Junkfood Confessional

My son is not really that big. Like 1st percentile in weight and height. Come to think of it, I was never really that big. Football was never even suggested to me. By anyone. Even though my dad played in college. People must have looked at me and thought, runner. Maybe because I was actually running away from them in a social-anxiety-induced terror. I don’t remember if I ate well as a kid. But my son. Man, my son. He will not eat anything. He’ll eat mac and cheese — if it’s the kind “that’s not already made.” He will eat chicken if the breading is just right. He will eat pork if I call it “pork chicken.” But he will eat anything with sugar on it. I think he would eat a cedar plank if I covered it in icing. This is irritating because I love to cook. I made carnitas the other day. He ate a peanut butter and Nutella sandwich.

When I get really upset about this, I take a deep breath and take stock of my own eating habits. I admit, I have a junk food problem. Every place I have lived has offered me a junk food escape.

Ironton, Ohio. Where I grew up. If you are from there, you know what I’m going to say next: Giovanni’s. As my son would say, “how can they make something so good?” I can say without any hesitation at all that I have craved Giovanni’s at least once a month for my entire adult life, no matter where I’ve lived. I know there are Ironton expats all around the world who find themselves salivating now and then at the thought of Giovanni’s. Giovanni’s is unparalleled in the world of pizza. I’ve had pizza in Italy. I’ve had pizza in Chicago. I’ve had all kind of frou-frou boutique pizzas around the country. But Giovanni’s is different. And it’s best when accompanied by a Mountain Dew, the national drink of southern Ohio. Maybe it is the grease. If there is a top shelf for greases, this is it. Extra virgin pizza grease. Maybe it is for the best that they put the huge pepperoni slices under the cheese. They would float off otherwise. Giovanni’s is a chain. You can get it in Ohio, Kentucky, and West Virginia as far as I know. But let me tell you one thing I will not do and that is wade into the rivalry of Ironton vs. Coal Grove.

Athens, Ohio. Burrito Buggy. This was a food trailer up by the College Green. There are plenty of times that I ate Burrito Buggy that seem foggy. You know what I’m talking about. Especially if you went to Ohio University. But that’s been a long time ago. The burritos here are probably in some ways a cousin to the Taco Bell burrito. But what they lack in fancy, they make up for in sour cream, other-worldly (quite possibly from another world) ground beef, and the softest flour tortillas you’ll ever encounter. And location. On the walk back from uptown to the dorms. You cannot go wrong with Burrito Buggy, whatever questionable decisions you’ve made up to the point you stagger up to that metal counter.

Swansea, Wales. Swansea is on the water. Swansea Bay of the Briston Channel. It looks across at Somerset, England, which you can see on clear days. But who cares if you can see England? Everything you need is in Wales. There was an internet documentary/reality show filmed here called Swansea Love Story about a young couple in the throes of addiction. I could relate to it. What was my go-to heart stopper here? It’s a tie. On the one hand, it was the kebab van. It was between campus and the little town of Mumbles as I recall. Slices of beef and lamb off the inelegantly labelled “elephant leg” could turn a bad night good. Or worse. Depending how you look at it. The other contender for my hardened, slowed-down heart there was the “chippie” across the park from campus in Uplands. My junk food partner, Hywel, and I would sit on a park bench up by the little Welsh chapel and eat roast chicken and chips wrapped in newspaper. Sometimes we ate the newspaper. The pigeons ate what we didn’t.

Columbus, Ohio. White Castle. Those oniony little vessels of so much goodness and so much arterial plaque. To this day, I am not sure if I really like them or not. But like all addictions, it was a love/hate relationship.

Boone, North Carolina. This is where I fell in love with the ham biscuit, the gateway drug to the chicken biscuit. To be more specific, I fell for the plate of ham biscuits they serve family-style at the Daniel Boone Inn. The salt content of these things could dry out a slug a mile away.

Raleigh, North Carolina. The chicken biscuit. Bojangles. I recently told me wife I was feeling wistful about chicken biscuits. She never understood them. She gave me the same look she usually does when I talk about chicken biscuits — equal parts disdain, disinterest, and, quite possibly, pity. But, really, I tried to get her to understand, now that we live in Texas I miss chicken biscuits. Like a person. I miss chicken biscuits like a person.

Austin, Texas. I just got here. The next arterial adventure awaits. Will it be the kolache? Does brisket qualify? The surreal orange concoctions at Round Rock Donuts? It could be anything. Something I don’t even know about yet. But something will step in and become my new go-to junk food.

After all of this food talk, I’m dying for a chicken biscuit and Harlan is still refusing to eat the vegetables I put out for him. Where does he get this nonsense?