Church's Chicken: 6/29/13

Hello again,

This week I went, Madison rode with me, to Church’s Chicken. I have passed by Church’s Chicken many times and I have always wanted to try the food there, so I figured why not make this restaurant the next entry for my chicken tender blog! The reason I chose to go to Church’s Chicken was because I was not too hungry at the time (it was after 2pm) and we were meeting friends for dinner a few hours later, so I did not want to have a big lunch anyways. 

 

 Here is the logo for Church's Chicken.

Batter and crispiness: A

-I really enjoyed the batter on the chicken tenders from Church’s Chicken. It was very crunchy and very flavorful. Overall I think Church’s does a fantastic job with the actual taste and texture of the batter, but the ratio of batter to chicken is disproportionate so much that you cannot taste the chicken in some bites.

Tenderness and juiciness of the chicken:  B

-Continuing with what I said in the previous statement, there is a lot of batter on these chicken tenders. In fact, there is so much batter that I had a hard time scoring this section.

Every time I took I bite I tried to focus on the texture of the chicken, but I could not decide on a grade until after I ate almost two chicken tenders. However, I concluded that the chicken is tender, the tips of the tenders and juicy, the middle is on the dry side.

Portion size/presentation: C-

-I was very disappointed in the size of this meal. When I first drove up and saw the prices on the menu I almost left because it seemed a little unreasonable, but I decided to order because I had already driven 20 minutes to go to Church’s…originally I did not realize it was that far away. Now, while $7.99 does not seem like a for a fast food meal, it was not warranted in this case. My meal consisted of 4 extremely thin tenders (on one of them there was a thicker middle portion), a small fry (it had about a handful of fries), and a regularly sized biscuit. Good thing I ate this meal only a few hours before I ate a big dinner or I would have been very hungry.

Description:

-Delicious all white meat chicken tenders available in spicy or original. Choose your favorite dipping sauce and you’re good to go. The four chicken tender meal comes with fries, a biscuit, and a drink for $7.99.

Side: C-

-As I said before, with this meal I got a biscuit and a small fry as my side items. When it comes to the biscuit I thought it was very tasty. The biscuit was the perfect mix of fluffiness and crunchiness, however I was not a big fan of the honey butter on top. Overall I liked the biscuit, but the same cannot be said for the fries. The fries were slightly soggy and lacked any seasoning. If I go back to Church’s Chicken then I will definitely get a different side.

Reheating: D+

-Not surprisingly, this meal did not reheat well. The tenders lacked any flavor, were chewy, and not crunchy at all…I actually had to throw away big chucks of the tenders because I could not bite through them. Also, the fries were almost inedible and there was a lot of grease when I finished eating. The one bright spot of the meal was the biscuit, which I think improved during reheating. Gone was the honey butter taste that I disliked while the fluffiness and crunchiness stayed. Originally I was going to give this section a D, but the biscuit bumped my grade up to a D+ because I was left hungry after eating the meal. Luckily, I ate a late lunch, so it was able to sustain me until dinner.

 

Here is my meal...see what I mean when I say it was small?

Overall I would give my chicken tender meal at Church’s Chicken a C. The actual tenders were good (even though they were small), the chicken was cooked fairly well (for a fast food restaurant), and the biscuit was delicious (even though I did not like the honey butter). My main complaints with the meal were the small portion size for the price, the disappointing fries, and the fact that the meal did not reheat well. I am not sure if I would choose to go back to Church’s Chicken, but I would go again if someone had a craving for it. In conclusion, it was not one of my favorite fast food restaurants, but it was not a bad enough experience that I would never eat there again. In my opinion there are just so many other places where you can get better chicken tenders for the same price or a little bit more.