The famous fried chicken dinner at the Plaza inn at Disneyland is similar. The fried chicken is fabulous, and a bargain to boot. The sides are okay> meh.
I feel all national chains make TERRIBLE bland soggy coleslaw, though I’m positive it’s because they probably get it premixed in plastic bags that are frozen for transportation. They don’t even do the single step of mixing their coleslaw dressing and lettuce mix themselves. As a result you get coleslaw that’s just a sad soggy mess.
Weirdly enough I think KFC coleslaw is decent, whenever I get it it at least SEEMS crisper. But coleslaw from Churches, Popeyes, Chili’s, and others is just terrible.
I had no idea what they use for their fries. I’d be willing to bet that their cardinal sin is only single-frying though.
My suspicion is that they’re putting so much emphasis on the whole “fresh potatoes” concept, that they feel like double-frying would somehow be untruthful in some sense, if they didn’t cut them and fry them right then.
Which is unfortunate; they have 75% of the makings of fantastic fast food fries, but they just execute wrong.
This probably veers ever so slightly off track for the thread, but I think still applies.
Chicken and Waffles. The reason I list both is that outside a few places in the southern states that specifically specialize in it, most places are chicken places that serve their dish on a waffle, or primarily breakfast places that do an option with chicken.
In which case, the dish that represents the primary interest skill is normally good to great, while the second is almost always TERRIBLE. So, I’ve been to chicken places that put their wonderful dish on what was obviously until moments earlier a store-bought frozen waffle, or breakfast places that serve buttery, delicious fresh waffles with an equally obviously flash fried previously frozen chicken tender on top.
Crazy making.
I have similar but substantially weaker issues with Steak and Egg dishes, but there at least the secondary ingredients aren’t nearly so obviously an afterthought.
This is absolutely true. It’s been true for many years!
We have an extremely upscale restaurant in our neighborhood that is sort of the inverse of the OP question. They’re fancy and expensive with many things on the menu, but almost everything is barely edible.
Except the steaks, fries, and creamed spinach. All of those are fantastic. Like nearly as good as Peter Luger (but less expensive). Nothing else, not appetizers, mains, sides or even desserts, is worth ordering at all. But at least the really good things are the things I most want to eat. They’re just always amazed when we come in and don’t even want to look at the menu.
In that example it references the temperature at which barbecue is typically cooked, 250°F. There used to be a barbecue place in my area called Fahrenheit 250.
There was an Americans Test Kitchen Recipe for Fish and Chips that had you par cook the fries in the microwave and then rinse them prior to frying. It’s pretty labor intensive but makes a great fry if you’re doing it at home. The actual recipe is paywalled but this blogger seems to have stolen it for their Harry Potter inspired fish and chips.
A few co-workers and I were going out for lunch. They all wanted to go to a local coney restaurant. This is a famous restaurant in the area that supposedly has the best coney dogs. I hate coney dogs, but the majority ruled on that day. I was going to order just a plain hot dog and be mocked by all but I noticed they had a cheese sandwich on their menu. I thought, I love a grilled cheese sandwich. So I ordered one. Much to my chagrin, it wasn’t a grilled cheese. It was two pieces of slightly dried-out buttered bread with a thick slab of tasteless cheese. No grilling or melting of the cheese was done. I would have rather eaten the dreaded coney dog.
Now I know a new thing. Coney Dog. It sounds terrible, but better than that cheese sandwich you describe.
I knew a Coney dog once, could eat an ice cream cone anywhere near him…
WTH? There is nothing wrong with a good Coney.
Ooh, sad. The McD’s salads were taken off the menu around here and I desperately miss my Southwest salad with grilled chicken and no dressing! They’ve never been anything but fresh and it was my guilty pleasure (with a small side of fries, natch). I’m hoping it’s just a supply issue!
I feel like most of their recipes are labor-intensive…makes for a full TV episode but ain’t nobody got time for that! 
Same- I loved that salad and never liked McDonalds except for that and a very occasional egg McMuffin in a road trip pinch but the salad was actually good. Now Burger King has a pretty sad, greasy salad .
And I’ve always found Wendy’s salads watery…so gross.
First-world problems, ya know…
Sable or sablefish is a whitefish
It’s a chili dog?
Hot dog, or a beef or beef and pork European-style Vienna sausage with lamb or sheep casing, topped with a meat sauce made of seasoned ground beef or beef heart, topped with yellow mustard, white onion and sometimes cheese.
Note the “seasoned.” The closest to chili would be in Cincinnati where they use (what else) Cincinnati chili.
A hot dog with chili sauce sounds terrible? Sounds perfectly fine to me.
hells yeah!
It is. The origin of the Coney Dog and Coney Island restaurants in general is an interesting one. Why are so many restaurants in the greater Detroit area named after a New York amusement park?
I did many lale-night trips to the Lafayette / American Coney Island restaurants (two competing Coney restaurants right next to each other in downtown Detroit) in my college days. I think American Coney was our preferred Coney because they served beer while Lafayette was alcohol-free.
Even better than their Coney dogs, I thought, was their chili fries. The poutine of the midwest. Yum. I only do chili fries maybe once a year these days, since it’s not the healthiest thing to eat.