I have a bit of a confession to make: I'm not that big of a Chick-Fil-A fan. I'm just not. Worse yet, I'm the only person I know who just doesn't rave about how wonderful Chick-Fil-A is.
Maybe it's the soggy breading they use on their chicken. It always seems like it should be crispier. I just don't like breading, especially when the other chicken joints use a perfect, crispy batter instead. Chick-Fil-A's breading reminds me of some kind of Shake 'N' Bake entree gone wrong. Yuck. The spicy chicken has a decent flavor to it, but it'd be infinitely better with a crunchy batter.
I think the peanut oil makes everything taste saltier than it should, too. I know it's supposed to be healthy, but blecch. Luckily, it's not overwhelmingly salty like a lot of fast food, but it's still a tad worse than I'd like.
I must admit that they do a few things right. The sausage breakfast sandwich is pretty tasty, so I suppose the adorable ad cows should say "Pork iz yummy too." They offer a variety of delightful sauces for their chicken nuggets (Raising Cane's, take note). Polynesian sauce is concentrated win in a little plastic tub. The waffle fries are an ingenious way of ensuring there's enough fry coating on each fry to cancel out that icky "potato" flavor that I don't like. The party platters are awesome if you have to feed a bunch of people in a pinch, too.
Overall, meh. Y'all can wait in that excruciatingly long line. I'm going somewhere that has better chicken.
Do I want to eat more chicken? Yes. Do I want to eat this chicken at lunchtime when the drive thru is a mile long and there are 139 kids running around inside? No. Will I still go there despite this? Yes.
Yes, it's a chain, but it's the best chain around. I eat at Chick Fil-A as much as any local eatery for two primary reasons: (A) the chicken never fails to be delicious, and (B) the service is without peer, particularly the service at the well-managed Franklin Avenue location.
Sure, if you hit the drive-thru at noon on a weekday, you will find yourself surrounded by dozens of hungry Waco motorists. But they've actually got drive-thru service down to a science, utilizing multiple lanes and credit card-scanning carhops. And the employees are unfailingly friendly.
My one and only beef with Chick Fil-A -- or Chickle-ay, as my 3-year-old daughter calls it -- is that the cows can't spell. Come on, Chick-Fil-A! Let's teach those bovines that 'Eat Mor Chikin' won't get you past junior high-level English.
