I’m genuinely curious. Years ago, I was a chubby young pothead who lived on fast food. Taco Bell, McDonald’s, KFC, you name it—I ate it. Back in college, fast food probably made up at least 50% of my diet. And it wasn’t just because it was quick and cheap—I actually enjoyed it.
But these days, I find myself craving it less and less. Besides being more health-conscious, it just doesn’t hit the spot like it used to. It’s more expensive than ever, mostly bland, and I feel terrible after I eat it. So what’s changed? Is it just part of the enshitification of everything? Have I just gotten old, or has fast food really gone downhill?
Taco bell has turned to ass. Even their bean burrito tasted off and most of the menu items I see are crazy shit that doesn’t resemble anything in terms of Mexican food.
The answer is probably “yes”
- Food is probably worse.
- Your taste buds might have changed.
- Your gut bacteria might be different.
I have a couple reasons for believing each.
- Nutrient concentration in food has decreased over time (Veritasium talked about a fascinating explanation for this) and the desire to find low cost alternatives like HFCS over cane sugar changes the taste of food.
- “Children prefer higher levels of sweet and are more sensitive to bitter tastes until adolescence.”
- Your gut microbiome literally changes over time.
I stopped eating fast food during covid and never got back into it.
The one time, post covid, I was out and stopped to eat, it was gross. But it’d been so long, I genuinely don’t know if it had always been gross and I lost my acclimation to it, or if it was actually more gross than it used to be.
Anecdotally, I’ve heard complaints online that the quality has gone down while the prices went up, so it probably has gotten worse.
I worked in a “European” US bakery for a hot minute around 2012, and one of the things I remember most was them trying to find new providers with cheaper products. This lead to a difference in taste because obviously in this case the cheaper products are actually a sub-par product.
A big part of it has been the consolidation of the businesses who sell food to restaurants. They all pull from the same places, and so the variety has gone down and the filler gone up.
It’s not just fast food, it’s all restaurants that are suffering this plague.
I never did anything better than learning to cook at home. My home-made pizza tops any delivery, and I always get to eat it hot out of the oven.
My home-made pizza tops any delivery, and I always get to eat it hot out of the oven.
What state/country do you live in?
Genuinely shocking to me how disgusting fast food places have gotten. But I’m also not sure if it’s just my perception
It super isn’t. Pizza is still alright in my experience, but everywhere that has fried chicken tastes significantly worse than it used to.
The big chains got worse since there is basically a cheese monopoly in the US and its products have gotten cheaper to produce and worse quality. The expensive pizza places are still great because they typically don’t source their cheese from them. Can’t remember where I read that.
Ex. Pizza Hit in the 80s was incredible pizza. It’s meh now.
It’s gotten worse. I don’t bother eating any of it because I make better food at home.
Doesn’t pot famously make food more enjoyable?
I agree, fast food is not worth what it costs. The reasonably quick food landscape has expanded though, we can get different things, better Mexican food, a Chinese fast to go place with some really good tasting stuff, a restaurant that advertises “curry in a hurry” even.
Popeyes is still good though.
Gonna have to disagree with you on Popeyes. They’re generally good for the first few months they’re open, the nosedive. The fries are good, the chicken is dry and extremely thin for what you pay.
It’s still good where we are, is in a run down part of town, not generally even fast, technically, but still so good. Publix has good fried chicken too but the spicy Popeye’s, so good and the only ‘fast food’ I will eat. Even french fries I generally just make oven fries now, but I never even try to make fried chicken.
Brand names have gotten worse, that’s not you. Cost saving measures upon making sizes smaller while still raising prices. I swear, KFC mid-2000’s was amazing compared to the bland oily ones of today. That said, you probably have gotten desensitized to them in general as you grew older too.
Local fast food is still really good for me, but I’d just avoid major brands like Mcdonalds. They’ve become synonymous with trash food.
I’m in the UK and KFC has gone downhill here too - something I’m very grateful for! A few years ago I got a real craving for a crispy, juicy piece of chicken with the colonel’s secret spices. I ended up with a grim, wizened leg that tasted of stale oil and despair. Never again. My own cooking is sooo much better, and cheaper too. Win win!
Cost cutting has made fast food restaurants worse in ways that aren’t essentially shrinkflation. Restaurants like Taco Bell cutting their beef with cheaper ingredients (though apparently it’s only 12% fillers). Chipotle giving you more of the cheap ingredients like rice, and less of the good stuff like guac. Even slower service and longer lines because they don’t want to pay as much staff during peak hours.
