I’m not sure if it was in other countries too, but in Australia the sequel to the cheeseburger crust pizza was a meat pie crust pizza: Pizza Hut Just Launched A Four'N Twenty Meat Pie Pizza
That one with the hot dogs in the crust was execrable. The concept wasn’t all that terrible, but the execution was abysmal. They used the cheapest, greasiest, nastiest hot dogs they could possibly have found for their crust. So rather than getting a little bite of pleasant hot dog, we got a bite of some kind of liquid-smoked grease, fillers and mystery meat. It was almost like they’d used vienna sausages that were heated enough to render their fat, except that I suspect that hot vienna sausages would have been preferable.
I had a pot roast sandwich at Arby’s that was vile. I believe it had ranch sauce AND cheese. On pot roast. It was completely disgusting. I have no idea how it could have made it past a taste-test. I was seduced by the pot roast, but in the end my heart was broken. 
I liked the Burger Buddies!
Maybe there’s an inverse relationship between liking White Castle and liking Burger Buddies, because the one time I ever tried White Castle burgers, my digestive system and I had a long and unpleasant conversation. Never again.
Stole my idea. That thing was awful.
I agree that I liked the naked chicken chalupa and await its return.
BK’s fries aren’t bad right now, but not as good as they used to be. But they’re certainly better than the “Satisfries” they had about three years ago.
Same with Wendy’s fries - they’re okay now, but I really miss their old ones (circa 2005 or so?) Those were amazing and up there with classic McD’s fries in my opinion.
I managed a Jack in the Box at the time and I, for one, loved the deli trio sandwich. It became my lunchtime standard for awhile, and it certainly sold well enough. It was certainly easier to deal with than the “pannido” sandwiches it was an upgraded version of - you had all the same ingredients, but instead of putting them on grilled bread, they had to be rolled up like a cigar and stuff into a baguette that was about a foot long and about as wide as an Olive Garden breadstick. Those things were a pain to make, especially when they introduced a breakfast version where we had to chop the fried eggs and sausages in half and try to shove them into that thing.
If you wanna talk about truly awful gimmick LTOs that Jack had, my nod would have to go to the “taco nachos”. Someone upstairs apparently decided that the tacos, which are a crime against Mexican food in and of themselves, would be even better if we chopped them into three pieces, arranged them in a circle in a bowl, and poured about half a pound of nacho cheese sauce on top of them, and sold them for twice as much as a regular order of tacos. That one didn’t last long.
A 4-star post. I’m stealing some of the phrases for my occasional restaurant review in the geezer section of the midweek rag that nobody reads.
You know, Jack in the Box doesn’t get enough credit for doing the Taco Bell “Let’s throw anything onto the menu” thing well before Taco Bell did it.
Same here, it’s like they added concentrated French Fry Flavor Extract ™ to the fryer or something. A strange buttery flavor reminiscent of movie theater popcorn butter. Blech. 
I seem to recall that was pretty much what they did, unless I’m misremembering. (Looking online, I’m thinking of the revamp back in '98. Apparently there was another one about four years ago that I was unaware of. And it ['98 revamp] involved spraying the fries with something before cooking them, so not stuff in the oil.)
My younger sibs worked at an independent movie theater when they were much younger. This theater used real butter on their popcorn, not butter-flavored oil, and more than once, customers would come back and ask, “What’s this stuff all over my popcorn?”
:smack:
Does anyone remember when Pizza Hut had the Priazzo in the mid 1980s? I worked there at the time, and they were GOOD!
LOL, from your link 
"***Its a dick sandwich.
It’s a steamy dick wrapped in fried “chicken”. If you want steamy slimy dick chicken, then go for it. Own it. But don’t try to pass it off as food.
This is why America.***"
I’ve tried 2 of the 3 new Signature Crafted build your own burger (or grilled chicken or fried chicken) meals at Mcdonalds. The barbecue bacon one was pretty good but the dijon bacon one wasn’t. Guess I still have to try the guac one, but it doesn’t matter too much if the burger under the toppings isn’t anything special. It’s long bothered me that McDonalds didn’t really do toppings on burgers, and, yes, I was a fan of the Arch Deluxe.
I liked the burrito taco thing at Taco Bell, but maybe I mostly liked the $1.49 price tag since fast food meals have crept up into the $7-15 price range (and most basic “sandwiches” are $4-5 and up).
Also tried the KFC Zinger. Was nothing special, like Wendy’s spicy chicken but much cheaper. Though it’s supposed to be fresh and hand breaded at KFC and not frozen. Also if you opt to pay 99 cents less for your meal they give you a cookie.
I guess I don’t know if any of this things count as gimmicks or just specials. I think the McDs thing with building a sandwich and them bringing it to your table is a gimmick for them any way.
I saw the advertisements for the Burger King Mac 'n Cheetos, and it looked vile enough that I never bothered ordering it.
Lemme tell you a menu item that I miss: Broccoli and cheese baked potatoes at Wendy’s. Yummmmm.
On second thought, the undisputed worst thing ever at a fast food restaurant was Wendy’s Boneless Wings which I believe were created at the time to compete with McDoanld’s Mighty Wings.
“Boneless Wings” in total quotation marks, because they were literally their normal chicken nuggets drenched in your choice of buffalo, teriyaki, and BBQ sauce, and were $4 for an order of 8 “boneless wings”. For that price you could have gotten 20 chicken nuggets and just drenched them in the little sauce packets they give you at the restaurant. It should have been illegal to call them boneless wings.
I do have to give them credit for originality on this one.
Granted, the menus of almost all fast food chains are predicated on combining a limited number of ingredients in ways that make them seem like distinctive products (Taco Bell is the famous cliche example, but really, they all do it). Someone was really thinking outside the box at KFC that day. And it has surprisingly stuck around.
The KFC Double Down, God forgive me.
I just got a ‘grilled’ hot dog from Burger King. I was very anticipatory about it, Burger King usually has some pretty good stuff. OMFG it was the worst shit I’ve ever consumed. First of all, it was tiny, it was as skinny as a candy cane and barely filled out the bun. On top of that, it was rubbery as hell and just tasted like shit. So if anyone is thinking about getting a hot dog from BK: don’t.
I remember those, we used to get the Napoli all the time. Good stuff!
I remember the Burger King table service. I seem to remember that they had had popcorn for you until your food was brought to your table. And tablecloths.
Back to 2017 - I didn’t really care for McDonald’s Signature Crafted chicken/bacon sandwich. Like many of Hardees’ larger sandwiches, it was sodium overload.
I agree with Ambivalid’s view of BK hot dogs. The chili-dog wasn’t any better.