The Food Issue: “To-go”

Photo credit:

These days, as the line between busy-ness and laziness blurs ever more, food to-go has become an exceedingly frequent consideration. We want it now, we want it fast, and we don’t want to stop doing whatever we’re doing — or, in some cases, risk direct contact with other humans — to get it.

In many ways, our collective habits of eating and running have changed dramatically over the last few years. In others, they’ve hardly changed at all. Here in Atlanta, the multi-billion dollar “food delivery wars” rage on, with about a dozen near-identical apps vying for market space. Meanwhile, the Varsity celebrates its 88th anniversary, just as packed with paper-hatted diners chomping chili dogs as it ever was.

Our city has always been a kind of microcosm for the country at large (Donald Glover didn’t call it “the most American place” for nothing), and I’ve spent my first month as Creative Loafing’s new food editor (hi!) diving headfirst into Atlanta’s ever-expanding definition of convenience cuisine. I have a car that now perma-smells like french fries to prove it.

In this issue, we took a multifaceted look at how the idea of to-go is playing out right here, right now, as convenience, technology, and cravings converge. We investigated food delivery app overload from a restaurant’s perspective and got up close and personal with one homegrown startup that approaches culinary connectivity from a totally different angle. Expanding the concept of to-go even further is the tale of a heartening collaboration between Meals on Wheels Atlanta and the Peachtree Road Farmers Market and a hilarious piece on the oh-so-precious memories spurred by frozen fast-food slushies. We discovered that despite the push for more walkable neighborhoods, drive-thrus are making a bit of a comeback — or at least refusing to disappear. And that food trucks are seeking new frontiers (did somebody say “booze on wheels”? Yes, somebody did.).
One thing is for sure. Atlanta may be a city on the move, but we haven’t let that stop us from stuffing our faces along the way.

::

Photo credit: