We successfully connected my niece with her relatives and took off for the long drive back home. When we got to Lafayette, I pulled off I-65 for gas. It was only 4:30, but my daughter said she was hungry. I really didn’t want to stop again. There was a White Castle next to the gas station. I couldn’t remember ever having eaten at a White Castle, so I thought it was a good chance for a new experience. I suggested it to my daughter. She replied, “That’s fine. It’s food.”
Four words, but it’s amazing just how wrong they were.
We each got the two cheeseburger (cheeseslider?) deal with fries and a drink. I carried the food out to the car and opened the bag. My first thought was that the real cheeseburger looked a whole lot different than the photo on the sign inside.
I took it out of its tiny box. It looked gray. It felt soggy. The bottom bun was mushy, like it had been sitting in warm water for an hour or so. I braced myself and took a bite. It tasted gray and soggy. Even the tiny slice of pickle was soggy. My daughter and I both had a tough time getting them down and we both felt rather ill afterwards.
White Castles have been around for 88 years. I find it difficult to believe anyone has ever gone back for a second visit. Is it possible they’ve survived that long on first-time customers only? I will forevermore refer to White Castle as “Home of the moist buns.”
We got back on the interstate and soon ran into the perpetual traffic jam on northbound I-65. We were stuck in stop-and-go (mostly stop) mode for the better part of an hour with no end in sight. We weren’t the only ones frustrated. Here’s a shot my daughter took of the passenger in the next car.
I took the first chance I had to exit. I cut west on side roads to I-57 and then headed north again. There’s no way to know if this was faster or not, but it did get us out of Indiana earlier, allowed us to avoid that nightmare known as I-80-94 and got us moving.
We found ways to entertain ourselves on the way. Some local radio station that we happened upon had a promo for a “rubber ducky derby.” I challenged my daughter to say it three times fast. She tried maybe 50 times, but I don’t think she ever accomplished it.
Why didn’t you go to the Dog N Suds in Lafayette??
White Castle is disgusting – we had it once to try it and that was the last time. Ick.
I’d already been to both Dog n Suds in Lafayette, and I wasn’t really planning on stopping anywhere. White Castle was just a spur-of-the-moment thing — and I regretted it for the next several hours.
During the depression when I was a little girl White Castle had an ad in the paper, for a special – on maybe something like 6 hamburgers for $1.00. Uncle Bill went and got them and that was our supper.
Yes, things were tough!
Ugh…I can’t stand White Castle’s food. :-p
I had the hardest time that evening trying to discover why some random girl called my phone and left me a voicemail saying, “Hey… Can you say ‘rubber ducky derby’?” :-D