Featured Eating out

Clearly, I most enjoy low-hanging fruit.

However, I do get food delivered often. Mostly junk food. I found a pretty good pizza place nearby and I saw an advert for the double Big Mac the other day so I'm sure I'll get that sooner rather than later.

I can rarely, if ever, be bothered to cook. If it takes longer to prepare than eat I can't do it. Unless I can literally just put it in the oven and leave it. Also, I'm pretty fickle so even defrosting food is a commitment because then I have to eat that thing and who knows what I'll want to eat in however long defrosting takes.

I'm not big on sit-down meals. I'll get food at a pub usually unless I've already had to much to drink. Most of my social interactions involve alcohol though so I'll often not want to eat unless it's right at the start.

Restaurants I only go to on dates so it's, uh, been quite a while...

 

I'm cooking more and going out less. That's pretty much life these days.

 

Thank you for that! You seemed very comfortable expressing yourself verbally. I tried doing a similar response, but after several attempts I realized that I'm not used to recording myself and do not want to subject anyone to what would be a much more awkward and self-conscious attempt to communicate my views. I've resigned myself to the usual 45 minutes to type 3 paragraphs.

I resonate with a lot of what you mentioned for different reasons. I used to have a very unhealthy and entrenched routine with food and alcohol. Over the past several years my weight has fluctuated a couple times over a range of about 50lbs. At times, in order to manage it I would work very hard to restrict my diet during the day, then drink a lot and after that eat dinner before going to sleep. To a moderate degree of success I controlled my weight at the expense of my psychological health, i.e. obsessing over food and my routine, and getting terrible quality of sleep (no dreams, waking up super early and tired due to blood sugar crashing in the early AM, etc etc). Not to go too deep into it, I am no longer in that pattern, but I still have a tendency to adhere rigidly to whatever pattern works and it's sometimes a challenge to let that go. In the past I've definitely had instances of aversion to social eating, or just gotten something to go while other folks eat, for terrible reasons ("I won't get a good buzz if I drink later on a full stomach"), but presently it's got more to do with self-restricting carbohydrates. I sometimes get fairly obsessive to the exasperation of my partner, particularly if she's worked hard on a dish and I (seemingly arbitrarily) decide that it's got too much of something starchy or sugary. She's been very understanding and though we frustrated each other quite a bit, we've been able to reach more of a middle ground. I'm kind of afraid to let go of the current diet because it lost me 50 lbs and I'm worried that I'll gain it back if I ease up. Anyway, I also find that it's a lot easier to have peace of mind when I'm eating something that I've selected or prepared myself.

It seems like you made incredible progress and I can understand adhering to a structure that worked. For me, I think the challenge ahead is to let go of some of my rigidity. I think it may be possible by exploring other adaptations to my lifestyle that will allow me a greater breadth of control over my health without revolving so closely around my diet. However, food has always been an addiction so it's a work in progress.

 

Covid happened so no outdoors and your question is therefore too much of a confrontation to me

 

We rarely go out for a meal, only when we are with family or on special occasions - birthdays, etc. We have gone out for dinner on Christmas Day every year for the last three years and will do that again this year unless we are all still in lockdown. This is the place we've been going to - the view in the other direction gives you some idea of why we go there and it's only about 20 minutes drive from where we live. The atmosphere is fabulous which is at least 60% of what we get from going out to eat, and it saves a lot of the hassle of cooking and washing up.






But it depends what you mean by going out to eat. Until COVID, being retired we used to go out somewhere for a coffee and a cake pretty well every day - we'd take a newspaper or a book and read together for an hour or so. We'd go to this place on the hills of course (their fruit crumble is to die for, and occasionally I'll have a full English breakfast), but also to the usual coffee chains, and to garden centre cafes. Since the pandemic, we started making our own 'real' coffee and found it was better and cheaper than the stuff we were buying out, so that will change our habits considerably even when things ease up. We'll still go out for a drink, a snack and a read two or three times a week, though, because we like the atmosphere at the places we use.

We'll probably go out for a meal if we are visiting family or they are visiting us - usually for a light lunch or to a pizza house. We used to go to Indian restaurants occasionally, and there's a good Thai restaurant in walking distance, but both I and my wife have trouble with ibs (the perils of growing older ) so we don't use them so much these days.

 

It seems to kinda cycle for me and my family. It's usually never more than once a week but it'll cycle from going once a week for months to not at all for months. It's usually just take out/delivery and then going to a sit down restaurant only a handful of times a year, usually for someones birthday. I do go on my own to get fast food about every other week though with occasional breaks just because I'm feeling lazy and I can't seem to get over a fast food bacon cheeseburger on an occasional basis.

