> These are some of the nicest restaurants the average citizen can hope to afford to go to more than once in their lifetime. This is almost undoubtedly untrue.

> These are some of the nicest restaurants the average citizen can hope to afford to go to more than once in their lifetime. This is almost undoubtedly untrue. There are many independent or local restaurants in most regions that cost the same (or less) than the chains you mention. Ethnic restaurants frequently deliver more bang for the buck. In all of these non-chain categories there are “nicer” options that deliver a better atmosphere, food, wine, whatever the citizen in question is looking for. As for the chains, they should have at least one thing to offer: consistency. No one is faulting folks for having a guilty pleasure, or working a chain into their routine when they’re looking for a known quantity meal. But some people never break out of the mundane that consistency brings. The types who are too afraid to try things because they’re supposedly “fancy.” Or because they don’t look like they 2nd generation immigrants who run the restaurant down the road. The kind of folks who go to a Buca in Honolulu or Applebee’s in Times Square; those places are expensive as shit, and living a life like that is truly terrible.