fast food follies, part 3

[calimac]

(part 1) (part 2)

It's already written, so I might as well finish it up.

Church's Chicken
I hate to say it, but this is a chain that believes that only ghetto-dwellers eat fried chicken, because I've never found an outlet anywhere else. Apparently they decided that East San Jose wasn't downscale enough for them (or was it that it had too many Mexicans and not enough Blacks?) because both their outlets there abruptly closed several years ago, and now there aren't any less than 50 miles away. In a way, I kind of miss sitting there in a booth, quietly eating my chicken, when some guy would slip into the seat on the other side of the table and try to sell me some cocaine. That never happened anywhere else. But the chicken was pretty good, a change from KFC in the days before Popeyes, as long as they didn't try to dress it up. Church's attempts at spicy or whatnot were inevitably disastrous. Just get the plain original chicken.

Long John Silver's
There's a local KFC which doubles as a Long John Silver's, and that's my only experience with it. I tried the fish. Once.

Krispy Kreme
A Southern chain which arrived here with great fanfare some years ago, temporarily generating lines even longer than the ones outside the new Chick-fil-A. Someone brought in some of the donuts to work and insisted we try their wonderfulness. Now, I like donuts, and I've been a regular patron of the local independent donut shops. The Krispy Kreme was the most repulsive, oversweetened, body-less, and utterly vile donut I've ever had. And that's when it was fresh and piping hot. Eaten when cool, it was far worse than that.

El Pollo Loco
I found this chain in LA in the early 80s, and then, like Popeyes a few years later, it followed me home. (The name may be freely translated as "Psycho Chicken," which was the title of a parody version of Talking Heads' "Psycho Killer." I don't know if there's a connection.) I ought to eat here more often, because, as long as they don't leave it on the grill too long, the chicken is tasty, and it's unquestionably better for you than anything fried, but it is awfully expensive for what is just a little char-broiled chicken. I usually order an off-menu item whose existence I discovered long ago: the "wing-lovers' special" - 3 or 4 wings, depending on how generous they're feeling that day, plus the usual sides, for $5.

Boston Market
Another chain that followed me home - I discovered it when attending a late-80s Readercon in Worcester, Massachusetts, a city with, outside of the hotel, all the ambience of a bomb site and as many places to eat, so I subsisted on driving across the town limits to the neighboring towns which all had Boston Markets, and soon afterwards they started appearing here. It's another place I'd eat at more often if there were more around. The rotisserie chicken is always meltingly tender, even the breast meat, and there's a wide selection of tasty and healthy sides. But they should stick to what they know: recently they introduced ribs, and they were the worst ribs ever: so hard I couldn't cut them with a knife. I sent them back and got chicken in their place.

In-N-Out Burger
Another chain from elsewhere introduced here with great fanfare, to my mystification when I tried it, which I did several times to ensure it wasn't a freak occurrence. The burger was piled high with all the stuff I don't want on a burger, and the on-menu options were limited (I subsequently learned there's an elaborate list of off-menu choices, none of which quite do it for me), and somewhere hiding in among it all was a small, overcooked, tasteless beef patty. This must be the burger that the famous Wendy's "where's the beef?" commercial was intended to parody. On top of which, the place's name sounds like a laxative.

Baskin-Robbins
A fundamental memory of childhood that I hardly visit any more because there are hardly any around any more. What's it still doing on the top 50 list? There's better ice cream, but it was certainly good enough.

Wingstop
The only mystery about Wingstop is why I don't eat here daily, especially considering that the nearest outlet is closer to me than any of the others. I love chicken wings, they cook them well, and the flavorings are tangily delicious and work well with the meat, qualities conspicuously absent in most other chicken-wing vendors, many of which are really more like bars with chicken wings attached. Well, Wingstop is expensive - and doesn't have discount days - and I think if I ate here often, I might get tired of it, which I don't want to happen. So I save it for a very occasional treat.

Jamba Juice
There's one of these at Stanford, and a few times I've dropped in when I could really use a hearty juice. There's a couple of combo juices that actually don't contain anything I dislike.

Comments

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

There's Church's Chicken in a central Philadelphia subway/train station, and not terribly much south of there-- neither of them are ghetto neighborhoods. I'd call the food low quality but tasty. Church's and Popeye's are the only fast foods I like.

Burger King used to be good, but their burgers have become completely flavorless.

Is Dunkin Donuts on a future list?

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

If you ever find yourself somewhere there's a Culver's, I encourage giving them a try. They've been my favorite fast food restaurant for the last 10-15 years, though the duration of that fondness might well have to do with the fact that the nearest one has been more than 700 miles away for the last decade.

Culver's has a broad menu (including pot roast dinner), the best fast-food burger I've found, tasty french fries, and frozen custard! They serve coffee in ceramic mugs for dining in; that alone endears them to me. They've remained excellent while expanding locations well beyond their Wisconsin beginnings. I hope they continue to do so.

