One of the first regular features I developed for the Dallas Observer when I was the food critic there would never fly today. Called “What’s in the Pail?”, it entailed me biking to construction sites—of which there was no shortage in Dallas—and asking laborers to show me the contents of their lunchboxes.
Obviously, in our current political situation, it’s morally untenable to flash credentials at random workers and request an accounting of their personal items. But even if the government wasn’t terrorizing Americans, the schtick wouldn’t work. That’s because so many people now buy their lunches. While the number of lunches purchased nationwide slid 3 percent between 2023 and 2024, an indicator of growing financial anxiety, U.S. restaurants on average still sell 53 million midday meals each day.
