This 5pm Dining blogger will be on Radio Scotland’s Kitchen Café show this afternoon (starts at 1.30pm) to talk about the changing food landscape of the High Street over the last 25 or so years.

The short version is that it has changed beyond all recognition. Comedians still like to make jokes about Scotland’s food but that joke went stale a long time ago. It is not perfect but, compared to the Eighties and a good chunk of the Nineties, Scotland’s High Street now offers a huge range of good places to eat.

Limited options

It might seem incredibly to anyone born post Star Wars – the first one, not the rubbish reboot – but it is not so long ago that, outside of the major cities, your restaurant choices were probably limited to a curry house, a Chinese restaurant and maybe an Italian. The larger, more grand hotels would possibly have a posh French restaurant where you could expect the maitre d’ to be condescending to you unless you ran the local Rotary club. The standard of the food was not as good as it is now because few people knew any better and that includes the chefs.

TV, cheap travel and immigration have completely rewritten that scenario. Eating out used to be a special occasion. Now it is another leisure option on a par with going to the cinema or going to a gig. Growing up in Dundee in the Eighties, eating out was reserved for landmark birthdays.

Everyone is a critic

These days, teenagers debate whether to eat at Nandos or Pizza Express of a Saturday afternoon. Snooty maitre d’s are more or less extinct and – thank you MasterChef – everyone is a food critic these days. If they think that their meal wasn’t up to par, they will be shouting about it on social media the moment they leave the restaurant.

Eating out has become affordable for almost everyone. There is an argument to be had about whether or not the national and multinational chains are good for the food scene but their huge buying power has certainly kept price points pretty keen on the High Street.

Staggering choice

The choice available now is staggering. Take a quick look at the different cuisines available on 5pm Dining. From tapas to Turkish, from pizza to Persian and from burgers to Brazilians, you can eat food from pretty much every corner of the globe.

Of course, we are never completely happy and there are plenty of criticisms that could be levelled at the High Street food scene in Scotland. However, in general, we have never had it so good.

Tune in at 1.30pm if you want to hear more.