I used to eat “raw” hot dogs as a child and the thought makes me so queasy now.

I have to agree. They also plump them up really well compared to boiling.

It must depend on both the quality of the dog and the bologna. I remember vividly as a youth trying Oscar Mayer’s offerings of both at the same time (back when I ate cold hot dogs as a snack) and they tasted exactly the same.

I’m going to pile on here - you’re missing a bunch of brands. Also, if you’re going to cram Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods in there, you may as well be judging the house brands for Walgreen’s, Walmart, Kroger, etc. Good grief.

There’s a few regional, but well-known, brands missing here - but Utz is particularly damning.

I would love to love our local burger place - everyone does. But each time I’ve gone, the meat has basically been meatloaf meat made almost-smash burger style, so there’s chunks of onion in the meat. People rave about this place, but I think its completely disgusting.

They are the absolute best on grilled cheese. Even if using a different cheese, I’ll use one to help with the melting. They are scientifically designed for maximum salty-fatty-meltitude.

I remember reading a different article somewhere that baby carrots are NOW made from carrots specifically bred with to be a little sweeter and easier to polish down into the baby carrots. They’d likely still be indistinguishable from regular carrots by most of us.

I did find this source, but I don’t know how reputable…

Cheese is technically edible mold and for many people, the funkier the better.

Subway tastes cold. Or warm. It does not really taste great. 

That sucks. I’ve never used the SB app (we have a local coffee stand I prefer), but I’ve not had that experience with Wendy’s or McDonald’s. I could see it happen at Wendy’s, less so at McDs.

It’s been a while since I’ve watched it, but one aspect I loved about Top Chef was the online community. Especially finding a decent review site to talk it over, but Tom used to do a blog post for every episode, too. It was nice because he would provide insight to the “drama” and focus a lot on the food.

Looked this up on wikipedia and it sounds really fun. It also has that “I could try this at home!” bonus feel to it.

There is a fantastic story somewhere about the data Target collects: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/?sh=70838bb06668

The mobile apps are amazing. You often get good coupons, but more importantly to me, you know what the store has. There have been promotions certain stores in my area haven’t done, or stores that run out of other limited offers. This is partly what slows me down in the drive-thru, if I’m still hungry. I think back to…

I do Waffle Wednesdays occasionally with my students in 4th grade. It’s pretty fun.

The two best tools I have are a kitchen scale and a stand mixer. I can use the stand mixer bowl to measure everything in and get it kneaded. Easy peasy.

I throw an ice cube on the floor of the oven.

Baking bread is one of those hobbies that is pretty easy to start, but can really take you on some journeys. I’ve got all this stuff and it really makes it easy, but if I had to pick just one thing, it would be the scale, followed by the stand mixer.

Most of the places around me (WestMichigan) offer home/American fries OR hashbrowns (shredded). Not that it affects this much, but I’m happy it’s become standard because I much prefer hasbrowns.