Comment by pomian | Hacker News Reader

Comment by pomian | Hacker News Reader

We used drive across America - the USA and Canada regularly, for over 50 years. In the last 10 years the annual drives, especially up and down the west coast or inland up and down (I15 for example), have changed completely.

There used to be great country diners along the way, a real treat after driving all night to pull in to a gas station, eat a country breakfast. At night, there would be steak houses, burger joints, chili shacks, taquieras, and so on. Now, there are only, these mega stops, with fast food chains, all of them the same. You can drive 2000 miles and chew on identical food and cultural experience. A big part of the pleasure of travel has been destroyed, not to mention the health. What used to be culturally local home cooking, is now the the basest junk food, with hardly any food value, or pleasure. I would hate to be a truck driver nowadays. Now you have to drive away from the highway, sometimes miles, to find an eatery.

It would be nice if that changed? But I think the big chain gas stations- together with the big car companies, will lobby for special funding from the government, as they seem to do, to add charging infrastructure. And a chance for local cultural identity and food, will be passed into history, again.

I think it's a way that inflation's expressed itself. The only way to keep prepared food affordable for ordinary people having an ordinary meal has been relentless application of economies of scale and making the food worse. That keeps the prices close to "the same" but if you find food that tastes like even mid-tier fast-food in 1995 it costs 3x what it did then, not 1.5-2x like the current fast food joints. That's because they squeezed more money out of economies of scale, and made the food worse.

A place serving a decent home-style or local-diner-style meal that isn't just microwaved can't compete with the Pizza Hut express or a McDonalds for the money of people just popping off the highway for a bite and a fill-up. They're too slow and they (have to!) charge too much. Plus land and rent's getting more expensive all the time, in excess of broader consumer inflation, and has been for a while (many fast food chains are also plays for real-estate value, as I understand it, which is another way they can afford to undercut local competition)

Conversely with the rise of Sikh driving culture in the US the last few times I stopped at truck stops I got much higher quality food (samosas & butter chicken thank you!) and was able to fuel up on good quality tea.

Those things weren’t available ten years ago. I’d argue over the last 10 years highway food has gotten better in the US.

Samosas is quality food?

I think pretty much anything can be quality food if it's done well enough.

>> You can drive 2000 miles and chew on identical food

For people with food allergies, I don't think you understand what a life-changer that is.

That's a very educational comment. I didn't think of that view point. Thankyou. Although, I wonder, if you find the little mom and pop outfit, if they wouldn't be more flexible in tailoring the food to your requirements? I would assume there are always locals with special needs too.

Nobody takes it seriously, they just think you are on some sort of fad diet. The chains don't take it seriously either but since they're standardized you know what makes you really sick and what makes you less sick.

I imagine it comes down to risk. Anecdotally I did food prep for my college dining hall and we had a decent number of people asking for sandwiches on gluten-free bread, but we only had one who asked for a very strict protocol (had to be from a new bag of gluten-free bread, new gloves, sauces were squirted on only (no spatula that could have touched glutenous bread)). We knew the customer by sight so were used to going through the process - I'd guess it'd be tiresome to have to explain the whole process at every new restaurant.

That said, I'm doubtful a fast food restaurant would do much better for a dietary restriction that severe. I too miss local and independent restaurants and am a little sad to have missed the "golden age" of road trips in the US.

It’s like playing roulette. Will they know what’s inside of the food they make? I don’t mean this as a dig, sometimes it is difficult. Most places don’t make _absolutely everything_ from scratch. There are various sauces and bases that they outsource, and keeping track of all of the allergens is difficult.

I have found that the small restaurants do go above and beyond to _find out_ if they have an allergen. Once I had an owner call two suppliers to check the ingredients for a particular sauce they were using and had mixed in to a lot of the entrees.

But also, I’ve had horrendous experiences, from being purposely served croutons (“gluten isn’t real”) to arguing that a dish lacking milk did not mean it was gluten free (turns out there was barley in it and my wife got sick).

Homogenization has definitely made _our_ lives easier, although I do believe there is something lost in it.

My strategy for end of day meals when driving long distances is to look for a non-chain brew pub in a smaller town. You are going to find a business that is the passion of the owner and that sets a certain minimum threshold for food quality. Plus if they felt they needed to make their own beer they will probably be paying attention to food instead of selling Sysco glop bucket #6.

Override this strategy if you see a non-chain restaurant that hasn't had its exterior updated in 3 decades with good reviews. They probably have something good going on.

Accept that sometimes this strategy will fail.

This is precisely the goal. However it's sad, you have to drive further from the highways to find something. Then, the last time I stopped to ask someone at a gas station for a good local restaurant - specifically not a chain, the answer I got was "there's a Denny's down the road." Nothing against Denny's - but they missed the point.

I would attribute this perception to state and county highways increasingly being used as last resorts when interstates are not available. The major interstate stops are newer and more planned out. The diners are still there but are increasingly outnumbered as commercial infrastructure is continually built. I agree that locally owned, unique stops are a better experience than a series of Casey’s and the like and hope that Americans will become more adventurous again, which could cause capital investment to return to unique establishments.

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