 

I generally like to cook; it's a rewarding skill that keeps giving as you learn more. I usually keep it simple during the week, and sometimes I'll try something a bit more involved or difficult on the weekends.

I like going out to a nice (not necessarily expensive, but one where there's some culinary magic going on) restaurant once every couple of weeks (not counting this year due to covid), because it's nice to not put forth the effort and get a really spectacular or unique meal. This gives me so much satisfaction that I really can't imagine living somewhere that didn't have a good food scene. I grew up in a small-ish town (200k metro) that definitely had a handful of good places to eat, but I'd go to the same two or three over and over again, which got boring.

I think some fast food is actually really high quality, so I'll lump those in with the restaurants above, but in terms of the McDonald's/Taco Bell/Sonic sort of stuff, I really have to be craving something particular or be really lazy to get it. Before all the Doordash stuff was available, I think I ate more fast food if I wasn't cooking and didn't want to deal with the journey to a restaurant, but now, I'm not super into it, just because the big fast food chains churn out mediocre food, for the most part.

 

They sell mainly standard English food - snacks through to fairly standard meals. They don't open evenings and are closed Monday-Wednesday ... most of business up there is from tourists and day trippers, so they aim at weekends. They get a lot of cyclists following one of our main long distance race routes and some bikers too, as well as the tourists, so they have interesting customers. This is their ordinary menu:

http://www.peakviewtearooms.co.uk/2020 Food Menu Sept Final.pdf

It's lovely up there - except a lot of the time they are in the clouds and it's all spooky and you can't see much at all, or it's chucking it down with rain. We like it all, but many only want the sunshine lol.

We live on the edge of a small town - 15 minutes walking one way and we are in the town centre, and 10 minutes the other way we are out in the open country. The road up to the cafe runs past us a few hundred yards away.

 

Hi Sloe Djinn,
I wouldn't ever give anyone professional advice or any kind of advice really because i have no idea what im doing lol.
But, as someone that has tried and failed and doesn't regret it.....You never know....you might love it and could be a raging success, and there's almost never the right time to do anything.

Spoiler: rehash of my business- super long weird story

I started my business with a friend- (my daughter's dad's partner/stepmum). We lived together in a rental and we both really liked my grandmothers semi-traditional indian fudge. She took some to work once and people literally ate it up. We then started making it for her to sell at work. We operated as a hobby, only using our own resources and kitchen, and demand kept growing through our network. We still had other jobs at this time. We then applied for a wholesaler/manufacturer licence were soon selling to cafes and other business/private parties etc. Unrelated to the business, people were always randomly dropping in at our place, and i always fed them, whatever time...whether coffee and treat or meal...just depended on the time and there was always enough regardless of how broke we were. People always gave excess produce where we lived...beautiful small country town. And whenever i made excess food I'd take it over to friends and neighbours. Some started offering to pay...which felt wrong...but we started really considering it as a business and we wrote out a business plan and applied for and received a government grant and mentoring.

We specialised in catering for people with special dietary requirements and we made healthy food that almost anyone could eat. It just kept evolving...people started asking for cakes, and it really started taking off. My friend fell pregnant and had to step back and go back to work fulltime and there was significant personal issues/dv happening in our home. But i kept on going and she helped where she could and soon we were crazy busy and catering 7 course dinners for groups and all sorts of crazy things. The best part was the celebration cakes which we made with oracle messages chosen through stichomancy. It was really wonderful to give someone an experience that made them feel truly valued and special, especially people that had severe dietary restrictions.

But the whole thing was messed up too....i was working from dusk till dawn, there was dv and sabotage happening consistently and i was trying to look after my kid and was half delusional and half facade. I'm not a business person, and im not a sales person, and i hate social media and im super private. I kept giving everyone discounts, felt sorry for everyone, couldn't say no to requests even when i was busy, was horrible at record keeping, couldnt find work life balance, always felt guilty for working around my daughter, was overly perfectionist, and generally hated asking anyone for money. My business mentor told me he didn't understand how i was still alive and i was both dangerously trusting, stupidly generous and paranoidly private with no business acumen. He felt the business was literally run completely on good will and intentions, and dumb sheer luck and sweat. And the worst part was that the business was called intentional creations and i was trying to create this food full of love and blessing, through intentional creation...but i was totally messed up and burning out rapidly.

The requests kept increasing, I kept pushing, the dv and conflict in my life kept escalating until i broke down and starting having ptsd whenever i tried to cook. I cancelled all my contracts and orders and was desperately trying to heal my life and protect myself and my child. And out of the blue, an amazing person gave me the opportunity to operate a vegan cafe at a spiritual retreat. This was literally like a dream come true....literally....but I had to say no because i was so messed up. No one could understand why i gave it up, i kept getting requests...but i felt like a fraud and didnt trust myself at that stage.

