I like a good takeaway. So does Neil. Our conversation usually goes something like this…...Neil "what do you fancy?"......Me "I don't know. What do you feel like?"......Neil "I don't know. You chose"...…Me "No, you chose. I like anything"......Neil "I don't know. You decide". We can go on like that for ages sometimes, and it pretty much happens every time!
Once the choice is made we always get it delivered, unless it's fish and chips. Yummy.
The takeaway has always been around in one form or another. Street food has been available in most countries for hundreds of years. There is even archaeological proof of food vendors in the amphitheatres. People have always been willing to pay for someone else to prepare their food. I'm willing to pay someone else to prepare tasty food for me, especially tonight!
When my parents were young, and again through the early years of their married life, there was very little choice of takeaway. Fish and chips was the take out meal to get, and I know they bought it on the odd occasion, but I don't remember it being very often as I grew up. Partly this was due to them being very careful with money, and partly because they preferred to grow, make and cook our meals. They used to buy half a pig from a local butcher, and my dad would cut it up and freeze the meat. Dad had an allotment, and we had a big garden, so a lot of our food was home grown. Dad baked bread and made his own beer and wine. Mum cooked all our meals from scratch, and baked cakes and biscuits. This was all while both of them worked, dad full time and mum part time. I had a very healthy upbringing, and that was the norm. I think the first time I tasted a Chinese takeaway was when I was sixteen and a friend came round. She had chicken chow mien and I tried a bit. It felt exotic and exciting to try something so different to what I was used to, but I didn't have another Chinese takeaway until I had been married a few years, a long time after that day.
Fast forward to today. Takeaway and fast food is normal and very popular. I hold my hands up and will admit that, in spite of loving cooking, the idea that I don't have to do any preparation to eat is a joy sometimes. To scroll down a menu in anticipation, and think to myself shall I be daring and try something new this time makes me tingle with glee. Of course you then run the risk of getting something you don't quite like as much as your 'usual', and being disappointed. You do not want to be disappointed if you have ordered a takeaway! Some places are inconsistent in the quality, but on the whole we all have a favourite restaurant or takeaway we use time and time again. You know it's going to be scrumptious when it arrives, and you trust the place you've got it from.
The ultimate luxury is getting your takeaway delivered. We always do that!! The whole point of not having to cook is not having to pick it up either. It's the height of laziness of course, but definitely the way to go if you are having a duvet day!! Deliveries were an ingenious idea of someone somewhere, and most restaurants have copied it. There are even pizza bikes!! Pretty much every where offers delivery. Even some Burger King's are doing it, (yippee....though not ours 😞).
Anyway, according to the daily paper today, all this makes it easier for people to have access to the wrong types of prepared foods. Those with high concentrates of fats and sugars. The ones that make us fat and ill. Some of the ones responsible for the epidemic of obesity in the western world. Apparently we like our exotic food adapted for our taste rather than authentic, which means they are often changed. As a result, what we think of as proper Indian or Chinese food, for example, is often tweaked and sometimes full of processed meat rather than fresh. We've all had the Chinese chicken meal that is full of perfectly square cubes of meat! Chicken is not perfectly cubed! But hey, that doesn't stop the food from being super delicious, and that's why Neil and I are having a takeaway tonight. I fancy Indian food, but fish and chips will be better as Neil had his operation yesterday. His body probably couldn't cope with any spice. He has enough spice in his life with me anyway! 😅😅😅😅😅
No comments:
Post a Comment