The horrors of Restaurant Depot ☠️

If you’ve never snuck into a restaurant wholesaler, you are living in The Matrix.

We get a lot of hate for making the default rating of a restaurant in SOS “Assume the worst”, but a quick stroll down the aisles of Restaurant Depot will show you what we’re getting at:

Many items you’d take for granted as a simple whole-food, like a “grilled-chicken-kebab” or a “meatball” are actually ultraprocessed frozen creations made in advance for restaurants at extremely low cost.

We cut an instagram reel of our top finds, some extra dirty details below:

Egg Shade is used by Chinese takeout restaurants and Halal carts to make their fried rice that bright yellow color, giving you the impression they are gracing you with some turmeric or ethnic spice. (Reddit explains)

1% EVOO, you best believe Italian restaurants are putting this on tables for you to dip your bread in. It is artificially colored to complete the ruse.

Suspicious Grilled Chicken with seed oils built in, there are a bunch of binderized chicken products that are prepackaged and frozen, undoubtedly put on the menu as a healthy option.

Not the parmesan!

No comment

Meatballs, like grandma used to make, if grandma was a chemical engineer

Soybean oil is <$1/lb the incentives are NOT in our favor.

Prefried fries: Does it matter what’s in the deep fryer if all the fries are prefried in seed oils before they even enter the restaurant?

The 100% EVOO is only 3x the price of the 1% EVOO, seems like a steal?

The tip of the iceberg

That really was just a sample of what is an entire economy of deception and cost-cutting. Americans spend 20% more on restaurants than on groceries, and there’s no label to read when you sit down for dinner. This makes it much easier to sneak ultraprocessed food past the goalie.

Restaurants are a backbone of American culture, but sadly they are largely a show, using atmosphere and presentation to dress up the nastiest hyperprocessed garbage you’d never allow in your home kitchen.

Fight back by voting with your dollars towards restaurants serving you actual food. If you need help finding them we’ve got your back.

🫡