What Americans were eating en masse during Election Night
The American presidential election affected me too, so last Tuesday I found myself—completely breaking my self-imposed rule of not drinking during the week—nervously sitting on the couch with a glass of easy-drinking wine. And a bag of crisps. Because it was a very exceptional Tuesday. Stress crisp, anyone? A day later, it turned out what America itself had been stuffing down that evening!
Of course I knew that Tuesday night wasn’t going to bring any definitive answers, and by now it’s taking an awfully long time, so we can hardly sit around drinking and eating nonstop until the result is known. But this is what America sought comfort in during its night of ultimate tension, in numbers never seen before: French fries! And I’m sure they didn’t stop at six fries each…
Screw your salad
Because Google Trends taught us that this question to the digital oracle had never been asked so incredibly often: Are there fries near me? And that an hour before coverage of the results began, Americans googled these five food searches most often:
"Fries near me" and "liqour store near me" are at all-time highs in searchhttps://t.co/Gx6j7GtCJuhttps://t.co/Lf24eYg6uy pic.twitter.com/mma88WWmCR
— GoogleTrends (@GoogleTrends) November 4, 2020
Slurp, hiccup
Indeed, they had never needed the liquor store so badly either… Recent research conducted by the American Psychological Association and Harris Poll found that 68% of American adults experience this election as ‘a significant source of stress’. And what do people do then? Look for comfort food, often with a drink on the side. I had also never been on such friendly terms with my liquor store as I was in March during the first lockdown, when I had to try one delicious cocktail after another, so I can understand them…
Breathe in, breathe out
But if everyone manages to calm down, hopefully people will soon start eating a little healthier again. Save those delicious crappy foods for when you can truly enjoy them in peace, rather than using them to work through a particular mood, because that often backfires and you end up in a spiral that makes you feel miserable all over again. In short: hang in there, America!
Also read:
- What to eat when you’re in a f-ing terrible mood
- What type of stress baker are you?
- 18 times being deeply disappointed by your fast-food order
