Tinsletown, St John’s Street, Farringdon
Cookies ‘n’ Cream, £4.99
This diner was set in some sort of underground bunker. I didn’t like it. It was dark and full of teens sharing one plate of fries between six on their school holidays. The menu showed pictures of attractive famous people like Reese Witherspoon (who stole my boyfriend Jake Gylenhaal) and Demi Moore (who stole my boyfriend, Ashton Kutcher.) I don’t think they’ve ever eaten there though.
There were far too many choices, again relying on the waitresses recommendation - the Oreo shake. Like impressionable children, we blindly agreed. And oh MY, I’m glad we did, for this was the Daddy of all shakes:
Unbe-fucking-lievable. Stephen’s eyes glistened like a greedy child’s, coyly whispering: “It’s made of pieces of Heaven.” It truly was. It even had whipped cream and REAL M&Ms on top. No cheapo own-brand versions here:
The powdery, stale flake did ruin it slightly, but hey, apprently true perfection has to be imperfect (thanks, Noel Gallagher).
Anyway, the dregs of this shake looked disgusting and I certainly wasn’t going to touch them:
Stephen, however, is a tramp and shovelled a load in his mouth. He soon regretted this decision when he realised it was made of pure sugar. And then some. I believe he uttered the words “little pieces of hell’. What a turn around.
On exiting the diner, we realised the foyer stank of piss and were grateful we hadn’t noticed this on the way in. This probably won’t stop me going back though as they’ve a vast array of other shakes I want to try, like ‘Jaffa Cake’, After Eight’ and ‘Cherry Bakewell’. Unbelievable, I know!
Walking to the tube, I realised that my bum had got bigger and not in a good ‘J-Lo’ way. I was concerned.
McDonalds, Oxford Street
Cadbury’s Caramel Shake, £1.49
I didn’t want to do this. I’ve had McDonald’s shakes before and know they’re pure lard. But we took a deep breath and battled on. Opening the door we tried not to vom as the scent of salty fries hit our noses. This is what a McDonald’s queue looks like:
At one point I thought I was actually going to deposit a small pile of sick on the floor of the ‘restaurant’:
The lady behind me looked quite nauseous as well but I can’t confirm if she’d also had too many milkshakes.
There was a charity box on the counter. It said ‘HELP RMHC’. Assuming it stood for ‘Recovering Milkshake-a-HoliCs’, I put a supportive penny in.
We eventually psyched ourselves up and tried the grey-looking drink.
It was like shit in a cup. But not as flavoursome. It was so tasteless and certainly not worth the fat it will most definitely heap on your thighs. How it made it onto the menu I’ll never know – it wasn’t even good enough to offer to a tramp (although the rest of the office lapped it up on our return. Animals).
Sainsburys, Charing Cross Road
For Goodness Shakes, £1.49
LOLZ at the name, right? Drinking it wasn’t quite so funny though. In its defence, it was never going to beat the first three, but it tasted really bland and even its ‘23 vitamins and minerals’ couldn’t save it.
Apparently, if you drink it within 20 minutes of doing sport, you can do 40% more. But I didn’t really understand the point of having the energy to do 40% more of something you’ve just finished doing. But whatever.
DOES MILKSHAKE REALLY BRING ALL THE BOYS TO THE YARD?
We both felt a bit odd after all that sugar – our vision kept blurring and we were super thirsty. Stephen had to go and play football afterwards and was worried he would projectile vomit pure sugar all over the other players. He also struggled to brush the grit off his teeth when he got home.
I went home with a headache and thought my weight gain was the reason the train struggled to pull out of the station. I had to concentrate really hard not to throw up all over the serious business men on the tube. I don’t think they’d have found it funny if I’d vommed all over their expensive-looking suits.
Weirdly, despite all the hideous side effects, I keep finding myself craving a nice, thick milkshake. That’s addiction, kids. It’s a downward spiral from here. You have been warned.
