I remember when all of my contemporaries were avoiding Cracker Barrel restaurants because they were racist and homophobic as a company.
The company has admittedly come a long way since that time.
It’s weird to think that the same people who were defending them back then — racist, homophobic people — are now the ones going after Cracker Barrel for offering something healthy on their menu.
The Cracker Barrel is a place where you can feast on meatloaf, with three “country” sides and a buttermilk biscuit, while seated next to a stone hearth or with an oil lamp silently flickering on your table. It’s a place where you can, after your meal, buy a glass angel, a peacock fountain or cow-hide pillow in the attached gift store. It’s the kind of place that presents itself as America’s front porch, a rural refuge far from the cultural strife of our cities.
Cracker Barrel’s country tranquility was apparently shattered on Monday, when the chain announced on Facebook that customers could customize their breakfast plate with a plant-based protein as a replacement for their traditional bacon or smoked sausage.
“Discover new meat frontiers,” Cracker Barrel wrote in its post. “Experience the out of this world flavor of Impossible™ Sausage Made From Plants next time you Build Your Own Breakfast.”
The blowback was immediate and intense. Comments, hundreds and hundreds of them, were split along ideological, generational and political lines.
What a country.
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