Thursday, March 3, 2011

False Advertising

Wednesday night I had the pleasure of dining at our church potluck. One of the signature items was a tricked out hot dog. My son was raving about them having sampled one at a youth event last week. He said they were good but made him awfully thirsty.

I seem to be on a roll with my food reviews so I’ll try another one. I needed a break from Erb and Gerb’s sandwiches for awhile. I’m a little hesitant to go back there anytime soon after having to sneak into the ladies rest room. For full details, check my last blog.

Here they are, all beef hot dogs, bacon, sausage, mozzarella cheese, french fried onions, mustard, ketchup, garlic mayo, and pineapple sauce. I have a hard time stepping out of my comfort zone, but when it comes to food, I will always try something at least once. Believe it or not, they were actually quite tasty, I went back for seconds. This combination of flavors, even the pineapple sauce, was very good. The only change I would make is a few more drops of ketchup. The downside is it’s probably not the healthiest choice on the menu. People with cholesterol or high blood pressure might want to pass these by. My rating would be 4 out of 5 stars.

Would you believe the very next day, I get an email from Arby’s promoting their new sandwich, the angus 3-cheese & bacon toasted sub. If I bought the sandwich at regular price ($4.99), I got a free curly fries and drink. The similarity between this and the hot dogs was kind of spooky. But I enjoyed the hot dogs, so I took the bait and went to Arby’s for lunch.

This is what I got. Ok, I know all about advertising and marketing and the whole point is to put your food in the most positive light. But come on, this isn’t even close to the picture in the ad. I think every restaurant is guilty of this to some degree, but fast food chains in particular seem to blatantly dish out items that never look like the picture, ever. When was the last time you got something in a fast food place that looked like the picture on the menu?

The curly fries were great, my absolute favorite type of French fry is the curly variety. The sandwich was good too, it did have pretty good flavor. It just was not worth the $5, even with the free fries and drink, I won’t be getting this again. Rating is 2 out of 5 stars. My recommendation is to stick with Arby’s value menu. For $5 you can get 5 jr. roast beefs or 5 jr. ham and chedders. In my opinion a MUCH better value, and maybe just a bit better for you.

On another note, my old car turned over 222,222 miles. It’s been a good reliable car, but probably on it’s last set of wheels. The windshield is cracked all over the place, 2 out of 4 speakers don’t work, the radio works, but not the cassette player, no CD, sorry. The cruise control stopped working about 80,000 miles ago. And it leaks drops of lubricant all over.

All the above I can put up with if not for the fact the digital dashboard is going out. The gas gauge and speedometer are the same digital readout as the mileage above. When you first start the car, the whole dash is black, which means there is no way to tell how fast you’re going, or how much gas is in the tank. Probably not something you should take on a cross-country journey. After it’s been running about 10-15 minutes, the dashboard suddenly lights up. I’m still driving it, but am not sure for how much longer.

Keep checking the blog to see if the car lasts long enough for me to try the remaining 14 sandwiches at Erb & Gerb’s. Good eating everyone.

5 comments:

Steve at Random said...

When you write about food, you get my attention. And I have a car -- the Buick Park Avenue -- that's similar to yours. I'm considering at this point how do I sell it? It's too big for most teenagers. Should I take it to the car auction and see what it goes for? At this point, however, I don't really have any issues with it, except that it has more than 175,000 miles so I won't be driving it on any long trips. I'm also worried that I'll never find a car as comfortable as my Park Avenue. It has such a nice ride. So I guess for now, I'll hold on to it as I won't have any car payments. But it is becoming something of a money pit.

randymeiss said...

Your Buick is on the fence where you still might be able to get something out of it. My car is already 90% out to pasture. I'd have ethical problems selling it to anyone other than a junk yard. Our game plan is to drive it until it drops. If it's any kind of major repair, it's going out to Johnson's salvage.

Lisa Grace said...

Thanks for the post, Randy. When I saw these hot dogs on Man vs. Food I knew that would be our next challenge. Last year's Super Stack Heart Attack Burger was pretty good, but this was great! The hot dog stand where these babies are created is owned by a Cuban hot dog master. His are topped with a quail's egg. Hope you didn't miss it!

Unknown said...

I used to frequent a site that posted tons of photos of ads versus the real food at fast food places, it was pretty fascinating. And I don't like hot dogs, but MAN those look delish.

AZJim said...

The hodogs sound good. As far as the car goes, I just hope that when it gives up the ghost you are not someplace where you get into trouble.