#832 Nach-atoes

In my last column, I wrote about oil and grease and even though the point was to rail against the big oil companies, I nonetheless found myself starting to get hungry.
That, my friends, is Pavlovian conditioning.
Just writing the words “oil and grease” rang the bell of thinking about food and the primitive parts of my brain started sending signals to my stomach. Oil and grease have very deep associations with us omnivores.
They contain fats, and for all the bad things you can say about fats, they are marvelous storehouses of energy. Fat packs in a ton more energy ounce for ounce than carbohydrates.
That’s why the smell of oil and grease can melt the strongest dietary resolve.
The health club where I work out is unfortunately placed. It is across the street from a Jack-in-the-Box. Not a morning goes by that I don’t emerge from the club, freshly aerobicized from an hour of racquetball, that I don’t run in to a cloud of tempting smells emanating from the Jack’s exhaust vent.
Here I’ve burned off all these calories, and my body is already vulnerable to the idea of replenishing that nourishment, and what does my nosy food-sensing organ encounter but a salacious steam pocket of freshly deep-fried hash browns and a big waft of Breakfast Jack.
Yum.
There’s something about deep-fried potatoes that strums the deepest chord within us. Maybe a wash of nostalgia, when our teenage years were spent inhaling one continuous plate of french-fries.
So it is that when I saw an ad for Denny’s the other day I was struck by their newest menu creation, Potachos.
Genius. Combining the best caloric extravagances of greasy deep-fried potatoes and nachos. They are so obviously going for the late night youth crowd. Kids wanting to stay out who can’t go to bars, but are still on the prowl and oh so hungry.
Potachos is just the high octane fuel they need. Deep-fried kettle chips, sausage, bacon, peppers, onions, and lots of cheese cheese cheese. Oil, oil, and grease grease grease.
Lord, let my digestive system be 19 again for just one day.
America, ya gotta love it.