McFeatters: U.S.-style fast food invades Baghdad
Pizza Pizza restaurant in Baghdad, Iraq. A wave of new American-style restaurants is spreading across the Iraqi capital, enticing customers hungry for alternatives to traditional offerings like lamb kebabs and fire-roasted carp. (Aug. 23, 2012) Credit: AP Photo Karim Kadim
Forget the lofty ideals that President George W. Bush invoked as rationale for his invasion of Iraq. The United States' most lasting legacy to that ancient land may be fast food.
According to the Associated Press, the residents of Baghdad can now enjoy pizza, milkshakes, chili-cheese dogs, hot wings, Philly cheesesteaks and oversize hamburgers served in restaurants with vaguely familiar-sounding names: Pizza Pizza, Burger Joint, Mr. Potato and Burger Friends.
One fried-chicken restaurant, KFG, is admittedly a knockoff of KFC, although the owner says the initials stand for Kentucky Family Groups. Indeed, "Kentucky" has become the generic name for American-style fried chicken, which Iraqis pack away by the bucketload.
A Turkish firm plans to open a chain of sandwich shops called Subz.
There were American fast-food places in Iraq during the U.S. occupation -- Subway, Burger King, Pizza Hut -- but they were on heavily fortified bases inaccessible to ordinary Iraqis. When the American troops left, so did the franchises. Lee's Famous Recipe Chicken is the only American franchise left in Baghdad, the AP said.
But the U.S. left behind a taste for half-pounders with cheese, and extra-spicy chicken. Local entrepreneurs and investors from neighboring nations have moved in to fill that craving.
A Baghdad physician, Dr. Sarmad Hamid, worried that the U.S.-style restaurants "will make Iraqis, especially children, fatter." But, he said, "People might benefit psychologically by sitting down in a quiet, clean and relatively fancy place with their families, away from the chaos in Iraqi cities."
The restaurants, for which patrons dress up to visit, testify to a return to something like normal. There's still some risk, but at the height of the terror campaign any place that attracted a crowd -- especially one with American associations -- was a likely target for bombing.
Even the owners of traditional Iraqi restaurants, such as the ones specializing in roasted carp, welcome the competition. Said one owner: "Sometimes we need 'Kentucky.' Not just fish, fish, fish." The patrons of any American strip mall would certainly agree.
Dale McFeatters is a senior writer for the Scripps Howard News Service.
