Restaurant/DoorDash discourse

[ghostrunner]

Stuff like this makes me feel like a grumpy old man. Same for anytime someone complains about the cost of DoorDash meals.



these are replies to the same tweet - I think the third one is a weird troll, but the other 3 I think they really believe what they're saying.

[thrill]

I saw the post from the guy who exported his doordash purchases and spends like $25k a year.

I'm afraid to do it, because I'll be closer to that number than I would be comfortable seeing on a spreadsheet. I'm probably between 10-15k.

Unlike these dummies, I know I'm doing something very stupid. I live alone right now and just hate having to feed myself three times a day. I've got like 4 free hours a day and don't like spending 1-2 hours of that cooking and cleaning up. I do cook on weekends. I'm very bad with money.

[cardinalkarp]

For the average person if you spend more cooking at home you’re doing it wrong. I would say that the difference isn’t as great as one would expect (at least in my case), but the quality of the food I’m making at home is so far superior to any of the garbage you get from takeout it’s not even an apples to apples comparison.

People need to stop looking at it as a $ to $ comparison in relation to the food cost. Start including costs of some of the healthcare and medications you’re having to take because you’re slowing poisoning yourself with crap food should factor into the costs, but no one wants to see that.

[ghostrunner]

I'm sure it depends. I could see people who live in NYC having issues - you might have a kitchen the size of a closet, and a fridge about water heater sized. So freezing and storing food isn't as possible. Single people probably have trouble - you probably need an additional freezer if you want to buy a lot at once and not have it go bad. Having said that, sandwiches aren't difficult.

But the rationalizing is pretty off the charts. Gas money is paid to the restaurant and the door dash driver in the markup. Also I don't believe people who say time is money about their personal time are running side hustles 24-7.

If you like eating out or just hate cooking, then just say so. I like eating the food I cook, but the cooking itself sucks.

I saw the post from the guy who exported his doordash purchases and spends like $25k a year.

I saw that too. Apparently that was from 2023 and the guy is now dead, which isn't surprising if you saw what he spent it on. I think you can eat out and eat pretty healthy, but he clearly wasn't. I think Chick-Fil-A was his top restaurant, Chili's was second, and he had spent $1300 between two doughnut places.

[cardinalkarp]

I think you can eat out and eat pretty healthy

Once you look at the ingredient list of the so called “healthy” options I think you might reconsider. Most foods you’re going to get from a takeout place (unless you’re getting takeout from an expensive restaurant), is just highly processed garbage.

I see your point as far as location making it a potential issue, but NYC is one place, I would think most people whether they rent/own a home or apt have a full size fridge and a kitchen large enough to make a meal in.

Whether you like cooking or not (I happen to like it), it’s still a “chore” of sorts. It all comes down to whether a person wants to make that sacrifice for their health.

[IMADreamer]

Living out here in the hinterlands we obviously don't Doordash. We do eat out most Friday nights with friends. I admit I don't go to the grocery store often because we have a freezer full of meat, and try to have fresh veggies from our own garden as much as we can but I can't imagine Doordash is cheaper than eating at home. Even if you are figuring up washing dishes and all that.

My question is, isn't your food cold by the time it gets to you by Doordash? Let's say I order a steak, potato, and steamed broccoli which is my favorite meal ever. That has to be mushy and cold by the time some guy goes to get it from the restaurant where it's probably been sitting, then drives it to you.

[ghostrunner]

I think you can eat out and eat pretty healthy

Once you look at the ingredient list of the so called “healthy” options I think you might reconsider. Most foods you’re going to get from a takeout place (unless you’re getting takeout from an expensive restaurant), is just highly processed garbage.

I see your point as far as location making it a potential issue, but NYC is one place, I would think most people whether they rent/own a home or apt have a full size fridge and a kitchen large enough to make a meal in.

Whether you like cooking or not (I happen to like it), it’s still a “chore” of sorts. It all comes down to whether a person wants to make that sacrifice for their health.

We'd probably have to get into what you consider processed or highly processed, but I'd bet we also likely have different risk tolerances. I don't take great pains to avoid processed food, but we only go out to eat once or twice a week so I don't worry about it much. I think eating at a sit-down restaurant even a few times a week is probably fine even if there is some processed food involved. Eating at McDonalds a few times a week probably isn't. I assume a cheeseburger from there has at least 3 what I'd consider highly processed ingredients. Generally I don't eat at chains, which I think probably helps, but i also think a steak with veggies and fries from Outback is probably mostly harmless. If they use seed oils to cook it, that doesn't concern me for example. I will also knowingly eat highly processed food at times if I like it enough. I love ice cream and I assume most of it is processed in some way that's not great for me, and it's inherently full of sugar, but I'm still going to eat it.

I'm for taking steps to identify what's being done to food, but I think you really do need government to address that at any kind of scale, and I think we probably disagree on the specifics of how that should work.

[ghostrunner]

Living out here in the hinterlands we obviously don't Doordash. We do eat out most Friday nights with friends. I admit I don't go to the grocery store often because we have a freezer full of meat, and try to have fresh veggies from our own garden as much as we can but I can't imagine Doordash is cheaper than eating at home. Even if you are figuring up washing dishes and all that.

