Dining options are limited at 10pm in rural Ohio.

I took the southern route to St Louis from Detroit this time, traveling through Toledo to Ft Wayne. US Highway 24 is a dark, empty stretch of perfectly flat pavement speckled with occasional truck stops and gas stations.

Finding myself starving (not literally, as I haven’t been genuinely hungry in about 15 years) I pulled into an Arby’s, an oasis of quality in a desert of fried nothingness. Unfortunately, they closed at 10pm and my clock said 10:05.

Glancing around the small town of Defiance, Ohio, my only other options were a truck stop, McDonald’s, and Burger King. It was all the same to me at this point and Burger King was the closest.

I walked up to the counter and asked the long-haired young man at the register, “What’s good?” as if I’d never been to an entry-level high-speed dining establishment before, as if a place with colorful menus and paper hats was somehow above me.

We all do this when we talk about fast food, scarfing it down like pigs while maligning it in public. We want others to believe we’re at home sipping Argentinian wine and chewing on organic non-GMO kale instead of scarfing down pizza rolls and washing it down with Mountain Dew.

I said to the young man, “What do you think of the Whopperito?”

His response was, “We sell a lot of those. I would try it without pickles.”

So I ordered it without pickles.

It arrived ten minutes later with pickles (they forgot to make the order and apologized for the delay). I didn’t mind — I happen to like pickles and wasn’t in much of a hurry. If time mattered, I’d have flown to Missouri instead of driving for nine hours across the vast emptiness of agricultural America.

I gave it a brief glance, ate it without objection, washed it down with a cup of water, and returned to the Cadillac to continue my journey. Hours later I felt fine.

So that’s my take on the Whopperito. It’s a functional unit of food that did no harm. It’s the Toyota Corolla wrapped in a flour tortilla, a basic means to an end.

Styling and Exterior Design: 2/5

Handling: 4/5

Interior: Yes/5

Braking: ?

Technology: ?

Price as tested: $3.17