5 ms·

This all feels eerily similar to the all the fake products on amazon that are just rebranded versions of the same thing. In my experience many of these restaur

This all feels eerily similar to the all the fake products on amazon that are just rebranded versions of the same thing. In my experience many of these restaurants are all selling the same food. They're buying recipes and ingredients from a big nation supplier like Sysco so you end up getting the food just prepared in a different kitchen. We've ordered Thai on UberEats and GrubHub from nearly a dozen places and despite different names the food is identical and is flat in flavor. I've taken to finding real restaurants and picking the food up myself. It's more inconvenient but i'm getting better food for cheaper while building a relationship with a real business.

m463 6y ago
It's amazing how trustworthy/reliable brands have been buried by a torrent of nonsense generic brands on amazon.
- tenebrisalietum 6y ago
  Brands in and of themselves are worthless when they can be bought and sold like commodities, or simply slapped on existing or even totally different businesses.
  - aabhay 6y ago
    That's the definition of a bad brand. A truly good brand cannot be bought and sold in that way, takes decades to earn the trust of its rabid fan base, and with every slight imperfection creates legions of haters that declare the brand 'over'. E.g. Apple. But at the end of the day, Apple earns its margins with its brand, and entirely its brand.
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
> They're buying recipes and ingredients from a big nation supplier like Sysco... One sees so much nostalgia among Americans driving across the heartland for "the traditional diner instead of fast food chains where the food is the same everywhere", when in fact so many of those traditional diners are sourcing all their ingredients from Sysco. You can have the exact same eggs or biscuits, for example, in supposedly mom and pop places in state after state. I think it was already in the mid 20th century that the US lost the diversity of cooking found in some other regions of the world, and so this latest development with ghost kitchens is only continuing a long trend.
- bsder 6y ago
  > so many of those traditional diners are sourcing all their ingredients from Sysco The question is what level do you source from Sysco? Source flour, shortening, sugar, etc. and make your own pie or cake. It will still be unique. Source pie mix or cake mix from Sysco and, yes, you've lost your uniqueness. The real question: do the eaters care? The continuing existence of places like Applebee's seems answer the question with "Apparently not."
  - HeyLaughingBoy 6y ago
    Well, the real answer of course is that some of the eaters don't care, at least some of the time. I love good food and I'm a fairly good cook, but that doesn't stop me from picking up dinner at McDonald's when I just don't feel like cooking. I don't think that the existence of Applebee's proves anything other than sometimes people want to "eat a meal that someone else microwaved."
  - benrbray 6y ago
    > do the eaters care? I think those who are aware of the problem definitely do care. Many people just don't think about it, because they're not old enough to remember a time where the local diner baked its own pies, simmered its own soups, etc.. For me, all my perceptions of food changed when I started traveling outside the United States. Basic staples like bread and soup taste so good in places like Germany and Japan by default, but food of the same quality in the United States would cost $20-30 per plate. This is a big reason I started cooking at home. The quality simply isn't there in the American restaurants that are affordable to most people, especially outside of big cities.
    - bsder 6y ago
      > For me, all my perceptions of food changed when I started traveling outside the United States. Basic staples like bread and soup taste so good in places like Germany and Japan by default, but food of the same quality in the United States would cost $20-30 per plate. So, what killed these restaurants in the US? They used to exist. Why did they go away?
bavila 6y ago
That's interesting. I live in Hawaii, and we have a lot of different Thai restaurants. They are almost all family-owned businesses staffed by people who either first- or second-generation Thai immigrants. Those ones are always the best, and they all serve the same types of dishes but they also all have their unique spin on things. I haven't been to a lot of Thai restaurants on the mainland, but the few I've been to on the East Coast have all been similarly terrible. I've always wondered just where these places are getting their awful recipes from.
- linksnapzz 6y ago
  My $0.02 for a good Thai restaurant on the East Coast, crazy as it may seem, is to check and see if they have a picture of the late Thai monarch Rama IX displayed prominently near the coat-check/hostess station/bar. I don't know what it is, but the Thai places who have his picture up are invariably better quality than the ones that don't. But yeah, Thai food on the West Coast was reliably better.
SMAAART 6y ago
Well, it's also happening at your local restaurant(s). Try to attend and "Fancy Food Show" and visit the booths of companies selling to restaurants. You'd be amazed at how streamlined production is from, prepared ingredients, to fully pre-prepared dishes ready-to-be defrosted/heated and served. I would not be surprised if in the near future 80% of restaurant meals will be ready-to-serve meals. The future is not what it used to be.
bobthepanda 6y ago
What's interesting is Thai food is actually part of a massive soft-power promotional campaign by the Thai government. https://www.vice.com/en/article/paxadz/the-surprising-reason-that-there-are-so-many-thai-restaurants-in-america https://www.vice.com/en/article/paxadz/the-surprising-reason...

