
America’s ‘Fried Chicken War’ - elorant
http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20200429-americas-fried-chicken-war
======
stronglikedan
For those in the SE US, I recommend trying Publix fried chicken, if you
haven't already. I get a whole fried chicken for less than $10, and it's
better than anything I've had in a restaurant. The trick is to call an hour
ahead, and have them make it fresh for you. That's half a fried chicken, plus
another half as fixin's!

~~~
chasd00
grocery store fried chicken can be amazing. A local store in my old
neighborhood ( SW Dallas ) would cook a fresh batch on Saturday afternoons. so
good and very affordable.

~~~
csommers
Safeway has some of the best chicken tenders.

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westwooded
Love that they use lard vs. the unhealthy vegetable seed oils that all places
use nowadays.

Just like how McDonald's used to use beef tallow.

Best fried chicken has to be Korean fried chicken at this point. Double frying
it gives the inside the tenderness temperature while the outside is perfectly
crispy.

~~~
bluntfang
I've been curious about McDonald's fries since I think they are tasty. There
are many articles around that still say they use beef products in their french
fries. According to their website they do not use beef, but a "beef flavoring"
that contains milk products and not beef product.

[https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/small-french-
frie...](https://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en-us/product/small-french-fries.html)

~~~
Ironlikebike
Yes this is true. It's a beef flavoring. My father spent the majority of his
career in food-processing engineering working in a factory that made
McDonald's french fries and confirmed this was the case. They're also par-
cooked (pre-fried) before being flash frozen, and they don't use a batter or
seasoning. Interesting tidbit, all of their competitors had their fries made
in the same facility. I believe most of them even used the same type of
potatoes.

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adaisadais
I moved to SF last year from SC and it has been a royal pain to find a good
fried chicken joint.

Friends, if you find yourselves in the southeast do your best to get into a
Bojangles.

Any suggestions for a good chicken joint in the Bay Area?

~~~
anxman
I know this is kind of heresy but there isn’t good fried chicken in the Bay
Area and I’ve traveled the country in search of fried chicken. I can’t tell
you how many times people have said “omigod you have to try so and sos” only
to be disappointed over and over.

The best I’ve found in the US is Howlin Rays in LA (obviously) followed by Ms
T in Chicago followed by the Gus’s chain.

In the Bay Area, KFC is still the most reliable.

~~~
sevencolors
I'd agree SF could have better Southern-style fried chicken. But at the KFC
level Krispy Krunchy Chicken is pretty damn great :)

~~~
anxman
I haven't tried KKC yet. It's on my list. Also, Thomas Keller's fried chicken
is wildly overrated also. Perfect fry but very unseasoned. Not worth a trip
up.

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II-V-I
I'd love to choose a side. Sadly, I'm living in Copenhagen after living in the
U.S. for many years and there's no fried chicken war and barely any fried
chicken. I recently found one joint where you can get a decent fried chicken
sandwich, though that's about as far as it goes.

It's such a shame because the chicken you can buy here is, to my taste, of
much higher quality compared to that in the U.S. The tenderness is incredible,
and it's so moist it's almost impossible to overcook. I'm not really sure why
it hasn't caught on here. Perhaps it's simply a matter of preference/taste.

~~~
mikkelam
I'd love to know which place serves fried chicken sanwiches in Copenhagen,
could you share that?

~~~
II-V-I
Of course. Jagger [1] is the one I'm speaking of.

[1]: [https://jaggerfastfood.com/menu](https://jaggerfastfood.com/menu)

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danans
I don't know if it is any good by discerning fried-chicken standards, but I
would be amiss not to put in a plug for the American fried-chicken destination
of my youth: Frankenmuth, MI (AKA Michigan's little Bavaria):

[https://www.frankenmuth.org/dining/world-famous-
chicken/](https://www.frankenmuth.org/dining/world-famous-chicken/)

~~~
bluedino
The blandest chicken you can get. It's such a soulless midwestern plain Jane
place to eat (Zehnder's)

~~~
danans
I believe you, and I would probably agree if had it again today, but nostalgia
has its own flavor, ya know?

These days I guess they'd at least give you Tabasco or Sriracha on the side?

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ksenzee
Chicken Mary's is the only place I've ever been offered fried chicken with a
side of spaghetti. It's good, too.

~~~
spike021
Jollibee's also has fried chicken with spaghetti! It's a Filipino thing and
it's super good. Not sure where they have locations other than California,
though.

~~~
NikolaeVarius
They have a NYC branch.

I argue that they use entirely too much sugar in their spaghetti. Not that I
have some moral outrage about sugar in the stuff, but it was actively very
sweet.

~~~
kyllo
Yes, Filipino spaghetti is definitely intended to be sweet--it uses banana
ketchup in the sauce. Bananas were used as a substitute for tomatoes due to
the Philippines' relative abundance of the former.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_ketchup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_ketchup)

~~~
stephenhuey
Banana ketchup usage for Filipino spaghetti came about during a tomato sauce
shortage in the Second World War:

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/filipino-
cuisine...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/filipino-cuisine-
asian-fusion-180954947/)

------
bpyne
The best I've eaten was from a stand at a Dominican Republic heritage festival
in Providence, RI sometime between 1989-1991. A little, old, Dominican woman
cooked the chicken. It was loaded with flavor including some spice.

Recently I picked up friend chicken from a small restaurant in Providence, RI
called North. It was their take on chicken karaage. It was crispy but tender
and was spiced with something mildly hot. It's my new favorite.

I prefer sticking with the small places. They're not afraid to spice to local
tastes rather than spice for the median person in the US.

------
koenigdavidmj
Another Kansas chicken place worth mentioning is the Brookville Hotel. It’s
two lies for the price of one—no longer in Brookville (now in Abilene) and no
longer a hotel (but they have some old rooms preserved as a museum). But it
serves half a fried chicken per person, plus all the fixings (creamed corn,
mashed potatoes, coleslaw, and more), at a sit-down white tablecloth
establishment, for under 20 per plate.

