Guilty Pleasures

Normally I like to avoid chain restaurants and the like. However, I do have some guilty pleasures. I've been eating fairly healthy the past week to try to lose some weight. My doc suggested it would be a good idea. :) Both Tara and I were in the mood to go out, so we decided to hit Benihana. We enjoy the goofy show the chefs put on and we both have dishes we like: Tara goes for the chateaubriand and I go for the hibachi shrimp. I also love the ginger dressing and she loves the onion soup.

Another one for me is Chipotle. I love getting a nice huge chicken burrito with black beans, rice, pico, cheese and sour cream. I also love their chips with the lime flavor.

Dairy Queen Peanut Buster Parfait with chocolate ice cream. Georgetown, ME, where I grew up has only one road leading to it due to the fact it's an island. Growing up, you had to pass the DQ in Woolwich, ME. It was literally on the corner where you turned south on Route 127 to head to Georgetown. So that was where we always went for ice cream, except for the occasional trip to the LONG gone Dairy Joy on the west end of the Carlton Bridge connecting Bath and Woolwich. I'd hit the DQ a lot in the summers after I got my driver's license. Luckily working for my Dad's construction company during those same summers burned of those and any other extra calories I found. So the PBP's remind me of my massively misspent youth. :)

Basic McDonalds or Burger King hamburgers. Sometimes I just crave a cheap, mass-produced hamburger. I don't know why.

Sweet and sour chicken. Again, another remnant of growing up. We'd go to Chinese restaurant in the Holiday Inn (I think that's what it was) in Brunswick, ME, and I'd get that. Once in college in Worcester, MA, my friends would tool on me because that was all I'd order at Ping's Garden. So I eventually stopped getting that and started to try nearly everything else on the menu. Ping's was cheap and had great food, so we ate there a lot. One week, I went there three times, each time with a different one of my female college friends, and the hostess started giving me weird looks. :) I still have the soft spot for sweet and sour, so from time to time I give in to the urge.

Houston's Hickory Burger, without the Canadian bacon. Something about the combo of the beef, shredded cheddar cheese, and the bbq sauce on it just works for me.

Wendy's Frosty's. To me, it's like a huge cup of soft serve chocolate ice cream, but far cheaper than a similar amount of DQ ice cream.

Again speaking of DQ, I love their Krunch Kote topping. I never fail to have a lot of it fall on my shirt, but I just love it. However, my friend Joe in Maine dwarfs me in that. For him, Krunch Kote is the main course and the ice cream or frozen custard is purely incidental.

Fluff. You can't find it easily in Phoenix or Dallas, but nothing takes decades off my age like a toasted peanut butter and Fluff sandwich. Don't ask me to explain the difference, but marshmallow creme just doesn't cut it.

Jelly Bellys, primarily cherry and grape. Unknown why, but I just like them. I'm sure where ever my abused first car, a bright red 1978 Chevette Scooter (yes, even Chevettes could be made even cheaper with cardboard door panels), ended up, it still has fossilized grape Jelly Bellys under the seats from a bag that spilled.

UPDATE:
Thanks to Joe for reminding me of the Fat Boy, a throwback to 50's drive-in diners. Located in Brunswick, ME, it's a big square green building with parking spots around it. You park nose-first and when you are ready to order, you turn your headlights on and the waitpersons come to you. Nothing great, but fun for the nostalgia.