m463 6y ago

It's amazing how trustworthy/reliable brands have been buried by a torrent of nonsense generic brands on amazon.

tenebrisalietum 6y ago
Brands in and of themselves are worthless when they can be bought and sold like commodities, or simply slapped on existing or even totally different businesses.
- aabhay 6y ago
  That's the definition of a bad brand. A truly good brand cannot be bought and sold in that way, takes decades to earn the trust of its rabid fan base, and with every slight imperfection creates legions of haters that declare the brand 'over'. E.g. Apple. But at the end of the day, Apple earns its margins with its brand, and entirely its brand.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

> They're buying recipes and ingredients from a big nation supplier like Sysco... One sees so much nostalgia among Americans driving across the heartland for "the traditional diner instead of fast food chains where the food is the same everywhere", when in fact so many of those traditional diners are sourcing all their ingredients from Sysco. You can have the exact same eggs or biscuits, for example, in supposedly mom and pop places in state after state. I think it was already in the mid 20th century that the US lost the diversity of cooking found in some other regions of the world, and so this latest development with ghost kitchens is only continuing a long trend.

bsder 6y ago
> so many of those traditional diners are sourcing all their ingredients from Sysco The question is what level do you source from Sysco? Source flour, shortening, sugar, etc. and make your own pie or cake. It will still be unique. Source pie mix or cake mix from Sysco and, yes, you've lost your uniqueness. The real question: do the eaters care? The continuing existence of places like Applebee's seems answer the question with "Apparently not."
- HeyLaughingBoy 6y ago
  Well, the real answer of course is that some of the eaters don't care, at least some of the time. I love good food and I'm a fairly good cook, but that doesn't stop me from picking up dinner at McDonald's when I just don't feel like cooking. I don't think that the existence of Applebee's proves anything other than sometimes people want to "eat a meal that someone else microwaved."
- benrbray 6y ago
  > do the eaters care? I think those who are aware of the problem definitely do care. Many people just don't think about it, because they're not old enough to remember a time where the local diner baked its own pies, simmered its own soups, etc.. For me, all my perceptions of food changed when I started traveling outside the United States. Basic staples like bread and soup taste so good in places like Germany and Japan by default, but food of the same quality in the United States would cost $20-30 per plate. This is a big reason I started cooking at home. The quality simply isn't there in the American restaurants that are affordable to most people, especially outside of big cities.
  - bsder 6y ago
    > For me, all my perceptions of food changed when I started traveling outside the United States. Basic staples like bread and soup taste so good in places like Germany and Japan by default, but food of the same quality in the United States would cost $20-30 per plate. So, what killed these restaurants in the US? They used to exist. Why did they go away?

bavila 6y ago

That's interesting. I live in Hawaii, and we have a lot of different Thai restaurants. They are almost all family-owned businesses staffed by people who either first- or second-generation Thai immigrants. Those ones are always the best, and they all serve the same types of dishes but they also all have their unique spin on things. I haven't been to a lot of Thai restaurants on the mainland, but the few I've been to on the East Coast have all been similarly terrible. I've always wondered just where these places are getting their awful recipes from.

linksnapzz 6y ago
My $0.02 for a good Thai restaurant on the East Coast, crazy as it may seem, is to check and see if they have a picture of the late Thai monarch Rama IX displayed prominently near the coat-check/hostess station/bar. I don't know what it is, but the Thai places who have his picture up are invariably better quality than the ones that don't. But yeah, Thai food on the West Coast was reliably better.

SMAAART 6y ago

Well, it's also happening at your local restaurant(s). Try to attend and "Fancy Food Show" and visit the booths of companies selling to restaurants. You'd be amazed at how streamlined production is from, prepared ingredients, to fully pre-prepared dishes ready-to-be defrosted/heated and served. I would not be surprised if in the near future 80% of restaurant meals will be ready-to-serve meals. The future is not what it used to be.

bobthepanda 6y ago

What's interesting is Thai food is actually part of a massive soft-power promotional campaign by the Thai government. https://www.vice.com/en/article/paxadz/the-surprising-reason-that-there-are-so-many-thai-restaurants-in-america https://www.vice.com/en/article/paxadz/the-surprising-reason...