I'm old enough (not that old really) to remember libs looking down on poor people for eating fast food because it's cheap and nasty and unhealthy.

Over time that's shifted to libs looking down on poor people for eating fast food because it's a wasteful extravagance.

Idk, 10-20 years ago getting fast food felt cheap. Now it's like "what the hell did I get that added up to 20$?"

Like, you used to be able to feed several people for 20$, and now you can't? Idk.

American fast food chains are always the worst quality for price here. The best are always the local chinese restaurants (although they are in no way authentic Chinese cuisine). The best of the best are the takeaways that are obviously fronts for money laundering. If they only take cash and change branding every six months, the food will absolutely slap and it'll be dirt cheap

Yeah. I already avoid restaurants, since I have a ton of allergies, and I just don't feel like rolling the 1/20 'cross contamination' chance. But like, I don't really feel like I'm giving much up, since I save money and health eating in anyway.

Pre-pandemic my wife and I were gourmands. we would have fun looking at different restaurant's websites during the week and try a new one out every couple weekends. We had favorites, we were the couple our friends would ask about where to go in town. We were kinda proud of it.

we both (without ever really discussing it) just stopped. something since that time is just... gone. Is it the exorbitant cost? the tired and careless waiters? The reduction in food quality? The tired and hungry people around us?

We've both spent at least spent a decade apiece in service. Maybe we were paying for a dream. Maybe our treat was not dinner, but 1hr 30 minutes pretending we were other than we were, paying to pretend we had the money to waste. For the illusion of a good life.

Anyway its gone. I can't even place my finger directly on what it is that is.

We've gotten baller making food from scratch. in the years since (it wasn't great at first haha) we learned to make things at home that are better tasting and cheaper than what i can get from the finest place I've ever been.

and you cant beat the company.

anyway i have no point i guess. fuck all restaurants? yeah. Fuck em, they are not worth it. and this is coming from me! I'm the guy who loved them! That was my fucking bag!

I can tell you one instance in which I eat out...

In all seriousness, I like to cook at home for the most part. It's cheaper, safer for me as a vegan, more customizable, and just more fun, especially since I like to try out various recipes. However, I live in a place with a shared kitchen, and I've been not using it so much because of some insufferable shit that goes on there. I do microwave any frozen vegan meals I can get my hands on, and I plan to start cooking regularly again once I finally move into my own apartment where I have a whole space to myself. That's gonna happen around early September, though.

As far as eating out goes, I like to do it at the cheapest joints where I can find a nice quick vegan bite. I find that a lot of Asian restaurants, especially Indian ones, do this job for me pretty well, but I change it up every now and then.

I remember the days when Carl's Jr advertised their "Six Dollar Burger" as a restaurant quality burger that sold for ~$4 back in 2001. Now six dollars is the basic burger these days. Today I notice the price premium for fast food over restaurant food (including inflation in both) has drastically shrank.

apparently that’s always been normal?

Maybe in some areas, but not everywhere. Restaurant prices are 30-50% higher in my rural area now than they were in 2019. Entrees at our favorite Chinese restaurant went from $8-9/ea to $11-13+, single-topping pizzas at the locally-run shops went from $7-8 to $10+ and extra toppings went from $1.25 to $1.75, and all the big chains are advertising higher prices, too.

A meal for two with an appetizer, tax, and tip is like $50 minimum now. Just a few years ago it was $30. COVID also forced a lot of people to cook more so they really take note when even fast food costs 5X what it would to make the same thing at home.

Anyways, If we all got a 50% raise I don't think anyone would complain about fast food prices.

I didn't really eat at restaurants before, but then COVID happened and working from home became far more common. Now I work from home a lot of the time, so I just cook at home most workdays just like I normally do. Being vegan (BTW) has somewhat limited my options too.

As a result, I really don't know what anything costs at a restaurant anymore, but whenever I happen to see a menu the prices seem ridiculous to me, even at fast food places which I thought were never worth spending any money in before the prices shot up.

I've already had some anxiety if a guy wanted to take me to a $$ or higher restaurant, but even now very few historically affordable places don't give me sticker shock. I'm almost becoming a total recluse who refuses to walk outside for any purpose.

