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A Tweet Roasting Restaurant Chains Has Many Small Town Food Lovers Up In Arms

In the world of online foodie discourse — which is a bigger thing than you’re probably giving it credit for, see: random restaurants trending nearly every day — giant chain restaurants don’t have a lot of advocates. No one is really that eager to talk about the finer aspects of Chili’s menu, rave about how good the cheddar biscuits from Red Lobster are, or highlight which IHOP pancakes slap — unless of course, you come out swinging. Then you’re going to have a lot of sudden defenders blowing up your notifications.

That’s undoubtedly what happened to Twitter user Alex C (@anothercohen) after he openly criticized Chili’s, Applebees, Olive Garden, and Red Lobster over the weekend in a tweet that has since earned over 4k replies, 8k retweets, and 14K likes and is still growing (Red Lobster is currently trending at number 3 in the US right now).

Alex C openly wondered how the four national chains were still in business which essentially, in his own words, “triggered all of suburban America” as thousands of online foodies came to the defense of these American staples. Despite all the hate, Alex seems to be standing by his original assessment, and we can respect the bravery — even though his take on Olive Garden’s salad is straight-up wrong.

Olive Garden’s salad is probably the worst salad you could ever find at a restaurant, and you can blow up my Twitter notifications if you think otherwise. As derided as these big chains generally are, for many a suburban kid growing up in the late ‘90s and early ‘00s, a lot of these restaurants exemplified the height of luxury dining (not hard when you compare it to McDonald’s) and introduced us to a larger world of flavors that opened up our relatively sheltered palates, so we understand the fondness a lot of people have for them.

Check out some of the best takes in this raging debate below.