Fast food is the term given to many foods that can be prepared and served quickly. While any meal with low preparation time can be considered to be fast food, such as TV dinners, typically the term refers to food sold in a restaurant or store which is rapidly prepared and served to the customer in a packaged form for take out/take away.Outlets may be stands or kiosks, which may provide no shelter or seating, or fast food restaurants (also known as quick service restaurants). Franchise operations which are part of restaurant chains have standardized foodstuffs shipped to each restaurant from central locations.The capital requirements to start a fast-food restaurant are relatively small, particularly in areas with non-existent or poorly enforced health codes. Small, individually-owned fast-food restaurants have become common throughout the world. Fast food restaurants with higher sit-in ratios, where customers can sit and have their orders brought to them, are known as fast casual restaurants.

"How Many Quarter Pounders From McDonald's Could You Eat Instead Of That Pasta?" CSPI investigates and compares Italian Foods to Fast Food Items. You'll be surprised how bad that Spaghetti in meat sauce is for you!

Fruit, nuts, and sliced chicken...on lettuce? This salad sounds wholesome enough. But don't be fooled! Bacon, bleu cheese, and gobs of Italian dressing all play a part in this salad's pitiful nutritionals. Over 1,100 calories for a salad?!

Italian scholar races through culinary history, giving a new meaning to fast food.

AFTER a five-year battle, the fast-food giant McDonalds has retreated from a southern Italian town, defeated by the sheer wholesomeness of a local baker's bread.

With all the current talk of Slow food, fast food, good food, bad food, we thought it was time to take a closer look at Italian ice cream. Like fine wine, olive oil and even chocolate, ice cream is not the same all around the world, and shouldn't even try to be. It's the milk and fresh local ingredients that make all the difference.