Desperate for a coronary? Anxious to have a heart attack? Ready to die? If your answer to these three questions is yes, have I got news for you? A new fast food ‘restaurant’ called Popeyes is about to open in Bristol. I literally can wait.
In a puff piece in today’s Bristol Post, chief reporter Tristan Cork pens gushingly about the high fat fried chicken retailer that is set to open in the piss poor Avonmeads Retail Park, noting that people have been known to queue overnight in order to be first in line when the new store opens. Apparently, according to Popeye’s CEO Tom Crowley, “Bringing Popeyes to Bristol’s vibrant food scene has been a top priority for us“. At least the vibrant part of Bristol’s food scene that includes fellow junk food outlets McDonalds, Burger King, Miss Millies and KFC, I would think.
I am not a stranger to fast/junk food, it has to be said, but then again every time I do have some I feel very dirty afterwards. The urge to have, say, a KFC becomes overwhelming, I forget how bad it was last time I had it and the next thing I am in the long queue of cars at our local takeaway pondering my options. The assistant takes my order, which by this time has turned into a large of everything, I take my box, get home and start eating it. And it’s shit. It’s always shit.
The fries are barely warm, never mind hot, and the top quality chicken oozes with fat after a single mouthful. I know I have made an almighty expensive mistake before I have even got home. The proof of the pudding, or the high fat deep fried chicken shit, is in the eating. By the end, I am left with cold fries, scabby bits of fatty chicken and bones. It’s almost enough to turn a man into a veggie. The last time, my chicken shit dinner was so bad I vowed never to buy it again. Judging from this photo of the Popeyes product, there’s a fair chance I may not be investing in it.
When the first KFC opened in the area where I lived when I was young, it was quite a novelty. Fast food was a fish and chip shop, with the odd Chinese and Indian takeaway here and there. Clearly, we all fell in love with fast food, or at least enough of us to encourage the purveyors of junk food to turn us into junk food junkies. Now we have a new kid in town: yet another fried chicken shop.
The arrival of Popeyes only goes to remind me how out of touch with just about everything that is going on in the world. I had never heard of Popeyes and when I fell for the Bristol Post clickbait story, I assumed Avonmeads Retail Park would be hosting the first branch. Not so. This will be the 76th branch in the UK. In which case, I don’t need to get out more.
Mind you, never say never. As part of the UK’s trade deal with Donald Trump’s rogue America, we may be forced to import and then eat chicken washed in chlorine and beef pumped full of steroids. Maybe junk food will turn out to be the more palatable option after all?
The way things are going, even a carnivore like me will be edging towards a plant-based diet and maybe that’s no bad thing. I’m not ready to die just yet but anymore of this junk food and maybe I will be. No jokes about Olive Oil (Oyl), thank you.
