Food Review: Chick-fil-A Macaroni & Cheese
I take pride in being a Mac&Cheese (MC; for the sake of this review) connoisseur. I absolutely LOVE MC! It is, without question, my favorite food in all the land! In my 38 years on this earth, I have tasted some amazing MC, and I have also avoided some poor attempts at MC.
To validate my knowledge of amazing MC, those who have tasted my favorite MCs will understand that I know an amazing MC when I see one! My all time favorite MC makers are my mother Sheena Royston, Mrs. Roberta Mobley, and a great friend of mine, Nicole George (I apologize if you have never been blessed by their MC). If any of my family and friends have ever tasted their MC before, then you KNOW that I know amazing MC! All 3 of theirs are somewhat different versions of MC, yet absolutely amazing!! This leads us to Chick-fil-A.
Chick-fil-A recently introduced MC to their food menu! Now, I must admit that I am always skeptical when fast food chains pull a move like this. I just believe that...if you are a burger joint, there is no way you should be MAKING TACOS!! You know who you are. Stay in your lane, mane!
Whew...glad I got that out of my system!
Well, Likewise, if you are a chicken sandwich establishment, then I see no reason why you should be stepping out of your box to Introduce MC to your menu (Note: This refers to fast food chains. Not places like Gus's...although their MC has become pitiful as of late). This is what Chick-fil-A decided to do...and I am glad they did!
Now, before you take this the wrong way, let me qualify that statement as i dive into my experience with their MC. Before I eat ANYONE'S MC, it has to pass the eye test. Listen, I have no time to waste tasting a MC that looks like old newspaper...just dry and inedible! I won't do it. I WON'T!! So it must pass the eye test. I need to see juiciness, melted cheese, heck...EFFORT for crying out loud (you'd be surprised). Chick-fil-A's MC definitely passes the eye test. It looks like someone's diabetic grandmother (with herbs, spices, secret recipes, and years of cooking experience stored in those jiggly underarms of hers) cooked this at Big Mama's House for Sunday Dinner! It looks moist and the cheese proportion that is stuck to each noodle is spot on. It actually smells like MC too (yes i sniffed it...sue me). Now, I have seen many people have complaining on social media about how their MC from Chick-fil-A looked different from the next person's MC. Well, any time you dip your large spoon into a pan of MC, each serving is going to look different, because the spoon is hitting that MC from all types of angles...Mm! Some people may have a lot of that top layer crunch that we love our MC to have. Others may just have the innards with small traces of crunch. So everyone's servings May look different.
Well, today, as I finally tasted Chick-fil-A's MC, I instantly said to myself: This MC does not compare to my favorite MCs of all time. But i never expected it to. This isn't Big Mama's house. This is Chick-fil-A. Although it looks like Big Mama's, it wasn't made by Big Mama, and that is a big difference in what we taste. There will always be a difference between homemade and store made. Even so, i wasn't let down by how it tasted. I think that it was a good MC and i will definitely try it again. If you want to know just how good it was, allow me to give you this MC tier level, and you'll understand how good it tastes.
Tier 1: My All-time MC favs or your Big Mama's version
Tier 2: Fleming's Restaurant or Stony River Restaurant (both here in the Memphis area)
Tier 3: Ryan's Restaurant (back in the day when their MC was )
Tier 4: Abbay's or Gus's
Tier 5: Some of these awful food plates that y'all be posting on Social Media like y'all did something
Chick-fil-A's MC is Tier 3.
"Well, if it is Tier 3, then why are you glad they made it?", you may ask. The answer is simple. I can't always expect my mom's MC to be readily available whenever i have a taste for it. And I'm not always able to make it to Fleming's when I want a high-end quality of MC. But i can always make a quick stop at Chick-fil-A to grab a nice serving of MC, and I can also be sure that my kids will enjoy it as well. And if you have a smart mouth and say "But You can't get it on Sunday though", well...that's what Big Mama's house is for.
Food Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.
It was nothing to scream and holler over, but it 'was' something to be happy about due to the now instant availability of a pretty decent MC. read more