We So Ashamed

We went to Pizza Hut as a family a couple weekends back.  It felt like we were doing something wrong!  

Jesse and I talked about it afterwards:  When you go to an American chain restaurant in a foreign country you feel guilty... and looking around at the other costumers only confirms the feeling... we all feel guilty.  No one really makes eye contact, but we all know we're (mostly) Americans.

We decided it's because we all know we should be eating somewhere else.  We're in GERMANY for crying out loud! There are a ton of cool, local restaurants in our community.  And it's not like Pizza Hut and McDonald's are the only places you find people speaking English.

But for some reason, we sometimes find ourselves at an American chain and it just makes us feel dirty.

I think it's because, at least for J and I, we are going to (for example) Pizza Hut because we are missing the cheap, familiar chain restaurants back home.  If we have a hankering for stuffed crust pizza, we are drawn to that red roof... (actually, I don't think the one in Einsiedlerhof has a red roof)... but we don't know why we do it.  Because it's not the same as back home anyways!

First of all, it's more expensive.  There's no $10 large pizza deal like we used to get almost every Friday night during tech school.  And it doesn't even taste the same because we're in Europe and they do things less disgustingly processed more European.  The deep dish pizza doesn't taste as greasy.  It's ironically disappointing. 

So moral of the story: we try not to eat at American chains that often.  But that doesn't mean we don't miss them.  And when we do get sucked into the American vortex of restaurants, we usually regret it anyways.

I tip my hat to you Pizza Hut, 
But you are just not as good as ANY of the restaurants I can walk to down the street to.  I cling to the memory that you were once a source of comfort food for us.  But now you just make us feel guilty.
Love,
Conflicted in Germany