Guilt can screw…especially guilt that supposedly ruins delicious pleasures for some people. Luckily, I suffer from bouts of real guilt from actual bad acts, so I’m impervious to feeling bad about eating embarrassing food.  Because really, that’s all a guilty food pleasure is…something you don’t want someone catching you eating.  I don’t mind getting caught eating a double can of Campbell’s Beef and Barley soup or having footage of me ordering my fourth Meximelt.  These aren’t guilty pleasures…they’re just pleasures.

1. McDonald’s Steak Bagel- I’m in love with this breakfast sandwich and it’s criminal that the good folks at this Irish burger joint don’t offer it all day.  As anybody who has devoured this while nursing a hangover knows, there is clearly vast medicinal value to this thing as well.  The actual bagel on its own is pedestrian and the steak would definitely  get sent back to the kitchen if ordered out. But I love the way the egg is cooked lightly, that there are two pieces of American cheese, and that there is no skimping on that miraculous sauce (which tastes like a holy mix of Hollandaise sauce , mayonnaise, and bacon fat) that anchors the whole damn thing.

2. Off- Brand Frozen French Fries- I’m always( I mean always) looking for an excuse to include these in dinners at my house.   “I’ll just pick up an extra bag of fries to go with our Pasta Bolognese tonight, O.K.?”  We rarely get a luxury brand like Ore Ida(what are we, millionaires?)because the cheapest ones I like better.  My favorites are the fries that aren’t actually cut up potatoes…they’re more like deep fried , formed mashed potatoes…I bake them about 5 minutes longer than the bag says so that they’re extra crispy and hold up better to the piles of ketchup and mayonnaise that they’re responsible for carting to my mouth.

3.  Gas Station Hot Dogs-I’m always pissed when I see that wiener rotisserie vacant at a Wilson Farms or Citgo.  That tells me they’re great but the kid behind the counter is lazy.  Too bad for Citgo because I definitely would’ve gotten one (or three), with everything on it that they had to offer…bad mustard, brown-ish, old pickle relish, and whatever is getting pedalled as cheese sauce in the crock pot.  I can’t not get one. Roll cameras if you’d like…