WHERE'S THE BEEF
Cindy Maddera
We hit the road as soon as we got home from work for our last camping trip of the year. Usually, one of us stops by Planet Sub and picks up sandwiches for the road, but our Planet Sub was closed or not answering their phone on Friday. We left the house with chips and just planned to get something on the road. We ended up stopping at Loves/Hardee’s. Michael took the dog and handed me some money, telling me to go find something for myself to eat. Then we would trade places. I looked all over that Hardee’s menu and saw nothing I could eat. The young man at the counter asked me if he could help. I asked him if they had something like the Impossible burger. He said “No Mam, but we do have the Beyond Meat patty that is all plant based.” I said “Yes! Give me one of those with cheese and curly fries.”
I grabbed my order and then traded places with Michael. I was about three bites into my sandwich when Michael walked back out to the truck. He threw open his door and incredulously asked “Are you eating a hamburger?!?!?” He’d looked at the menu too and had not seen anything vegetarian. When he saw me eating my Beyond meat burger, he assumed that I had resorted to just eating a regular hamburger. I explained to him that I was not eating a hamburger and he nodded his head, but still looked skeptical. I might have been a little excited about being able to eat a fast food burger, but this is something I have not been really able to do since I became a vegetarian/pescitarian. There have been many a road trip where Michael’s most common question is “but what are you going to eat?”
I have never been concerned about this. I know I can walk into a convenient store and grab some nuts and a bag of chips and be just fine. My diet is my choice and I have no expectations that places will be accommodating. Growing up in a state where beef is what’s for dinner and there are college meat judging teams means that choosing a vegetarian lifestyle is going to be a challenge. Salads have bacon on them. That’s just how it is. I have learned to adapt and get creative while traveling. I have also learned to not be picky or snobby or have any expectation of not having to ask for them to leave the bacon off the salad. Also, when you are on a road trip, you don’t expect to be eating anything all that good for you anyway. The junk food is part of the fun of a road trip. In spite of my low expectations, I am really happy that more fast food chains are embracing plant based options like the Beyond Meat patty and the Impossible Burger.
Michael talks about White Castle burgers at least once a week. They do not exist west of Columbia MO. There had been some questions about whether we should stop in at the one in Columbia on our way home from our camping trip. Michael did not want to take the camper through the drive-thru and then he thought there would be nothing for me to eat. I forced him to stop. I walked up to the drive-thru window and the woman inside said “Mam, you cannot walk up to the drive-thru.” She then sent someone outside to take our order. Michael finally got to eat some White Castle burgers and I got to eat some Impossible White Castle burgers. Josephine got to eat a lot of french fries. We were all winners.
Now I kind of see the point of Michael’s obsession with White Castle.