In 2025, food in America somehow got bleaker—more expensive, less accessible, and harder to justify. Thanks, Trump.
The average fast-food lunch has jumped 20–25% in recent years. That Big Mac, fries, and Coke now ring up around $15, and, sadly, there’s no sign prices are coming back down.
As a food critic with more than forty years of eating experience, I’ve reached a point where I have to reassess my own choices. When McDonald’s is charging prices comparable to better-tasting, better-run independent restaurants down the street, something is broken.
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TLO Restaurant Review: Angie’s Circus City Diner
What I Said: “All in all, it was a cost-effective, low-budget, big-time breakfast with the three rings of total clown-based entertainment that made me stand up and applaud. All I needed was a trio of prancing dogs, and I would be in total business.”
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Praise the Lard: Frybread Salvation at Mary Lee Clark UM Church
What I Said: “On top of the steaming frybread was the usual fare—spiced ground beef and slow-simmered beans that played perfectly off the dough. The lettuce, onion, and cheese did their job, but it was the picante sauce and jalapeños that really upped the game and got my mouth watering.”
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Ka-Chow Down: Disney’s Cars and Route 66 Collide at Stroud’s Amazing Rock Café
What I Said: “The chicken-fried pork cutlet was truly exceptional, with a bacon-heavy sauce giving a real oom-papa. Combined with the traditional German noodles, Rock Café’s version was finished with onions and peppers on their 75-year-old black top grill, “Betsy.” It was a wholly unexpected treat!”
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Taqueria Feliz and the Glorious Return of the $1 Street Taco
What I Said: “Though my legs felt like jelly—I hadn’t been so nervous since my first date thirty-something years ago—I walked up to the raised counter of the food truck and sheepishly asked, “Can I get two of your dollar tacos…the marinated chicken and the fried pork?”
Then the man said the one thing a person always wants to hear: “That will be two dollars!”
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Smokes, Scratchers, and Brisket: Kimie’s on S. Portland is OKC’s Best Hidden BBQ Gem
What I Said: “Surrounded by rundown apartments, vandalized buildings, and dollar stores begging to be shoplifted, we recently received a tip that this ramshackle little shop slings some of the best barbecue in OKC every Friday and Saturday: fresh and flavorful Laotian-crafted masterpieces that will make any meat lover drool.”
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Reopened and Reborn: 39 Restaurant Returns to FAM in Mouthwatering Form
What I Said: “The duck fat in the biscuits was subtle at first, but ultimately delivered a rich, high-end flavor. Paired with duck sausage and duck confit, it incited a waterfowl intoxication I thought I was prepared for, but I was quickly seduced and swept away by its webbed wiles.”
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TLO Restaurant Review: Harbor Mountain Coffee House
What I Said: “I care more about what I put in my own mouth than what others put in theirs, and though I was disappointed to learn the assignment was more about trolling Ryan than savoring great coffee, I still accepted it with gusto, grabbed my wife's hand, and drove to McAlester on Saturday for a much-anticipated cup.”
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Postcards, Pasta, and Panna Cotta – Malfi Enoteca Sends Its Love
What I Said: “Using fresh sourdough bread from the local Harvey Bakery, it was crisply toasted with a light, fresh, and seriously tasty acidic zing. Combined and entwined, the warm bread and crushed tomato mixture made sultry love off the Amalfi Coast, and everyone was watching.”
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Flour Power: Chelino’s Tortilla Factory Still Rolls Out The Flavor in South OKC
What I Said: “Walking past the “employees only” sign, three women in hairnets were using the industrial tortilla press, kneading the dough and stretching it out to an acceptable length. Then they were cooked on a conveyor belt that looked like a Mexican adaptation of Willy Wonka… Guillermo Wonka?”
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Vladislava’s Czech Café Delivers Value, Vibes, and Very Naughty Pastries!
What I Said: “This whole meal was fittingly stout, with the spindly sausage coiling down my waiting mouth, taking bite after bite until the whole thing was gone. Of course, this was followed by the Czech sauerkraut that, if I might be so bold, definitely surpasses the German variation.”
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Born on a Bayou: Trying Fresh Crawfish, One Claw at a Time
What I Said: “In a real bonding moment, my new father-in-law, a seasoned Cajun storyteller, began teaching me the ins and outs of deshelling the bulbous crustaceans. Filling a cardboard box lid with the steaming crawfish, he gave me a crash course, from snapping the necks, sucking on their heads and scraping out the meat, one at a time.”
I hope you enjoyed looking back at my favorite meals in Oklahoma City nearly as much as I did. Here’s to another year of eating well in 2026!
Follow Louis Fowler on Instagram at @louisfowler78.
