No one likes to be left behind. This seems to be especially true when it comes to the big boys of fast food. If something is on trend and is taking off, they feel they gotta get in on the action to cash in on the craze as it were. At least that is how it feels with the fried chicken sandwich wars. Sure, things have calmed down a tad from the frenzy Popeyes spurred, but new variations seem to still be popping up with anything from a full on media blitz (I see you Taco Bell!) to, oh yeah, we had fried chicken sandwiches before but now we have revamped them since they were frozen crap to begin with, and you know who you are.

Plus, because Popeyes seemed to catch so many of them off guard with its popularity, they were all a little late to the game in getting either a new one or a re-worked one on the menu at all their franchisees. That is what happens when you feel you have to test market something to death first before full release. Even though, as you will see, sometimes even those pre-tested ideas are not so great.

This time around I am concentrating on the most well known of the fast food giants. The ones primarily in the burger and fries game: Hardees/Carl Jr, Burger King, Wendys and McDonalds. Between them you’d think at least one of them could come up with a good version for the super masses, right?

Ah Hardees, I grew up with them. The are all over the South and Southeast, and still called Hardees. In the rest of the country they are pretty much known as Carl Jrs which took over/bought up the Hardees Chain which itself had bought up the Roy Rogers chain, for those of you old enough to remember those. I’m sure they’ve absorbed some more, but you can just Google it.

Hardees is one of the fast food restaurants I worked at as a teen, because in the South, that is what you do. I flame broiled (they did that then), made biscuits, fried stuff, worked drive thru, wore ugly brown and orange polyester, worked the overnight weekend shift (they were 24 hours on weekends), saw some super drunks needing biscuits at 4am, you name it I did it there. Though I am not going to say it holds a fond place in my heart. The food I didn’t hate. Biscuits were made from scratch and weirdly, I preferred their fried fish sandwich over McDonalds when I started working there. I think because it was bigger and had more tartar sauce on it—plus shredded lettuce. But I’m here to talk about chicken!

As you can see in the pick above it is pretty simple. A fried chicken breast on a potato bun with a dollop of mayo on top and bottom and two large pickle slices. In essence, it is pretty basic, but in taste, I don’t know, I kind of liked it. The chicken was still crispy and the seasoning was somewhere between KFC’s and that other just chicken sandwich place that shall not be named. The are using a buttermilk and egg mixture dip then a roll through some seasoned flour, you know, just like grandma, if she worked at a fast food restaurant. The may was just enough without making things too wet or mushing up the coating. The pickles also seemed to hit the right note with a cool crunch and not overly tangy or sour. More of an undertone of vinegar to complement the chicken and mayo without overwhelming them. The potato bun was also right on target with a soft sponginess to further highlight the crunch of the freshly fried chicken.

All in and bite after bite, I found this to be an enjoyable version of what is out there. Though I’d still put it just a step below Popeyes and Bojangles. Still, Hardees seems to have pulled off a good one. At least the one I had at this location did. Here’s where consistency across restaurants can be an issue.

About a month after I had this one I was getting my car serviced and there was a Hardees next door. I decided to pop in and try the sandwich again. Well, sadly the version I had from this spot was less than stellar. It was downright terrible. The chicken was so over fried it was dry and shriveled up. The bun encompassed the whole thing. There was also barely a whiff of mayo on the top of the bun, though more would not have helped. The pickles were also also soggy and not crisp. This was an epic fail on many levels. It didn’t help either that the side of cole slaw I got as the meal deal was a mush of just cabbage, no carrots at all, and tasted like both the vinegar and mayo had gone bad. A rare feat indeed and an epic fail all around. At least they didn’t f**k up the tea.

This is why I can’t necessarily put this sandwich high on the list because the one you go to may not do it right. That is the enjoy of big chain fast food, sometimes the consistency of product doesn’t translate and you can guarantee the end product. You may get lucky and find a spot doing it great, but you may also get the dry dud I had. Normally I would have taken it all back to the counter and told them it was terrible, but I wasn’t in the mood and my car was ready so I bounced. Thus my caveat, you may have to try a few spots to find the one.

Then that brings me to this thing. Hardees could not leave well enough alone with just a good fried chicken sandwich, they felt they had to also bring in something else others weren’t doing by jumping on the fried chicken and waffle (still) craze with their own version in the form of a sandwich. Well, how could I pass up the chance to try something so obviously a ploy to the masses? Plus, I was already there so why not.

I am not the target audience for this since this is not a go to menu item for me, it is more of a novelty thing to occasionally try. But this was a monstrosity and I’m sure, an affront to chicken and waffle lovers everywhere. It is the same chicken breast from the sandwich but it is covered in a treacly sweet maple butter syrup which both makes your teeth ache, sticks like glue to your fingertips and just turns once crispy chicken into a soggy mess ‘o meat. And please, LOOK AT THAT WAFFLE! Why is it so small? It barely covers the chicken. It is like they took a whole round waffle, cut it into fours, then cut those fours in half like a slice of bread to create a sadly pathetic version of a waffle bun. Plus, once it is made, wrapped and handed to me, the waffle has already become soft and lost any outer crispness it may have had, thus just being a piece of soft additional sweetness creating more of a mushy sticky liquid mess. Seriously, how did they expect people to eat this without making a mess. No one eats in anymore, we are all in our cars and this will just get stickiness all over everything like a kid after they’ve ice cream. It will be everywhere and not a handy wipe in sight to help out.

