Jan Alaska

The only restaraunt on the list thats anywhere near us is Applebees, which is fine if you dont mind your mash potato running off your plate, I hate the place, if we eat out we usually eat at a local bar/restaraunt the only exception is an occasional visit to Pizza Hut Bistro that has the most yummy pasta.

I'd rather cook a good meal at home

Ash UK/US

Not sure I will ever eat at Mickey D's again after watching supersize me... I knew they were bad for you but when you get the facts and figures :scared: :scared: :scared:

Ash

AlisonPA

Thankfully my American husband thinks the chain restaurants are crap too. We have been to most of them locally and we are amazed that they are always crowded and the car parks are always jammed when we drive past. What amazes us most are the "all you can eat" Chinese restaurants that serve really, really old fashioned MSG's creasy Chinese food that are always crowded. Guess with some Americans it really is quantity not quality - hence the obesity.

Sarah

What I think is awful is when you go into those chinese buffet's (my husband LOVES them) is that I've seen loads of people walking roud who are morbidly obese and have those oxygen pipes up their noses and a cyclinder in a bag over their shoulder - I couldn't believe that when I first saw it. What are they thinking?? I could stand to lose a few lbs but if I had a tube up my nose and was a size XXXXXXXXXXL I think I'd get it and stay out of all you can eat buffets. Monosodium glutamate and high fructose corn syrup yum!

AlisonPA

I know what you mean. I have even seen a really obese woman on one of those motorised chair scooter things going round the buffet tables!

Bob

won't be going to the new branded italian bistro pizza huts then? *lol*

ironporer

Well said. Bottom line, salad and pasta and crap sauces are cheap...hence the menu options at Olive Garden. Best Italian I ever had was in St Louis, on The Hill, at a mom and pop place.

AlisonPA

There's a really great Spanish restaurant in Baltimore (Tio Pepe) - downstairs and made into lots of little rooms like a wine cellar. The food is very authentic Spanish and yummy and not overly massive portions. Wine list is wonderful.

Sarah

Anyone noticed how at a lot of these chain restaurants always have the A/C cranked up to max and you go in and you're freezing your nips off the entire meal? My husband and I won't go back to Don Pablos Mexican Cantina because we froze all the way through our fajitas! If we lived in Florida, fine but up here in PA it can be snowing outside and you go into Ruby Tuesdays and the A/C is on top speed! Same with Old Navy actually, its like a fridge in there.

Perfumdiva1

After this, I doubt anyone will ever eat in an buffet thing again

Went to a salad bar one day with my pal for lunch, and this lady in front of us, SNEEZED, all over the salad

So it was down plates for us, and I have never been able to enter a buffet establishment, of any kind again, even if they have sneeze guards

BTW, how come when you go to, say, Soup and Salad, everyone in there is enormous, and then they say, I eat salad and I am still huge, how come??

Well, suggestion here, dont pour 1/2 gallon of full fat, cream with added and extra sugar, salad dressing to your salad leaves, and cut out the baked potatoes with all its heart-attack making sides

And, then maybe you will find a difference if your weight loss

Sorry, but it just grosses me out, when people have a plate piled a mile high, covered in everything that is gonna kill you- EEEwwwwwwwwww, of course washed down with a gallon of coke

JMHO, and my major pet peeve

PD1

ironporer

Good points- from what I hear nobody here would want "real Chinese" food...we prefer the Americanized version.

AlisonPA

That's true. I definitely don't want to go to China! I guess I am just used to really good, modern British/Chinese food and definitely not buffet style.

Ash UK/US

I rememeber the very first time I came to the US my sister and I went into a Chinese restaurant and asked for something we usually order in england... the server told us it was not chinese, I told him we get it in the UK and he said english chinese is not the same as american chinese... of course we thought it was hilarious till we found out 'forgien' restaurants cater mostly to local tastes

NC Penguin

I have a Chinese friend (OK. She's HK Chinese) who travelled extensively in China so she ate real Chinese. She said what the Chinese eat on a daily basis in their homes was pretty horrible that she didn't like it much either.




NC Penguin

Eskimo

lol - that is so true in all the chains - nips like toothpaste caps (Woodsey not me)