Smaller (especially privately-held) chains have been able to buck the trend, but cutting quality has been a popular option as of late.
only 12%
hurk…
It’s gotten worse and the portion sizes are like fucking 1/3rd of what they used to be. It’s also like 3 times the price now. So yes, fast food is absolute dogshit now and not even worth the price.
The feeling bad part is aging.
Quality has absolutely gone down, though, while cost has gone way up.
I’m feeling nitpicky in general so I apologize in advance.
Prices have gone up, not costs. The increase in overhead for these places hasn’t gone towards maintaining the same product quality, much less improving it, nor has it gone towards the pay of workers, and its not really even the real estate.
The bigger price listed is almost entirely because shareholders want more before they keel over finally fucking die
That’s fair. I meant cost as in cost to me, the consumer, which is the price, but I think what you’ve said here is a valuable thing to consider when wondering why it’s so expensive and yet shit now.
Thanks, I’m too scatterbrained to have put it in those words, but yeah, thats totally what I was getting at. Thanks
No worries, we’re all trying to make it through the best we can and I didn’t feel anything adversarial in your critique, just a desire for you and your fellow worker to be treated with dignity in their labor
Eating garbage food will also make you feel bad, no matter your age.
I used to eat junk food a lot in undergrad, and since I developed a tolerance/got used to feeling shitty I didn’t realize how much it impacted me day-to-day. Once I started grad school I shifted to healthier eating (real, unprocessed food), and quickly noticed how much better I felt, how much more energy I had. Now if I eat fast food (rarely) I always feel like crap right after the meal.
Like everything else they are dropping quality and portion sizes while increasing prices. Line must go up. Last time I bought a quarter pounder at mcdonalds it was definitely made from 70% mongolian horse lung. Yea, I remember when it used to be a tasty burger. Fucking weird that their “beef” has become gamey. And I definitely took a bite where I was like “yea, that was definitely spoiled meat”.
Depends on the company and where you live, I feel. Some has gotten worse, some has improved.
But they have all gotten more expensive. So goddamn expensive. These days I can order a well made, flame-grilled burger at a burger joint for the same price as fast food slop.
The only thing I’ll say there is that with burgers you can sometimes get out over your skis and take a tumble. A lot of sit-down places think some giant watery meatball is a good burger. While photogenic, it is not necessarily good, and a short-order smashed patty or (smashed patties) generally taste a lot better and are easier to eat.
The best burgers are almost certainly not fast food burgers, but the worst burgers aren’t either.
And about the same speed. Most places take call in orders too now so call ahead and it’s basically ready when you get there
Both?
Yes it has gotten worse and time is a relentless asshole.
RIP Trans fats. So delicious, so terrible for you.
Can we all just collectively accept death is an inevitability and eat tasty food? This need for perfection in everything we touch is killing me.
Yes death is inevitable but you do have the opportunity to guide how you are going to die, to a degree.
Treating your body like a garbage dump will give you a long slow miserable death as you age as the garbage destroys your body. Eating more healthy can lessen that effect.
Yeah but I want the choice without having to cook for myself sometimes.
No one’s telling you that you don’t have that choice… Just that over-indulging in that choice could lead to heart disease. What you find to be an acceptable level of risk is entirely up to you.
I think the taste and texture may have become noticeably worse after the ban on artificial trans fats. It definitely impacted some of the junk food I used to buy in the grocery store. (I’m not saying the ban was a bad thing, just that a lot of us noticed the change).
Whatever the cause, I have noticed it, too.
i freakin love fast food, and as soon as covid hit i had to start a ‘blacklist’ of places that have gotten so bad (chipotle/tacobell/bugerking), its just not even kind of worth it.
fiveguys is one of my favorites as it did not change in any way.
fiveguys is one of my favorites as it did not change in any way.
Besides that price haha
20 bucks you can get a proper burger at a pub
Yeah. But their fries go hard. Lmao.
They used to load up… We get two burgers and mid fry to split with partner. Last time they shorted me on the fries on 30 bucks order for two.
Haven’t been back since
Oh fuck. That’d give me pause too. Haven’t experienced a lack of fries yet. But for 2 burgers at 30 bucks. I’d expect enough for both of you lol
