If you haven’t heard, there was a Twitter war between fast food restaurants a few days ago. Read about it here on the NYT of all places.
First things first, I LOVE Popeye’s fried chicken. I love it so much that of all the things I could ask for as my last meal, I’d ask for a Popeye’s 4 piece meal, a biscuit, and red beans and rice. Yeah, I said it. I’ve tried other fru-fru bougie friend chicken places here in Seattle like Ezell’s (good but not as good as Popeye’s) and I’ve had Church’s (a long time ago) as well as KFC (get outta here.)
I also love the Chick Fil A original chicken sandwich. I also do enjoy the Wendy’s spicy chicken sandwich, but if I had a choice between the two, I’d go for CFA. Anyway, I just had to try out the new Popeye’s chicken sandwich. A buddy of mine tried it a few days ago and actually said it was better than CFA. A few readers said the same thing. I had to try it for myself though.
I made the 15 minute drive during lunch. I was just at the Popeye’s a month ago and it wasn’t that busy. Today, it was PACKED! There were probably about 15 people waiting for their food and another 5 in line waiting to order. It’s NEVER been that busy before. It had to be this chicken sandwich. After ordering, I had to wait almost 20 minutes for my order.
I sat down, opened it up and it didn’t look as tasty as the photos. To be fair, CFA doesn’t look as good as the photos too, but it’s still delicious. With my first bite, I thought, “Wow, the chicken is really crunchy and surprisingly moist.” Then after a few more bites, I realized that I don’t really like sauce, so it was too saucy for me.
Here’s a photo of it mid bite:
You can see how juicy the chicken is. You can also see how thick the pickles are (a definite advantage over CFA’s thin ass pickles.) You can also see how saucy it is. At the mid way point, I put down the sandwich and ate a few normal chicken pieces instead before finishing up the sandwich.
If you like a saucy sandwich, I think it’s legit. Next time, I’ll get it w/o the sauce. However, the problem is that Popeye’s regular chicken is so damn good! If I’m already in Popeye’s, I’m going to get the fried chicken. I only have so much stomach capacity. I mean, I could do the sandwich and maybe the 2 piece meal… So is it better than CFA? I don’t know; I really do want to try it w/o the sauce. I think at the end of the day, they are both equally good and if you’re in the area for either restaurant and craving a chicken sandwich, you can’t go wrong with either.