My question is, isn't your food cold by the time it gets to you by Doordash? Let's say I order a steak, potato, and steamed broccoli which is my favorite meal ever. That has to be mushy and cold by the time some guy goes to get it from the restaurant where it's probably been sitting, then drives it to you.

I don't find that's a huge problem, at least picking it up myself and bringing it home. I mean it's never as good when eating at home vs right at the table, but it's usually not cold either.

I think DoorDash drivers often have thermal bags to store things in too, and some restaurants just package their food better than others.

[cardinalkarp]

I think you can eat out and eat pretty healthy

Once you look at the ingredient list of the so called “healthy” options I think you might reconsider. Most foods you’re going to get from a takeout place (unless you’re getting takeout from an expensive restaurant), is just highly processed garbage.

I see your point as far as location making it a potential issue, but NYC is one place, I would think most people whether they rent/own a home or apt have a full size fridge and a kitchen large enough to make a meal in.

Whether you like cooking or not (I happen to like it), it’s still a “chore” of sorts. It all comes down to whether a person wants to make that sacrifice for their health.

We'd probably have to get into what you consider processed or highly processed, but I'd bet we also likely have different risk tolerances. I don't take great pains to avoid processed food, but we only go out to eat once or twice a week so I don't worry about it much. I think eating at a sit-down restaurant even a few times a week is probably fine even if there is some processed food involved. Eating at McDonalds a few times a week probably isn't. I assume a cheeseburger from there has at least 3 what I'd consider highly processed ingredients. Generally I don't eat at chains, which I think probably helps, but i also think a steak with veggies and fries from Outback is probably mostly harmless. If they use seed oils to cook it, that doesn't concern me for example. I will also knowingly eat highly processed food at times if I like it enough. I love ice cream and I assume most of it is processed in some way that's not great for me, and it's inherently full of sugar, but I'm still going to eat it.

I'm for taking steps to identify what's being done to food, but I think you really do need government to address that at any kind of scale, and I think we probably disagree on the specifics of how that should work.

Obviously most foods we eat are involved in some sort of processing for the most part, and unless you’re just eating the most basic of diets it’s impossible to avoid. I try my best to avoid high and ultra processed foods, but even I have my shortcomings.

We rarely eat out (maybe once a month), so when we do we’re pretty picky on where it is due to it being a special occasion. I would agree that steak, veggies, and fries from outback isn’t even close to the worst meal out there in the most basic sense, but I try to be conscious that it’s likely factory farmed beef (which is loaded w/ antibiotics and hormones), veggies that have been sprayed with loads of pesticides, and fries that are fried in seed oils….and all of these are things I try to avoid. Of course with that being said, it’s exponentially better than eating at a fast food joint.

Eating out is almost always going to result in the above situations (especially at chain style sit down restaurants), because there motive is profit over high quality sourced ingredients. We too don’t really eat at chains, I would much prefer to give my money to a small local business, and typically one that advertises where they source their ingredients from (which is few and far between, hence only eating out very infrequently).

I completely understand that the way my fiancé and I eat is not doable for everyone. We have the luxury of being able to spend more for meats and other products that are either locally sourced or from small farms where we can have direct contact to the farmer themselves. We figure the additional cost is made up from the fact that we do make nearly all of our food at home (in addition to lower health care costs in the long run). During the summer we grow all of our vegetables (from seed as much as possible) and fruit (although our trees are still small) to take some of the burden off costs, although that in and of itself isn’t cheap, especially when first starting.

All of it is really personal sacrifice in some aspect. Would it be nice to be able to cut out the 10+ hours a week I spend cooking and gardening (even though I find those things enjoyable for the most part), sure, but even those things provide me benefit. Whether it’s learning the skills of gardening and cooking, to getting outside in the fresh air and sweating my @ss off, those things do provide benefit to my life.

It’s been a complete shift in how I used to live, which very much consisted of the standard American diet, and it took some work and discipline to make those changes, but I believe in the long run I’ll live a much better and healthier life because of it.

[sighyoung]

First, I think some people enjoy cooking because of the creative and self-expressive experience of cooking, and even out of love of cultural memory. My wife is like that: she will often decide to cook one evening, even though we have leftovers, because her job is stressful and she really enjoys keeping busy, doing something that's rewarding, and creating something that gives her a sense of control and reward. Plus, she's knowledgeable enough to make healthy food and to substitute ingredients and try different spice options when she wants to. Cooking is a joy for her.

She also has taste memory: she remembers dishes that she had or made twenty years ago, and says stuff like: "Do you know what I have a taste for? That gazpacho that I made years ago that contained . . . "

Me, I couldn't care less about that sort of thing. I never know what to order at a restaurant because I can never remember what I liked and ordered the last time I was there. So long as food is relatively healthy and provides sufficient calories for me to survive into the next day, I'm good to go.

But takeout options are often not good for us because of dietary restrictions. I now have high blood pressure (likely hereditary), so I have to watch salt intake, and you can't always get restaurants to modify ingredients. My wife (even though she's very fit and thin) is pre-diabetic. So it takes a good deal of thought to find a restaurant that satisfies both of our needs (or in which I can tolerate a dish that's moderately high in sodium, rather than really high). Most fast food is out, but a lot of restaurants have pitfalls. You can control ingredients more if you make the food yourself.

But we really do save money making our own food, too. Convenience is the main reason we eat out or get takeout, followed by the desire to have really tasty food that we couldn't otherwise make ourselves.