The Restaurant Menu Highway...

I’m an English major and an editor.  I work with words daily.  I love adjectives, and I like to think I know how to use them.  “Edible product” corporations know how to use them as well.  Modifiers including, but no limited to doused, drenched, slathered, and smothered permeate commercials and menus everywhere.  This post stems from a radio advertisement I heard yesterday from the advertisers at a very popular food chain.  It featured “skewers smothered in sauce.”  Since when did that kind of hyperbolic modifier heighten appetites?  

A nationwide waffle eatery takes its adjectival employment to the extreme.  This chain offers potatoes that can be scattered, smothered, covered, and/or chunked in additional to various other descriptive versions.  As if the simple carbs of poor-quality white potatoes aren’t bad enough, this joint gladly tops this side choice with fat (fried onions), more fat (cheese), and even more fat (sausage gravy).  How ‘bout them adjectives?

...pick your potato adjective

But this should be something that can be easily avoided… barring any cravings or out-of-necessity nourishment when this chain is the only option… at the last exit on the highway… and the next exit isn’t for 100 miles…  Other wise be sure to steer clear of this road hazard!

The tricky adjectives sneak their ways in with “Prius-like silence” under the guise of foods that sound healthy.

Too many people think they are making a healthy choice when taking the salad exit off the restaurant menu highway.  The trouble is this exit still typically leads them into Calorie township, a part of Sugar city, which is in Saturated Fat county.  The salad is usually doused in dressing!  Solution? A helpful tip when deciding on an entree salad from a restaurant is to order the dressing on the side.  But that’s old hat.  Take it a step further and keep the dressing on the side.  Simply dip an empty fork into the dressing each time before you fill it with more salad and when the salad plate is empty, be amazed at how much dressing is left in that ramekin!

...some salad with that dressing?

I want to be healthful…aka full of health… which is not what I’m full of after downing smothered spuds or a soaked salad.  No one is safe when an eating establishment is permitted to prepare sustenance, so the best option is to stay local!  Leave the car in park and explore the world of healthier culinary adjectives with every home-cooked meal.