Category Archives: America’s Culinary Treats

Did you know that the average American woman weighs 163 pounds, while the average American man weighs 190? It’s true. What does that tell us? Clearly some of you are holding us back, you skinny bastards. That’s why we at AFFotD present you with this list of foods which are delicious, American, and amazingly unhealthy. If we all work together, we can bring the average weight of an American above the Mendoza line! Get to reading, get to eating.

A Brief Foray into How Other Countries Are Ruining Pizza

“Oh God, no, not pizza. Ruin ANYTHING ELSE but spare the pizza!”

~Your Taste Buds

 hawaiin pizza

We talk a lot about pizza around these parts, but can you blame us? Pizza is just about the perfect, when done right. But, as you no doubt know, it’s…not always done right. Now we get a lot of flack from St. Louis and Ohio Valley residents because of our article that (correctly) points out what their regional pizzas are (garbage) but we can at least take solace in knowing that, as a nation, we generally have our shit together.

Other countries, though? Not so much. Sure, we’ve previously talked about Pizza Hut’s crazy international menu items, and England’s hot dog crust pizza, but we’ve not really taken the moment to sit down and let you know how badly other countries are screwing up pizza.

And boy howdy, are they screwing up pizzas.

Granted, this article only lists isolated instances—a bad pizza idea from a country other than America does not mean that the country in question does not know how to make at least passable pizza otherwise. But still, when we see pizzas being ruined across the world, it’s our duty, as Americans, to point it out. You know, so we can feel superior, and also so we can say, “Well, sure, we have St. Louis-style pizza, but we’re not monsters.

Because these pizzas? Yar, there be monsters.

A Brief Foray into How Other Countries Are Ruining Pizza

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Discontinued McDonald’s Items We Desperately Want Back

“Ba-da-ba-ba-daaa, We’re missing it”

~McDonald’s Customers

mcdonalds

Back in August, we wrote about how while McDonald’s is a great American establishment, they’ve managed to commit some real crimes against food.  We even promised in that article that we would not write any articles about the best food items you can get at McDonald’s, partly because it’s less interesting than “discontinued awfulness” and also partly because our Editor-in-Chief’s favorite sandwich there is the Filet-o-Fish which automatically discredits any opinions he might have about the McDonald’s menu as it stands in 2017.

But while we were digging through the disgusting, horrible ideas of McDonald’s past (ugh, that pineapple hamburger haunts us) we also noticed that a lot of items that were briefly on the McDonald’s menu seemed actually pretty good. Really good, even. Like, “man, we wish that was still on the menu” good.

So we’re going to talk about those items, wistfully, and mourn their passing.  Because some of this stuff, man…

Discontinued McDonald’s Items We Desperately Want Back

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The Worst Crimes Against Food McDonald’s Has Ever Committed

♫Ba da ba da daaa, send it to hell♫”

~Rejected Mcdonald’s Slogan

mcdonalds

It’s easy to make fun of McDonald’s, and in fact many most people who get mad when we make fun of their country (so pretty much every non-American) points out McDonald’s and its fast food brethren as some sort of dark stain on our American legacy.

“Don’t tell us our terrifying eel pies are gross when you all get fat on your Big Macs,” angry British people say because they lack the proper brain function to realize that the British dish in question is what a fucking nightmare looks like.

And sure, McDonald’s is not exactly “healthy” or “something you want to eat every day if you want to live very long,” but it also just hits the fucking spot sometimes, and there’s a reason why McDonald’s is popular enough to thrive in over 100 countries.

So yes, McDonald’s is good, don’t @ us. But McDonald’s also is constantly changing its menu, and change is not always good. So instead of writing an article about the best food items you can get at McDonald’s, which would mostly be our editor-in-chief trying to defend his Actually Bad belief that the Filet-o-Fish is their best sandwich, we’re going to talk about the times where McDonald’s really fucked up.

Because we find those funny, and also because thank God we don’t have to eat them.  So here’s a list of food items that would totally justify every angry Latvian’s criticism of our culture.

The Worst Crimes Against Food McDonald’s Has Ever Committed

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The History of Fried Pickles

“What?  They fry PICKLES now?  What’ll they think of next!”

~Bar Patrons In, Like, 2001

 pickles

People from other countries like to make fun of America for frying all their food, but that’s like making fun of someone for having a hot wife. Oh, what’s that, French tourists, all of our food is fried, making it taste a million times better? Real sick burn there, froggy!

Yes, we fry everything, because yes, everything tastes better fried.  We’ve gone over this in pretty exhaustive detail, so there’s no need to rehash things here.

Now, if you’re anything like the members of our staff, you’re drunk right now, maybe take a bit of a nap to sleep things off and get back to this article in a few hours.

