drag race in the last of the V8 Interceptors, help a talking fish find his dad, go to a Yahoo Serious film festival (I’m not sure what those works mean in that context) or have sex with Elle MacPherson.
That’s not as funny as you might think. I have heard many a tale of people migrating from England because of the image of Australia they get from years of being brainwashed by Aussie soaps like Neighbours and Home and Away. It’s like “Hollywood” Australia, with golden beaches, beautiful homes, young, suntanned people - you know the drill. After spending a few years struggling here, a lot of em go back.
I’d think that the relevant metric was per capita rather than per square mile because you need to have the tax base to afford the roads. Then again by that measure you’d expect the outcome to be reversed.
Some “small city” places I’ve been to that might be considered “redneck towns” that aren’t too far away from major metropolises are Lynchburg, Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia and Martinsburg, West Virginia. In terms of major metropolitan areas, Lancaster, Pennsylvania struck me as much more redneck-y that I was expecting.
Yup. The whole country is like that. Your friend should stay home, and so should you.
Seriously, this kind of petulant hostility is uncalled for and just affirms ugly American stereotypes.
I believe the op was affirming ugly American stereotypes. With a thinly couched "golly, is the whole country this way?’
I invited him to skip his plans for a visit. The offer still stands.
She should have went to Florida and stayed on Disney property. Pretty close to the magical American place.
Keep in mind that the USA is a lot larger and more populated than Australia. The states of New York, Texas, Florida and California each have a population comparable to the entire country of Australia. That in and of itself can be a bit of an adjustment.
Nope, go, and prove your friend wrong. And really “the roads were bumpy”?? Who worries about stuff like that?
Southern California (basically Santa Barbara to the Mexican border) and Australia each have 22.68 million people.