So...since I just got done eating this, and I non-resolved to post more, lemme write about my favorite fastish food order. For the purpose of clarification.
I am lucky enough to live in a city with lots of what I call fastish food options. Really, it IS fast food, just somewhat less industrialized and non-food (to varying degrees) than your typical fast food. Chipotle, Snap Kitchen, Fresa's Delicious Chicken, erewhere. I've noticed that the businesses that tend to do the best are the ones that mimic our beloved junk food but in a healthier way-- hence the long lines at P. Terry's. The burger, more than any other item ruined by modern American foodways, seems to call for reform. I mean, it was a simple meat and usually involves vegetables-- how did we make it so awful? So, it is not surprising to me that I can visit Elevation Burger, Flattop, Wholly Cow, P.Terry's, Hopdoddy for a better burger (various combinations of grass-fed, organic, local, etc) -- sometimes without even getting out of my car! You may think that's some lazy American horseshit (it is) but things like breaking your ankle or teaching to the point of exhaustion all day really make you appreciate people first world handing your first world food inside your first world car.
Anyhow, its a good thing, because I love burgers AND they are one of the few restuarant items I can always count on to be adapted to my eatin needs. When I'm not bending and flexing my own nutrition guidelines, I order a plain patty (or two) on top of a salad, BUT sometimes I bend and flex my own guidelines for the sake of sanity and variety. This means that sometimes I get cheese and if I wanna get real wild, I will order french fries, provided the fries being served are just potatoes and reasonable oil, two things that aren't inherently irritating to my system as long as no other french fry hoo doo happens. (As an aside, I really love that P.Terry's gets to advertise fries in canola oil like it is fancy-- what the hell are the fast fast places using? Gasoline? Heart attack sauce? Never mind, I don't wanna know.)
Here's the deal I want to clarify: Every time I order my burger without a bun but WITH fries, it causes confusion. Either for companions or employees, but always someone. Look, people, I KNOW that the whole lettuce wrapped burger or burger salad thing became popular because people were avoiding carbs totally. I KNOW that it would be less calories, etc to skip the fries, but sometimes I get them. I don't think that's exactly what causes the confusion though. What seems to confuse people is the idea that I don't just hog down on all the indulgent items, just because I want one of them. Like when people scoff at the idea of ordering a slice of pizza and a diet coke. Remember when "pigging out" was a thing you could say you were going to do? That phrase went away though because A) the 80s ended and B) pigging out and eating are pretty much synomous in the standard American diet.
Even though I'm already ramble-ranting, I think it is worth the effort to explain why there's merit in my skipping the bun even when I want the fries. The first reason is simple--the bun is gluteny and gluten makes me feel like shit beyond a certain threshold. And bread is beyond that threshold. By shit, I mean that it causes bloating, irritability, and joint inflammation. I prefer not having those things, though I will put up with for something really good.
The second reason, people of 'merica, is the 'betes. Fries plus bread! That's just too much sugar to process, unless you just kick ass at processing sugar, and I don't. In the event that you don't know, it works something like this: If you dump a crap ton of sugar, in any form, but most especially in the forms that convert to sugar in the system pretty quickly, you get a profound insulin response aka an insulin spike. Your body is supposed to use insulin to process sugar, but SAD tests the limits of that system and often wears it right the fuck out-- also known as type two diabetes. The insulin response, in my experience and I THINK in science, can be evened out in a number of ways: not ingesting too much sugar/carbs-- why I'm able to keep my blood sugar in the 80s even though my insulin response is a little worn out, combining your sugar/carbs with fat (preferably good fat) which emulsifies it and keeps it from just DUMPING into your system, and using some sense of food combining-- like eating a balance of protein, carbs, and veggies ( for me, at least half as many grams of protein as carbs seems to work.) The latter two support my decision to get the fries instead of the bread, though of course the first point is why I usually don't get them. Oh apparently you can also slow the hell down when you eat though I haven't mastered this. I think it used to be that food traditions helped with this-- milk with cookies, balanced meals, sugar only in desserts, but I can only barely remember such things being widespread in my lifetime. Collectively, America's tradition is to eat like you are at a carnival, always.
So, people really expect me to either not get the fries if I'm not getting the bread-- who do I think I am making decisions that can't be marketed easily as a diet with a name?! Or more often I think it's just expected that I will get the bread because I'm getting the fries and also get a shake or a pie and wash that down with a soda (seriously soda, wtf are you? I'm not even drunk when I drink you. Useless.) Why not? It's crazy really-- even at the places that exist for the purpose of selling a more nutritious burger, I swear people would be more comfortable if I'd just order a dinner that will kill me. Or make me fat(ter). Gawd.
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