Travelers often use being on the road as an excuse for doing things that the good sense, moderation and discipline of home usually won’t accommodate. This is especially true with respect to what we give ourselves permission to eat and drink. How many times have you said or heard others say this? “Oh, come on, we’re on vacation.”
What images do the words “road food” conjure up for you? For me, the pictures have actually changed over the years. When I was a kid, we rarely ate in a restaurant so road food was the magical stuff we consumed along the way. It always seemed exotic because it was such a rare treat. When I was older and doing a lot of solo traveling, road food came to mean all the snacks I bought to eat while driving.
After I was married, my wife’s good sense and penchant for nutritious snacking—plus the obligation to model healthy eating habits for two kids—changed my idea of road food once more. It became what we took from home to eat on the road: snack bars, fruit, rice cakes. Often we would haul along a container of gorp, that tasty concoction of M&Ms, peanuts, raisins, mini-pretzels, sunflower seeds, etc. that I’ve written about before. Although not absolutely wholesome, it is generally assumed to be a more or less well-balanced snack treat.
To a good many people, however, “road food” is simply the food you consume while you’re on the move. (I’m not really talking about RVing or camping here.) While you can bring the fixings for sandwiches and the like along with you, you can’t usually cook along the way. So this means you’re likely going to be eating different foods in a variety of eateries.
I don’t know about you, but I think food exploration is one of the major enjoyments of travel. And I immediately begin to think about regional favorites we’ve sampled along the road. For starters, there’s the hot “spoon bread” at Boone Tavern Hotel in Berea, KY. I also savor my recollections of lake perch at Cunningham’s in Mackinaw City, the pasties we get in Cadillac, the indescribable popovers from Jordon’s Pond House, near Bar Harbor, ME, and the amazing pizza served at Pie in the Sky Pizzeria of Stowe, Vermont.
My sister tells me there’s even a restaurant in Oscoda, MI, that serves dough Gods. This definitely takes me back some years. My mother used to occasionally make dough Gods on the day (Tuesday) when she made her weekly batch of homemade bread. They’re basically globs of bread dough, pan-fried and served hot with butter and syrup. If you’re intrigued, check out this article. The next time I get up to Oscoda, I’m going to add their version of dough Gods to my road food collection.
The great thing about the Internet is that someone somewhere has a passion for virtually everything you can think of—and a lot of things you would never imagine. Such is the case with road food. Want proof? Check out this site and you’ll find restaurants, recipes, road food news—even a forum so you can talk to other road food junkies.
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