I think last time i saw a mcdonalds menu it was like $11+ tax for a big mac meal, wasn't that long ago. I'm old enough to remember when it was 0.39 for a cheeseburger on Wednesdays

literally a few weeks ago at a work event we all drove off site to get macdonalds. they each spent over €10. for fucking macdonalds. i literally walked across the street to the corner store to get a drink for €1 and then waited until after work to go spend the same money at an actual nice indie joint for more and better food.

the same with taco bell and all the rest. you can get more for cheaper a bunch of other places, and the big brands are coasting off of their names (and driving those brands into the ground to squeeze out profits, as a capitalist will do).

incidentally, thanks american brands, for coming to my country and strangling everything else we ever had!!!

We eat way too much shitty junkfood because the kids love it and we often find ourselves out of time to cook a proper meal. For a family of two adults and three children we usually pay somewhere up to the equivalent of USD 60 for all of us. I think that is way too expensive for eating bullshit food out of a cardboard box.

I can't remember when we have been to a proper sit-down restaurant serving real food. That is just too expensive for us. I went to a nice-but-not-fancy Asian fusion place with work recently and the price just for the food there was USD 60 per person. The place was not the cheapest place in town but it was certainly not the most expensive either.

There's no good cheap ethnic places either. There's lots of pizza/döner places run by middle easterners with relatively low prices but the average quality of these is such that "Turkish pizza" has become a pejorative for disgusting greasy pizzas. Even the money laundering fronts are serving crappy food here.

my vibes based approach is: expensive is when you literally regret eating something, and its happening much more frequently

My ex and I had a rule to never order anything from a restaurant we could make at home. Quite conveniently, she was an incredible cook that could make damn near anything and I’m not too bad myself. The only time we’d ever eat out was for birthdays/anniversaries or sushi once every few months or so. Spending $50-$100 for us both at “fancy” places felt like an exorbitant luxury but I realize now that’s not far off from what many people spend regularly on meals.

The combination of very rarely eating out and then living outside the US when I did eat out slightly more resulted in me being absolutely shocked at prices recently. I went with a friend to a greasy small town diner and was in utter disbelief at $14 for an omelette. He assured me that it was pretty normal and it like short circuited my brain. I just couldn’t comprehend paying that much for a few eggs prepared so simply, easily 10x the cost of the ingredients. Paying that kind of premium regularly, especially scaled up on more expensive dishes, is so far outside of what I consider reasonable or even somewhat financially responsible that I’m shocked anyone does it. But the fact that the diner was PACKED with a line out the door made me feel like I was the one that’s out of touch with reality

This is me now, I can still remember when McZionisms had a dollar value menu though

Its all relative and people don't have sticker shock as much for things that are a trend, not a long term staple menu item (I would say that explains the "smash burger", you used to be able to get a griddle-cooked burger for less than that, even if it wasn't smashed but since that started as a trendy thing it showed up first in fast casual and more expensive places, not fast food per se).

if you look at individual items on a fast food menu though, many have like doubled in price in the past 10 years especially if you factor in "deals" that used to exist vs modern ones, they have inflated much faster than the overall market.

ProTip: if you're looking for fast food and have totally valid excuses for not eating at home (e.g. you're lying to yourself), balking at the fact all entres start at $9.99, some places are introducing $5 combos that are only available in the mobile app.

Restaurant meals have skyrocketed in the past few years. Used to go out to eat / order dinner every night since I was working wild hours and could afford it. Now going out for food results in a check of at least $50 whereas in the past it'd be more around $30 for a sitdown meal or pickup order.

Been eating out a lot less (once a week) and spending almost 50% more on food as to what I used to in 2018/19.

It seems like for fast food chains, dropping $10 bucks per meal or person will net you a few bucks back in change unless you're really trying to just get the least expensive option. Namely, no drink and no sides and no dessert. My baseline is Sonic with their Grilled Cheese sandwich, which isn't all that great, but you can usually ask for lettuce and tomato and I don't think I've notice an up charge. This runs a few dollars(ish) before tax.

Asian places seem to run a little over $10~$15 for a "plate" but you also get what feels like a pound of rice, veggies, tofu/meat. Probably the best deal as far as weight/price. Not including "buffet" style Asian places because I haven't been in one in 10+ years.

There's a bunch of non-chain Mexican places, brick'n'mortar and food truck, for around $5 bucks can get a few tacos which is alright but around $10 will get you a full place with a side of beans and rice as a side.

Its been too long for me to feel confident about my $20 a plate at a casual dining spot that I have in my head.