An Open Letter To Banquet

Dearest Banquet,

I recently purchased a few of your microwavable dinners for the first time in quite a long time. I remembered enjoying your meals at one point and decided it was time they came back into my life. So despite my roommates' protests, I grabbed two salisbury steak meals, two rib meals and a meatloaf meal (which, honestly, I don't know what I was thinking. I hate meatloaf.).

I didn't want to seem desperate so I waited a couple hours after we got home from the store before I tried one of the meals. Trust me, the curiosity I had for your frozen meat and gravy made it a very uncomfortable couple hours. A couple hours had passed and I decided I would wait no longer. I would heat up one of your delicious pairings of salisbury steak, mashed potatoes and corn.

Hope.

Three minutes in the microwave? Stir the potatoes? Three minutes more? "I can handle that," I thought. The microwave beeped after the final second and I knew I was ready for a feast. There was only one problem.

Maybe in my excitement, I didn't look at the tray before I put it in the microwave. So maybe I didn't see that the delicious salisbury steak patty, in its delicious dark brown gravy, was FOUR FUCKING INCHES LONG. Seriously, Banquet, seriously? I know I was lost in the excitement of eating your TV dinner but what the fuck happened? Did it shrink? Did I cook it wrong and I failed at retaining my original steak size? What did I do wrong?

Four fucking inches.

Or was it FOUR FUCKING INCHES to begin with? You knew, didn't you?! You allowed that measly, pathetic patty to get shrinkwrapped in with your soapbox mashed potatoes and dehydrated corn. You did it! I know it!

How could you do this, Banquet? I trusted you. After all these years, I trusted you. And you do me like this, homies? It's not even about the $5 I wasted on your food. It's the principle of the fact that you call that poor excuse for meat a salisbury steak.I have had horrible things happen to me in my personal life over the summer. Things that made it hard for me to think I could ever trust or love again. And just when I thought I was breaking away from this awful funk, you go and pull this shit on me. Why don't I just hand you a knife and you plunge it into my fucking back, Banquet?! I might as well!

This is what betrayal looks like.

I want answers you motherfuckers. I want delicious, gravy-filled answers. And no, I don't want coupons mailed to me so I can spend free money on more disappointing dinners. What's next? Chicken fajitas with glass in them? BBQ rib patties that insult me and exploit my confidence issues? No. I want a personal letter from your CEO, Carl Banquet. I don't give a shit if Carl Banquet is not a real person. I want an apology you miserable sons of bitches. Maybe then I'll learn to trust again.

I fucking love you, you bitch.

Dave Losso

Mac Snack Wrap: Disgustingly Delicious

Food: McDonald's Mac Snack Wrap
aka a Big Mac taco
Price: $1.49
Location: McDonald's on Clark St., Chicago, IL

The Story: I waited in line at McDonald's on my lunch break from work, unfortunately deciding which one of their shit-inducing products to reluctantly put into my body next. If there's a sick, demented version of serendipity, it happened. There on the menu was a new addition: the Mac Snack Wrap, the result of some awful mating of a Big Mac and a taco. I've never had a snack wrap from McD's and I hadn't, thankfully, had a Big Mac in some time, so naturally I ordered one....or two.

The Verdict: The best way I can describe the Mac Snack Wrap is disgustingly awesome. Not that it's so awesome that it's disgusting but that it actually achieves the feat of being both disgusting and awesome at the same time. I don't know if it was just the laziness of the McDonald's employees that made it but it was kind of lukewarm for starters. Granted, I'm kind of a fan of lukewarm food but when you're trying to eat the innards of a Big Mac stuffed inside a flour tortilla, it makes it kind of rough to get through. Tepid sandwich aside, the Big Mac parts were fine but McDonald's tortillas are really shitty. Alas, I got through it.

Final Word: While the Mac Snack Wrap isn't exactly an abomination of food science that should be shot in the head and put out of its misery, I wouldn't recommend eating these more than, well, once.

I ate the second one.