britishers -- tell me about WIMPY BARS and their shitty burgers

I last went to Wimpy back in 2018. I popped off to this one in Bermondsey, but it was closed:
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-h494VRwu-Z8/W0B-WBZPqXI/AAAAAAAAXwE/LLXbveoloScxufJSV_gsKz_Y9y1etS2qACLcBGAs/s1600/Untitled-24.jpg

I must have just missed it. But there's one in Basingstoke, so I went there instead. It looked closed from the outside:
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LgxliPO9Opc/W27YtHB7jkI/AAAAAAAAXy0/QahAV8Yk8wcyhCDtmyrbpTkWoq_ohoSDwCLcBGAs/s1600/Untitled-18.jpg

As far as I can tell it still exists. I was torn by a desire to photograph the meal, but at the same time I just didn't have the guts. I remember coming down with impostor syndrome. I have a blog, but I'm not famous. Anthony Bourdain can get away with writing about Wimpy because everybody knows that he's joking. I'm not in that position yet. I did manage this photo, which made me wonder if there's a small warehouse somewhere in Doncaster that makes things for Wimpy:
https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-V1IjMCNcZH8/W27ZQXoFq5I/AAAAAAAAXzI/J5U3eT-G_hwxg7Imw6YdFYdVO2tmbCCZQCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_Wimpy.jpg

Who works there? Old people and one young intern, probably. The burger had the same taste that I remember from when I was young.

Wimpy is trapped - they're more expensive than McDonalds and Burger King, so they compete with Wetherspoons, but Wetherspoons has beer. Nando's is slightly more expensive still but feels like a proper night out. The whole "nostalgia for the 1950s" aspect doesn't work because it's hard to be nostalgic for Britain in the 1950s. I don't want to think about self-loathing club comedians and Adam Faith when I'm eating. And the Instagram aspect doesn't work because Wimpy is meaningless in the states. It's not even naff enough to be funny, it just exists.

Like Little Chef! Except that it exists, unlike Little Chef.

Xp We are stardust, we are golden
And we've got to get ourselves
Back to the garden

ok, I'm here

https://i.postimg.cc/LXnGkN5F/20230113-152356.jpg

it's the mid-afternoon so not many people expected, but place is half full, mainly with kids who've just finished school, but still, no sign that this place is dying.

Staff seem to be mostly Spanish, kids seem to be leaving, still most of the tables are occupied. Stereo is playing Sweet Harmony by The Beloved, always a favourite. let's see what's on the menu.

https://i.postimg.cc/Rh01JDZw/20230113-154751.jpg

chose the "bendy with cheese" - a little disappointed that it isn't called a "bender in a bun" now, but relieved that I can ask for it without difficulty.

https://i.postimg.cc/J7yvF6qs/20230113-155141.jpg

sausage is good, meaty, tomato is mealy, too many onions, bread is nasty, like the cheapest rolls from the supermarket, actually crumbles as I eat. I'll give it a 5/10

they started playing Shape Of My Heart, so I made my excuses and left.

Last Wimpy I had was at a service station en route home from Reading festival in like 2003 or so. Bun was brown and stale and gross.

last nostalgia Wimpy i had might have been around the late 2000s. normally i'd say no such thing as too much onions but given these had the texture and flavour of boiled sellotape i'd make an exception

My mate Paul worked in Stevenage Wimpy and used have to put on the Mr Wimpy costume for kids parties and have the shit kicked out of him by sugar-crazed nippers.

yes, the onions were still like boiled sellotape, no idea how / why you do that to a poor onion.

wonderful revive. still laughing at adam faith. still laughing at boiled sellotape

aesthetic charming, bun looks heinous, menu doing too much. recalls french outlet flunch somehow

had a small fight with an ex once because he went on a longed-for nostalgia visit to the nearest wimpy without me while I was on a very prohibitive diet. thought it was brazen at the time, but in retrospect it was the low blood sugar / yearning for a bendy colouring my thinking.

i think the spicy beanburger is the only thing i miss and would cautiously revisit

I don't think I've posted this before - UK competitive eater Beard Meats Food tackles pretty much the full Wimpy menu at the Milford, Stafford branch a couple of years ago. It's a curious wee shack rather than a sit in restaurant, for added novelty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QG3LIX4gQY

THAT'S MY CHILDHOOD WIMPY!!

and yes, it's a shack. but then Milford is basically a pub and a row of houses

Wimpy in Woolwich, London 1987

https://i.imgur.com/u5gqwBM.jpg

These photos are grim as hell

This one was my local for many years

https://i2-prod.walesonline.co.uk/lifestyle/nostalgia/article22387826.ece/ALTERNATES/s1227b/1_JS183910396.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/u5gqwBM.jpg

so brown so grim so true to london in the 80s

bugger
https://i.imgur.com/u5gqwBM.jpg

nate woolls, is that the one in ogmor, wales?

Lol that's Woolwich. I know the 96 bus well

Lol that's Woolwich. I know the 96 bus well

are you talking about the photo in the post labelled "Wimpy in Woolwich, London 1987" or the other one?

Lol don't see the label.

Anyway, feeling local pride though there was another wimpy nearby that I went to regularly

It's in Porthcawl in Wales xp

Ah Porthcawl, yes sorry. Its very prominent iirc

I wonder if anyone ever goes into one of Britain's surviving Wimpys, sits down, starts eating their meal and then suddenly realises they're the only person there not recording themselves for a youtube video

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/myMaYrEKA3M/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLDvTYMGj-jHB9NxtAJ4EaEbSoSUcg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/1i6pNkmNlFk/maxresdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/9vfpLIE_nDo/sddefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/pqRNd2eMk0o/maxresdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/DLmFjxyMDIc/hqdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/mZnxWL17x7s/maxresdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/oSSWEOQPaxg/maxresdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/9Q8GEH7fUgA/maxresdefault.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/pCtc2jtlubU/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLC97u5Keu8o8n8RDCRRA5F4ClY4cg

Apart from SweatpantsjoeatstheUK, the dudes making their YouTubes of their trips to Wimpy seem to be a very specific kind of older white dude and I would not like to glimpse at their Facebook feeds

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/oSSWEOQPaxg/maxresdefault.jpg
There is no dignity in pulling a face like this multiple times once you're in your late 40s, mate

Also all that food looks repulsive. wholemeal buns = puke, and why are those buns such an unusually flaccid beige?

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/myMaYrEKA3M/hq720.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEhCK4FEIIDSFryq4qpAxMIARUAAAAAGAElAADIQj0AgKJD&rs=AOn4CLDvTYMGj-jHB9NxtAJ4EaEbSoSUcg
this guy has such perfect "manager of the WH Smith's where you worked on Saturdays when you were in 6th form" vibes

I have absolute no nostalgia for Wimpy but if we're talking about the burgers served up on the charcoal grill at the kebab shop round the corner from where I grew up, that's a Proustian rush right there (RIP Merton Kebab & Burger House on Haydon's Rd, we salute you)