Restaurant prices are up 3.4% from last year, matching overall inflation — and fast food, long seen as a budget fallback, is no longer the cheap option it once was.

Consumers interviewed on camera described sticker shock at drive-throughs, and news segments are now walking viewers through menu hacks: ordering deconstructed items, using chain apps, and stacking loyalty deals to cut costs. One example from Chick-fil-A showed that ordering 30 nuggets, six plain buns, and free sauce instead of six chicken sandwiches drops the per-sandwich cost from about $5 to roughly $3 — a savings of around $12.

When fast food budgeting requires a calculator and a social media tutorial, it signals something concrete about where household food costs have landed.

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