This really was a failure on so many levels I just wonder how it made it through all their levels of market testing to this final realized product without considering the serving issues this was going to present. Could this have worked? Yes, because there are places which do these kinds of “sandwiches”. The difference is the waffle is bigger, thicker and not cut in half. You will usually find the syrup comes on the side, more for dipping or adding as you eat or right before you eat than having time to soften up the whole reason we like fried chicken—that crunch of deep fried coating goodness. This needs to just disappears in the pantheon of fast food ideas that might have seemed good in the idea stage but failed miserably in execution. Just move on like I have.

Which brings me to Burger King and their Ch’king sandwich. See what they are doing there playing off their whole king thing? Yes, more marketing. Though for whatever reason it kept ringing in my head as Chung King, anyone remember them from the 70s? Did the folks at BK even consider that? Probably not. Like several others, BK is offering up both a regular and spicy version of the sandwich and I decided to just get both because the fattening is still happening.

It’s a hand breaded chicken breast on a toasted potato bun with a “signature sauce” and pickles. The spicy version adds a spicy glaze. (And if you fell the need for veggies you can get them upgraded with lettuce and tomato—but really, why) It was a decent sized piece of chicken but the big failure here was that sauce. It is some kind of mayo based thing which, from a too extensive internet search, also includes maybe ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, red wine vinegar, brown sugar, sour cream and possibly other stuff. Only the king knows for sure. For me there was way too much of it and it was too sweet. It kept the chicken from maintaining its crunchy exterior and made the bun too soft and soggy. It was even worse with the spicy glaze because, as you can see, they put BOTH on the sandwich thoroughly coating the chicken and the bun. I barely got any spice or heat because the other sauce is still too sweet and negates any you might have gotten. It’s just a wet mess.

Let’s talk about those pickles. They were huge. The biggest of any of the sandwiches. The bigger the better right? In this instance I’ll say aesthetically, sure, but even that big and thick they lacked any kind of real crunch you would expect and not much on adding any kind of vinegary tang. Especially one to offset the too sweet sauce. Nice idea, but again a failure of execution in the final product.

Growing up Wendys always seemed to be the late comer to the fast food big boys. Always trying to come up with something different to stand out. We all remember “Where’s the beef?” don’t we. The same seems to go for their version of a fried chicken sandwich as it only recently hit the market with seemingly little fanfare. And to be honest, after trying it, I can see why. Theirs comes upgraded already with lettuce, tomato, mayo and pickles on a standard bun. I’m guessing this is to detract from the fact it isn’t a nice hand breaded chicken breast like Theo other places offer. As you can see it might be wider than the bun, but it falls into the old school flat, compressed chicken patty type thing the other places have moved away from. Underwhelming and uninspiring in so many ways I really felt no need to even try the spicy version. But hey, they still have their frosty and they seemed to have moved on to pushing their breakfast sandwiches so even they don’t care about this anymore why should I.

And now I get to McDonalds, they try so hard. I am quite sure they test marketed the hell out of this. Trying to figure out the best way to get around the whole hand breaded thing and create a version which could be shipped frozen to all the franchise locations. It was also the only one that seemed to be trying the hardest to mimic the same sandwich from the chicken place which shall not be named. In terms of basics to them it is there. Just chicken, pickle, toasted bun. No sauce, no nothing. The bun is another potato bun like some others though. From there it is pretty much all down hill. From the side view you can see, yes, all white meat, but more flat, processed looking chicken meat than actual chicken breast. Think chicken patty. And much like the reason I’m not a fan of the shall not be named, it was a dry piece of chicken on a dry bun which two pickles are not gonna save.

I know I shouldn’t be surprised but McD’s makes so much money yet they seem to choose ways to create something so cheaply which is reflected in its taste. I’m not sure how they thought this could compete with all the other so much better versions already available. I can get frozen chicken patties from the grocery store and make something better than this. Much like Wendys, they just need to move on like they did from their other failures—McDLT, McLean Deluxe, the Arch Deluxe, Salad Shakers(?!), etc. Bring back the McRib permanently and be happy (mealed) with it.

Seems the big boys really are out of their depths on this one. They are trying so hard to get in on the craze they are looking past their missteps in trying to compete. While Hardees does the best of the lot, that isn’t saying much when consistency can be a challenge. Straight up I’d say none of these are even worth searching out when we already know there are so many other really good fried chicken sandwiches out there to try. I’ve even had a couple from some lesser known chains I’ll cover later which are way better than these.

So what have we learned today kids? Even though you may be a fast food behemoth and have tons of money to throw around for marketing, unless you put the same thought and cost into the food you won’t get the love and craze the originals have gotten. It will just be dismissal and excoriating reviews. No amount of marketing will overcome sucky food because, in the end, if it ain’t good, it ain’t good.