Will home-cooked meals keep me in a better shape than fast food?

Salt, fat, and sugar all make stuff taste good, and fast food is no exception. People always take things to extremes, and then use those examples as stereotypical norms. Yes you can eat something healthy at a fast food place, but unless you rotate the place you go to you're eating 1 of maybe 2 items every time. If you get 1 meal a week from fast food, then no biggie; in moderation a "healthy" fast food meal is fine.

It's when you rely on fast food for half your breakfasts (because it's "faster' to sit in the drive-through for 10 minutes than to cook up some eggs in 5 minutes on the stove...), all your lunches (because making a sandwich in the morning or the night before is too tough), and several dinners every week that you run into obesity issues in a lot of people.

It boils down to poor time management IMO- people who eat out a lot will claim it's due to lack of time, and that same lack of time leads to no workouts, no cardio, but plenty of time to surf the web, play computer games, chat on the phone, and watch TV.

With a little practice/experience, it's easy to make a lot of good food (good meaning both healthy and tasty) at home without spending tons of time in the kitchen. It's just a low priority for a lot of people who are distracted by the little stuff.