I enjoyed all of your reviews. The biggest surprise is that you can't tell the difference between Popeyes mild and spicy chicken. I'll have to try their mild the next time I'm at one; years ago the difference was clear to my palate. I, too, like Five Guys, though I prefer Culver's burgers even to theirs. I want to like Boston Market more than I do. Their food has been too salty each of the few times I've had it.

I'm not into submarine sandwiches, either, but turned out to like Subway. Even better than Subway is Jimmy John's, though their menu is more limited (and there's likely less that you'd care for).

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

Well, so chicken. We have a Church's just a few blocks away, and I don't think its location qualifies as "ghetto," though it's certainly ethnically mixed. They were our favorite fried chicken place, because what they served actually had flavor, but I haven't eaten fried chicken in a decade or more. Pollo Loco is where we go for chicken now—I don't consider them expensive, and I find their chicken both healthy and tasty, especially with a lemon slice squeezed over. I'm afraid I can't judge the quality of wing places, as I've never thought wings were worth the bother, with all that skin and bone and that tiny bit of meat.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Dunkin Donuts is on the list of 50, but I've never been to one. My only comment on Dunkin Donuts is that, while I know what the name means, it nevertheless sounds slightly risqué.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

An 8-piece chicken only - which I cite to eliminate the complication of sides - is $12. Even if it's dark meat only, it's $10. That's expensive.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Is Culver's a coffee shop, then, rather than a fast-food place? The menu seems in-between, but when I saw the note "Please, no tipping," I thought this has to be a coffee shop, because to say that implies a wait staff. This was a list of fast-food places without wait staffs, so coffee shops, like, say, Denny's, which on size alone would certainly be big enough, are ineligible.

The menu does look good, though. I'll be in Illinois in April, probably going outside Chicago, so I hope that'll be my chance.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Church's locations: Well, it may depend on your definition of "ghetto," but a look at their location map does suggest a strongly ethnically and socioeconomically based idea of who eats fried chicken. I don't know the map of San Diego in those terms that well, but I see that, aside from one in East San Diego (is that yours?), every one in the area is south of 94 (and not downtown, either), which is rather suggestive. There's KFCs in the northern part of the city, but you won't find Church's. I also tried LA and Chicago, both of which are well-supplied with Church's, and while in both cases there are a few outliers, the geographic concentration is, frankly, staggering.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Church's locations: It may depend on your definition of "ghetto." I checked their location page. There aren't many in Philadelphia, and I don't know its ethnic or socioeconomic map at all, but I do know Chicago and LA, both of which are well-supplied with Church's, and while in both cases there were a few outliers, the geographic concentration strongly suggested a corporate ethnic/socioeconomic idea of who eats fried chicken. The KFC maps look nothing whatever like these.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

Eight pieces is more than the two of us would eat. But I think we also draw the "expensive" line in different places. I start thinking that a meal for two is expensive—too pricy for "fast food"—once the bottom line hits around $15.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I'm not talking about whether it makes an expensive meal. For a meal, you'd want sides anyway. I'm talking about the price of chicken: how much it costs for what you get. I recently asked Kinko's for a bag for my copies and they said, "that'd be 25 cents." I said, "For a paper bag, that's highway robbery!" It's not that 25 cents is a lot of money. It's that it's a lot of money for A PAPER BAG. And $12 is a lot of money, not for dinner, but for EIGHT (not particularly large) PIECES OF CHICKEN.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

(Combining responses to pts 2 &3)

I can't stand KFC. Their food makes me sick. The smell of their food makes me sick. I've tried. It used to be okay, but it's gone waaaaaaay downhill.

There's a Popeye's a few blocks from here. When they first moved in, the New Orleans folk were all excited. Me: Meh. Some of their stuff is okay, but barely a cut above KFC and I haven't been there for years. The only exception: For some reason, they make a great mashed potato and gravy. The last several times erny, lo the years, was to get a large order of mashed potatoes and to try whatever special they were pushing.

I ate at a Chic-fil-a (which I keep pronouncing, in my head, "Chick A Fill") once, many years ago. The one location anywhere near here is at the U. I tend to agree: Above average fast food chicken. Still, not good enough to go out of my way for, though if I was at the college more often I might drop in. And make snide comments about their corporate politics; not the servers' fault, but the protest deserves to register.

Also agree that Church's was the best of the fast food chicken places. There was one about two blocks from here, perhaps twenty years ago. It went away; I gather the franchiser gave up all MN locations, or something. It was located just on the other side of the highway from the McDonalds/Taco Bell, so not, technically, in a bad area of town. On a major street near the entrance ramp to I-35W, the location should be a goldmine. But no. It went through a few other eateries and has been a Generic Chinese Take Out for more than a decade. I've never seen the place be busy, and if they redo the bridge/ramp then it might not be a location anymore.