But also, you eat lots of fried food, especially bar fried food. You have probably ordered many a chicken strip, mozzarella stick, or even fried mushroom if you’re into that sort of thing while downing a high gravity pint. But for our readers who don’t reside in the Southern area of our nation, the last fifteen years or so has brought a relatively novel fried item to many of your bar menus.

Fried pickles. It’s that dish that (again, for you southerners, you all grew up with these) at first blush seems strange. “Wait, so like…a dill pickle?  Fried?” many a Yankee has mumbled while looking over the menu at the Wood-n-Tap.

Yes, pickles, deep fried. You’ll order them for the novelty, but be surprised to find they’re delicious.

Juicy and bursting, salty and greasy, it’s the best kind of bar appetizer because it’s truly awful for you, but you can technically say you’ve eaten your vegetables that day. Gaming the system.

So with that in mind, we’re going to take a moment to tell you about the history of fried pickles, because now we get to list all of our bar tabs as tax write-offs.

The History of Fried Pickles

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The World’s Saddest Cuisines: Estonia

“Oh…oh no.  It’s another Russia-bordering country.  This is going to be so sad.”

~AFFotD’s Resident Food Critic

estonia

We know America does food better than any other country, primarily because when other countries make good things, we just steal it ourselves and make it bigger and better. We didn’t invent pizza, but have you had pizza in Italy? Our staff has.  t’s, like, fine. America does it much better, with a few notable exceptions.  Now, there are other countries that have great food as well (Italy’s still got us beat in the pasta game , for example).

And there are countries that have bad food.  But we don’t care about any of those countries. No, we take interest in countries whose food is not just generally bad, but wholeheartedly depressing in ways that cling to your soul.  We don’t know what caused our fascination with nations whose recipe books come pre-streaked with tears, but we’re not going to stop now.

Our latest nation with food that makes us so, so sad? The small Russia-adjacent nation of Estonia.  Strap in, this is going to be a doozy.

The World’s Saddest Cuisines:  Estonia

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The Worst Pringles Flavors in American History

“You Don’t Just Eat ‘Em”

~Wait, That’s The New Pringles Motto?  That Sucks

pringlessss

Pringles are the ultimate embodiment of America’s commitment to unhealthy but delicious food. They were invented by Procter & Gamble in an attempt to create a “perfect chip” that was not greasy and wouldn’t break or go stale. They also wanted to get rid of the issue of air in potato chip bags, which honestly doesn’t seem to be that big of an issue, but whatever.

It took over ten years to do this before finally being developed by a chemist from 1956 to 1958 (yes it took him alone two years to get it down). It had one slight slight design flaw, however. It tasted horrible.

Another P&G researcher had to come in to find a way how to improve the taste, while a mechanical engineer who also was a well-known science fiction and fantasy novel writer, designed the machine to cook them.

All in all, the Pringle as we know it was eventually released in 1967, and managed to get national distribution in 1975. While all that sounds like the fever dream ramblings of a bedridden retired R&D worker, it’s actually the 100% true story about how we got Pringles, a delicious potato chip that comes in a container you can get your hand stuck in.

And while just about everything about the Pringle completely justifies this drawn out process to give you a potato chip that you can use to make duck lips, as we’ve seen with many other esteemed American products, sometimes we get a little too cute with flavors, and end up with nightmares. Here are the worst flavors of Pringles that have been sold in the United States.

The Worst Pringles Flavors in American History

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The Dumbest Types of Sommeliers That Actually Exist

“A sumally what?  Oh you mean a wine guy?”

~American Fine Restaurant Diners

sommolier

French people are only good at two things—being snobby, and making wine. They’re also good at being made fun of by Americans, but that’s really us being good at something than anything else.

Sure, the French didn’t invent wine, but you can argue they invented fine wine, which is why even the staunchest of Americans allow themselves to order wine by using French terms such as “Pinot Noir” and “Cabernet Sauvignon” and “Franzia with some ice cubes, please.”

They even created a profession that consists of knowing every kind of wine and telling people what kind of food goes well with what kind of wine. You might call such a person “a wine guy” or “look at this smug Frenchie fuck” but they are actually called sommeliers, and the process of becoming one is surprisingly exhaustive and difficult as far as “jobs about booze” go.

Sommeliers are experts in all things about wine, including food pairings, service, and descriptions. A sommelier might find themselves in charge of developing wine lists, training staff, and pretty much anything that a restaurant might need done to or with their wine, and becoming one takes months of training and thousands of dollars spent on mandatory classes and tests. It is only for the most dedicated wine aficionados.

Or at least it was. Because apparently, people have gone ahead and become sommeliers for…well, some pretty stupid shit. Here are some sommeliers who are absolutely ridicuolous.