All that experience and all those mistakes taught me a lot about myself and life, and I failed gloriously....but i absolutely don't regret it. I would have always wondered if i hadn't tried. And I tried my ass off. And I may have another go in the future...and fuck it up again. Many people, especially business people thought i was a moron. And i can be...but im still me and i cant be them. I don't want to. I'm sure there's a healthy balance and medium in there that I'll find one day

I like this quote from Elon Musk "Failure is an option here. If things are not failing you are not innovating."
Its ok to fail. It hurts but its also the best way to learn. If I had stayed more low key and slow, and was more aware of my own shit...who knows? But it was screwing it all up that helped me come to those realisations.

Anyway...as i said...this is not advice in any way shape or form...just my story

I'm just saying....you never know.
And we have passions for a reason. Maybe you could write out a quick business plan and show it to a mentor....see what's sustainable. Whatever you do, best of luck with everything and just trust your gut...only you know what's best for you, your life, and your family.

 

Charlene, that was an amazing account. I'm sorry for the hardship and trauma that you experienced, but it sounds like you gained invaluable knowledge from it. I can't thank you enough for the wisdom you've dropped. I know, it's not advice, but I appreciate it nonetheless and will consider it as the days, weeks, and months go by. Here's also hoping that you find your way back to your passion in a manner that fulfills you!

 

I'm cooking more nowadays, because there is more time every day as I can work at home, so no more long commute to work like before the pandemic. I order takeout 1-2 times per week with a food delivery app as we get digital lunch vouchers as an employee benefit from work, I usually pick the healthier options from the menu. I think it's also a great way to support the local restaurants during these times. I rarely ordered takeout before the pandemic and I used to go out to different restaurants and cafés once in a while.

 

Wow Thank you, that's really kind!
Wishing you all the best and every success which ever direction you choose

 

I generally don't like eating out in restaurants. It's part of my social anxiety. I have problems with food in public places, other people houses, etc in general so going out to a sit down restaurant to eat is something that happens for me VERY rarely.
I do order in meals. I am lucky to live in a city that has a lot of variety in terms of what can be ordered in. When I am depressed and want to die I order in a lot more. When I feel like shit after being depressed and ordering in more I naturally start shifting to cooking at home.

Several years ago I exclusively cooked everything at home from scratch and did my best to not buy anything that came in a package. It was the best thing I'd ever done with myself. Now I do not do this anymore but it's something I need to do for my own life.

Let's just say I do cook at the very least 2 meals a day but they are completely unremarkable and are likely lacking in things that I need for health.

 

Denny's is a popular diner franchise in Canada. When I lived in British Columbia I lived with roommates and we all lived far away from our families. At Christmas, Denny's was open so we made it a tradition to go there for our Christmas dinner. I have some fond memories there.

 

I don't have a kitchen, so it's all takeout. And I lack culinary imagination, so it's all rice bowls and fast food.

I've used this as an excuse to leave the house every night and go grab dinner (plus a lunch meal to keep in the fridge for the next day).

 

I used to do it a lot. When I lived alone, I either eat out with friends, sometimes with my self to date her, or cook a meal for myself or for my friends who liked spending nights at my house. A month would never go buy without eating out for at least two nights or four. It was how I bonded with friends and loved ones.

When I moved home, my fam and I would eat out sometimes to celebrate special occasions like birthdays or small daily wins but we mostly preferred home cooked meals. We were big foodies in the sense that we always tried the hip new restaurant to judge it for ourself. Even then, I also often went out with colleagues from work for a beer or two and dinner. It was how we air out our concerns and ideas for work. Usually this would happen around once or twice a month and on occasions when married friends would cook up a party for their kids' birthdays.

Nowadays, nothing. Zero. We avoid it as best as we can. If we have to, we order take outs instead. My friends have been saying we should do it but I'm not so keen on the idea. It's okay if I lived alone but i'm far too protective of the senior citizens i'm living with so I would much rather not.

Safe to say I do miss it. It released a lot of stress for me to have good conversations with close friends over good food. We like food. Nowadays, it's more home cooked than outside food. We've also gotten the hang of food deliveries so we're practically exploring everything uber eats can offer at least on the weekends.

Why is this topic on your mind Slant?

 

So, I got the double Big Mac.

It was a Big Mac with two extra burgers.

I'm not sure why I was expecting it to be a game-changer. I did this with the Grand Big Mac which was, equally anticlimatically, a Big Mac with a slightly wider diameter.

That being said, I eagerly await the Grand Double Big Mac which, as far as I know, only exists in the imagination of myself and presumably other gullible gluttons.

I've got a feeling it's going to make everything right again.