Jesus Chicken #3 Fast Food Chain

[K Frame]

Yeah, I know about the branding merger. I've seen some of the ads they're talking about. That whole ad thing with "Carl Hardee" just was stupid as hell. Not sure who signed off on it, but it really didn't push the brand at all.

When I was in high school Hardees used to be about as widespread in my area of Pennsylvania as McDonald's. Even my little town had a Hardee's.

My best friend's scumbag brother in law was a manager for them for a LONG time until he lost his job when the chain started to contract.

I've not eaten at a Hardees since the late 1980s, but one of these trips down south to visit Castle Key I'm going to swing into one to see if it bears any resemblance to the chain I used to know.

The absolute BEST thing they had on the menu were their breakfast iced cinnamon and raisin biscuit. Holy crap, they are still on the menu, too! Those things were absolutely awesome.


Just pulled up Hardees locations... there are still a bunch of them in Central Pennsylvania. Most of the ones nearest me in Northern Virginia are to the east of Washington in Maryland, but they become more plentiful as you go farther south.

Castle Key's new home town has a Hardees in it.

[Mannlicher]

“Jesus Chicken” sounds so, well biased.   Lol

[BlueStarLizzard]

The absolute BEST thing they had on the menu were their breakfast iced cinnamon and raisin biscuit. Holy crap, they are still on the menu, too! Those things were absolutely awesome. 

Yes, and I don't know if they taste the same as they did in the 80's, but if you remember melting icing drowning a warm, buttery cinnamon biscuit with hot raisins studded inside, then yeah... Still AWESOME.

Even better is occasionally they'll have their blueberry biscuits. OMG. Diabetes sinning at it's best.

I think I say this every time Hardee's comes up, but it is the only fast food breakfast I really like. If they ever pull a McDonald's and start serving breakfast all day, I'll probably die of a heart attack shortly there after. A happy and fat heart attack.

[French G.]

The key to a Hardee's is to find one in an out of the way two horse town. Places become a destination, they are often the after church target for the geezer set. So, great breakfast if you can fight through the blue hairs. They stay for hours... Hours! Besides the cinnamon crack most of them do an actual unbreaded pork chop biscuit that is not mystery meat. Or country ham.

Other Hardee's goal is find one that still does fried chicken, not all do. Hate to profile, but if the staff is all black ladies, jackpot, excellent chicken.

[BlueStarLizzard]

The key to a Hardee's is to find one in an out of the way two horse town. Places become a destination, they are often the after church target for the geezer set. So, great breakfast if you can fight through the blue hairs. They stay for hours... Hours! Besides the cinnamon crack most of them do an actual unbreaded pork chop biscuit that is not mystery meat. Or country ham.

Other Hardee's goal is find one that still does fried chicken, not all do. Hate to profile, but if the staff is all black ladies, jackpot, excellent chicken.

The one on 29 stopped doing fried chicken.  I don't know if 5th street still does... I need check that.

[Scout26]

The key to a Hardee's is to find one in an out of the way two horse town. Places become a destination, they are often the after church target for the geezer set. So, great breakfast if you can fight through the blue hairs. They stay for hours... Hours! Besides the cinnamon crack most of them do an actual unbreaded pork chop biscuit that is not mystery meat. Or country ham.

Other Hardee's goal is find one that still does fried chicken, not all do. Hate to profile, but if the staff is all black ladies, jackpot, excellent chicken.

Funny you should mention that.  My Dad used to have one of his friends pick him up every Tuesday and they'd meet up with 4-5 other old guys at the local Hardee's in Indy, eat breakfast, and suck down cup after cup of the free senior citizen coffee and clog up the Stammtisch.  They knew all the employees by name, as did all the employees know them.

 

[K Frame]

'Yes, and I don't know if they taste the same as they did in the 80's, but if you remember melting icing drowning a warm, buttery cinnamon biscuit with hot raisins studded inside, then yeah... Still AWESOME. "

That's good to know...

Good to know...

[K Frame]

“Jesus Chicken” sounds so, well biased.   Lol

Maybe we can start calling Hardee's Mohammed Pork since they serve pork and ham products?

[Perd Hapley]

Other Hardee's goal is find one that still does fried chicken, not all do. Hate to profile, but if the staff is all black ladies, jackpot, excellent chicken.

A local radio host used to like to tell the story of how Hardee's had this great thing going as a burger chain, but then they queered things by trying to sell fried chicken. The way he tells it, it was a disaster. The chicken was good, but it slowed down the burger business, and Hardee's had to give it up. A cautionary tale. When they jettisoned chicken, and went back to burgers, they were a great brand once again.

So he says.

The way I remember it, people flocked to Hardee's for the chicken and biscuits. Every gathering, church social, and birthday party was catered with a box or 5 of Hardee's chicken. Now, when I go to the new, streamlined, Hardee's stores, I can't get fried chicken, but I still get to wait 10 minutes for a burger and fries.

I love burgers, and I almost never pick fried chicken when eating out,* but I still think they should have dropped the burgers, and just become a chicken joint.

*Unless it's Long John Silver's chicken, or a chicken sammitch pretty much anywhere.

[K Frame]

Just found this neat "10 things you didn't know about Hardees," which addresses the fried chicken and the roast beest.

https://www.thedailymeal.com/eat/10-things-you-didn-t-know-about-hardee-s-and-carl-s-jr-slideshow/slide-5

I had NO idea that they got into that because they were owned by the same company that owned Roy Rogers.

I do know that Imasco REALLY screwed Hardees up in a lot of other ways, many of which were very largely responsible for the problems the company had starting in the 1990s.

[Hawkmoon]

Are there any Roy Rogers fast food restaurants left? There aren't any around here. I know of two former Roy Rogers locations that are now occupied by Wendy's franchises.

Is anyone else old enough to remember Gino's? Back in the 1970s that was a chain of burger joints started by, and named after, Baltimore Colts football star Gino Marchetti. I loved Gino's burgers, but the business didn't last long.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gino%27s_Hamburgers

[K Frame]

Yes, there are some.

There's actually one not too far from my office. I was at a party a few weeks ago where one of the people brought fried chicken from Roy's. Not nearly as good as it was back in the day but it was still tasty.

There's also one along I-270 in Thurmont, Maryland. I used to stop at that one occasionally when I was heading North to my Mom's.

[makattak]

Are there any Roy Rogers fast food restaurants left?

http://www.royrogersrestaurants.com/locations

Looks like a few left in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, and Maryland.