The Dumbest Types of Sommeliers That Actually Exist

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Jesus Christ Why Do We Have To Keep Talking About How ALDI Is For Poors

“There is nothing more important to me than defending the honor of ALDI, I am not a corporate shill”

~Apparently half of the goddamn internet

aldi

Nearly six years ago, we wrote an article called “ALDI Owns Trader Joe’s, Corners The Market On Cheap Food Knockoffs.” Not to get too “how the sausage is made” on you, but the entire reason we wrote it was that one of our staffers was at an ALDI with their roommate, and made a crack about the ALDI brand of Ramen Noodles along the lines of “oh, you want TOP Ramen? Well lah dee dah Mr. Rockefeller.”

That’s it.

The article gives a brief history of the company, makes jokes about all the cost-cutting corners ALDI does, pokes fun at their store brands, and closes with a joke about how people who have jobs don’t shop there, and that their produce is low quality but cheap.

People.

Lost.

Their.

God.

Damn.

Minds.

So much so that a year and a half ago, we had to write another article about ALDI to clarify our position, because people were digging up this random article and posting the most pissed off comments imaginable there.

Seriously, we wrote an article that was jokingly like “ALDI is bullshit” and ALDI shoppers reacted as if their loved ones had just told them they don’t actually like missionary position and they should switch things up a bit.

Now, as our follow up article points out—ALDI is fucking fine, if you shop there, you do you, but ALDI literally does nothing that warrants the level of corporate shilling that you motherfuckers give it. If ALDI shoppers got together and formed a club, their motto would be “Well, Actually…”

We barely have the energy to throw away our empty whiskey bottles when we wake up in the morning, yet scores of grocery shoppers are looking up obscure articles about ALDI, finding the two paragraphs that talk shit, and posting long (LONG) comments that are like “I actually make good money, but I still go to ALDI, here is the exact percentage in savings I have, and let me name various brands and products that ALDI offers that I enjoy.” No one gives a shit, Gladice.

You guys, they won’t go away. They stalk us to this very day.

So fuck it. We’ll lean into the skid. Come at us ALDI lovers, you’re about to get a dose of hate.

Jesus Christ Why Do We Have To Keep Talking About How ALDI Is For Poors

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Cap’N Crunch’s Grossest Flavors of All Time

“Give me a break!”

~Um, That’s Not The Theme Song To Captain Crunch…

oh-captain-my-captain

When Captain Cap’n Crunch first hit the shelves in 1963, we didn’t worry ourselves with the fact that he’s not an actual Captain, and instead went wild over the corn-based cereal that was the first to be coated in a thin layer of oil to give it an additional boost of flavor.

The cereal itself was developed by Pamela Low, a flavorist (shut up, it’s a thing) (no it actually is) at Arthur D. Little who tried to make a cereal that tasted like her grandmother’s recipe of brown sugar and butter melted over rice.

Now, as far as “tasting like sugar butter over rice” goes, Captain Cap’n Crunch was an abject failure.  But if we look at the product through a “holy shit, this is really good, let’s put some crunch berries in it” lens, it was a roaring success.

Now, Cap’n Crunch is everywhere, and you’ll hear no one complain about that fact because Cap’n Crunch is goddamn magical.  That is, when they’re not trying to showboat.

Yes, much like Marshmallow Peeps, Oreos, or, God help us, M&Ms, Cap’n Crunch has tried many times to fly to the sun, only to see their waxen wings melt away. That was a very elegant metaphor about how you shouldn’t sell Cap’n Crunch that comes with fucking pop rocks in it.

Cap’N Crunch’s Grossest Flavors of All Time

more-like-totally-smashed-berries-amiright

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The Strangest Flavors of Lay’s Potato Chips in the World

“What?  But…why?”

~Your Taste Buds

crab chips

The potato chip—America’s most effective salt delivery system since 1853.  We as a nation eat 1.5 billion pounds of the stuff a year, which pares down to about 4 pounds of greasy, delicious shame for every American.

It is an actual American invention, coming into existence because of a douchebag customer who kept sending back his fried potatoes for not being thinly cut enough, and the chef who said, “fuck you, I’ll give you fried potato peelings then and oh holy shit he actually likes it?”

Since its inception, potato chips have spread all over the world, which is a good thing for people who work at liposuction clinics, and bad news for people who are trapped in countries that have decided a potato chip can be flavored as anything, no matter how batshit insane it is.

Surprisingly enough, we’re not talking about Japan, despite the atrocities they have committed against the humble Dorito. No, we’re talking about Lay’s, the parent company of Doritos, and a brand of potato chip that, for whatever reason has been hijacked by pure insanity in countries across the world.

And before you say “Hey, I tried a bag of Borsch potato chips one time, it actually tasted pretty good!” we just want to remind you that you’re wrong and we don’t care what you have to say.

On to the distressing potato chips!

The Strangest Flavors of Lay’s Potato Chips in the World

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