~~~
curiousllama
You want to talk value... Harolds fried chicken in the south side of Chicago
has half a fried chicken, a bed of fries, two slices of wonderbread and a shot
of coleslaw all smothered in mild sauce for less than 5 dollars.

I'm sure some pedant is about to come out with "oh really, the cole slaw is
smothered in mild sauce?" Yes. Nothing in that bag avoids the sweet tang of
mild sauce shoved through bulletproof glass.

It's the greatest food in the world.

~~~
germinalphrase
Harolds is really good, but if you’re in Minneapolis go high dollar and get
the Tennessee Hot from Revival.

~~~
curiousllama
Ooh - I will be in Minneapolis once this whole global shutdown thing is over,
so I'll definitely head that way

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29athrowaway
The only way to make fried chicken fast preserving its inner moisture is using
a pressure fryer. That's the innovation that enabled KFC to become a fast food
chain.

~~~
selimthegrim
And here I thought it was buttermilk...

~~~
blaser-waffle
I thought it was the 11 secret herbs and spices

~~~
selimthegrim
You probably think you're getting fresh chicken when you pull through the KFC
drive thru window right before it closes too....

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peterclary
Coincidentally I was just last night reading about another "Fried Chicken
War", which was a rivalry between two hotels in the Catskill Mountains arising
from a guest/manager dispute.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catskill_Mountain_House#The_Fr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catskill_Mountain_House#The_Fried_Chicken_War)

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bitxbitxbitcoin
I've been searching long and hard for the best fried chicken for all my life.
I'll need to give Chicken Mary's and Chicken Annie's a try the next chance I
get.

So far, the best has by far been Willie Mae's Scotch House - and the country's
food critics seem to agree. [1]

[1] [https://thehighestcritic.com/munchies/the-fried-chicken-
buck...](https://thehighestcritic.com/munchies/the-fried-chicken-bucket-list-
best-fried-chicken-restaurants-america-ranked/)

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phibz
Babe's in North Texas, several locations near Dallas, has got to be the best
fried chicken I've ever had. Easily.

~~~
larrydag
Should have read more. Beat me to it. I agree

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pvaldes
[https://ifunny.co/picture/how-to-find-kentucky-on-a-map-
hat-...](https://ifunny.co/picture/how-to-find-kentucky-on-a-map-hat-head-
kentucky-bOMrAKuc6)

------
homarp
if you're in Bangkok try the chicken from
[https://www.instagram.com/phonjaroen/](https://www.instagram.com/phonjaroen/)
behind the Thai boxing stadium.

------
larrydag
For those in Dallas, TX I suggest Babe's Chicken or Bubba's (same owner).

------
selimthegrim
They always say you've moved to New Orleans when you stop at Popeye's on the
way home after getting $250 worth of groceries

~~~
wincy
Oh man now I want to get Popeyes for lunch. I swear they put some sort of drug
in their red beans and rice, I just can’t get enough of that with some spicy
chicken!

Definitely try Popeyes if you get the chance, we’ve got them all the way up
here in Kansas City, so I’m not sure how wide their range is.

~~~
selimthegrim
One time I was driving back from Boulder to New Orleans. I think this was
somewhere on US-84 in Texas or I-25 in Colorado (I think the latter). My fan
had conked out (my AC had quit on the leg in). After a few hundred miles of
driving with the window down I saw Popeyes on the blue sign at the next exit
and pulled off at the exit. The moment I turned left to cross the overpass and
laid eyes on the Popeyes sign on the other side of the Interstate my fan
croaked back to life. I call it Al Copeland's miracle.

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throwaway123x2
What do people think of KFC's fried chicken in the US?

~~~
Larrikin
Personally, it's trash chicken that's usually poorly fried that comes with
awful sides, with the best spice blend of any chicken I have ever had that
wasn't coated in a sauce. The corporate suits have found a way to basically
destroy the product by doing everything as cheaply as possible yet there is
still a glimmer of what must have been an amazing product.

It taste better in other countries but not because they do a better job
replicating the original, but because it just taste like a completely
different chicken place with the same logo. It's like getting Fanta in a
different country.

~~~
wincy
Oh neat, thanks for the heads up, the next time I travel out of the country
I’ll have to make a point of trying KFCs to taste the difference.

I think KFC provides a baseline for other chicken restaurants though, like a
“your chicken must be at least this good to have a chicken restaurant”. You
have to get your MVP (Minimum Viable Poultry).

------
danans
> To keep her family from starving, Annie began selling ham and veal
> sandwiches for a few pennies to miners passing the front of her house.

It seems like an editor at the BBC missed something here. This should have
probably read "To keep her family from destitution" \- if they had ham and
veal to sell, they presumably had it to eat themselves.

~~~
miscPerson
It could be a sustainability thing:

If you butcher an animal, you have X lbs of meat now. Maybe you don’t need all
of that immediately just to survive.

If you only need Y < X to feed yourself, you can sell the excess and buy a new
animal plus food to fatten it up.

This converts a onetime benefit (killing an animal you have now) into a
sustainable way to provide for yourself.

~~~
danans
That explanation makes sense, but the author's phrasing still seems clumsy to
me.