Similarly, Long John Silvers. The only one I knew about was down the street, and it went away a long time ago. It was okay, but not better than that. (Recently, we were in Martha's Vineyard, MA. Some of the local fried fish places were pretty good, blowing away LJS, at least from my memory of it.)

Boston Market (and Culver's, mentioned by Geri) strike me as a middle ground that doesn't quite work. Better than regular fast food, but not as good as getting a rotisserie chicken from a supermarket. Sort of 'fast food for yuppies'. We have other, similar, places around here. Haven't really checked out their nutrition guidelines.

The only Baskin-Robbins I can think of around here is at the Mall of America. I've been there a few times; still good ice cream. But there are better ice cream places around (including at the mall). B-R is a desert place, not a fast-food place by my lights. Dairy Queen is trying, with some success, to make the bridge up to fast food, but their corporate HQ is in Mpls, and the Minicon/Convergence hotel is right next door to their flagship restaurant.

I'm not diabetic, and wish to remain not. When Crispy Creme came to town, everyone was excited, and people brought donuts to the place I was working at the time. I think I've tried two or three of their donuts, cut up. I doubt I've had one full Crispy Creme in total. I agree; vastly oversweet. And my fingers refuse to spell it with the K's. Sorry.

I like the juice places. I can't speak to Jamba Juice specifically, since they all meld into one. We have several around town, including the mall. Generic trick: If possible, add protein powder. Somewhat overpriced, but a decent snack on the go. Again, more 'chain' than 'fast food'.

Pollo Loco didn't ring a bell at first. But in Bend, OR, we stopped at El Pollo Gordo, which I hope isn't the same chain. Poor food, the only below-average place we ate at during our trip west. Apparently, its Big Thing in drive-through margueritas.

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't know. I never buy chicken in that format.

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

No, it's a burger place. Butter burgers!

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I don't either, but it's a useful metric to determine what they're charging you.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

There's a lot of "El Pollo X" this or that out west that have nothing to do with El Pollo Loco. My all-time favorite chicken place is a stand-alone in the barrio of Salinas called Pollo Dorado, for instance.

Maybe they vary, but I find most supermarket rotisserie chicken very unappetizing. Boston Market is much more to my taste.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

"burger place" is ambiguous. Some burger places are fast-food. Some have table service: that makes them coffee shops. The significance of the distinction is whether it qualifies to be on a fast-food list or not. This series of posts is about a fast-food list, and that's why a place that isn't fast-food wouldn't be on the list.

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Culver's is purely a fast-food chain. You stand at the counter just like at McDonald's, Burger King, Popeyes, etc. etc. etc and order your food from the menu posted above the order takers. Or there's a drive-thru that works the same as every other common fast-food drive-thru you've encountered.

A bit of table service comes into play in that they give you a little plastic table tent with your order number, then bring your tray of food to your table if you're dining in.It's probably that bit of table service that prompts them to have the no tipping note. Before you leave the counter, they give you your drink cup to go fill your own soda, like so many fast-food places have moved to. Or your cup of coffee, unless they're brewing a fresh pot, in which case they bring it out to you.

And if you're camped out for awhile using their wifi to keep up with life and business as I did whenever I was in Battle Creek these past several years, the staff tends to stop by the table and ask if you'd like some more coffee, the way it's done at coffee shops. Except you've already fully paid up front, as in a fast-food joint.

They still give you a plastic table tent number if your order is to go, but you then typically fill your drink cup and stand around in the order area until your food is ready.

Their one "fault" to my eyes is that they put a pickle slice on top the burger bun unless you remember to tell them not to. I dislike pickles, including pickle juice, and don't want either anywhere near any of my food.

I hope you have a chance to go to Culver's when you're in Illinois. I'll be interested in hearing your take on the place.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Some but not all El Pollo Loco outlets fit the description in your second paragraph.

[ken-3k.livejournal.com]

Culver's is probably creeping into the low end of what the marketeers call "fast-casual" dining. The bill for Leslie and I there usually runs close to $17? Leslie likes the new Culver's in town; we go there a bit because it is close to home.

I ate at a Long John Silver's, once. This introduced me to a novel concept: shrimp that you throw away. :-P That may have been a disastrously bad restaurant -- comparing notes with friends, everyone who had been to that LJS had a similar awful experience.

The only worse fast food experience in the last 20 years was a Burger King in west Michigan where the breaded chicken was still frozen inside when served. (That place was closed the next time we made the trip to Lake Michigan.)

Alas, I eat at BK / Taco Bell / Wendy's / Mac's House of Beef far, far too often. Ideologically I'd prefer to support the small independent diner-like places, but usually I don't have the time.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

"I'd prefer to support the small independent diner-like places, but usually I don't have the time."

I don't think I put on LJ my review of the Peanut Barrel in East Lansing, which we had lunch at while waiting for Mythcon to open up: "This is the place to go if you want to wait unusually long for your hamburger. Pretty good once it comes, though."