First, I've never even heard of Cook Out, anywhere, ever. We're staying at the Hampton Inn in Chesapeake, VA, courtesy of Priceline, on the way home from vacation and a week at the beach. We decided to run into the Va Beach area for a night after a week at Chincoteague. I digress. This place is almost directly across the street from the Hampton Inn and, on a Sunday night, was the closest place visible and open in a fairly high traffic area and at 9pm on a Sunday night, we just didn't feel like exploring much, and the Waffle House and Krisy Kreme donut shops just didn't look all that appeasing for dinner options. So we pull into this Cook Out location. Double drive throughs, the place looks clean, let's go for it.
The menu is huge. So huge it can be a bit intimidating if you've never been there before, and you're sitting at a drive through with people behind you, even if it is a double drive through. So I give a quick glance at the menu, and this $5 plate thing looks like a winner, I see cajun chicken, and pick onion rings and slaw as my sides, and sure, toss me a Coke float to drink. My daughter got chicken nuggets and a float.
My cajun chicken sandwich was GOOD! I wasn't expecting much. It was a decent size breast though, maybe 3.5-4oz pre-cook weight, with a light cajun flavor, juicy, with lettuce and tomato, and simple as can be. The slaw wasn't bad, wasn't great. The onion rings weren't horrible, but for fast food, not bad. Better than that crap Burger King passes off as onion rings (I was someone else compare to BK as better, I would beg to differ, then again, I didn't get a burger. The BK broiler isn't as good as this cajun chicken, taste wise, that's for sure).
My daughter said she wasn't very hungry ( I made her pick something, so I didn't hear her say "Daddy, I'm hungry a half hour later.") She ate a few chicken nuggets. Said they were ok, but not her favorite. In fairness to her opinion, they didn't look all that great. She got an Oreo milkshake though (hey, don't judge, we're on vacation and she swam off more calories than her old man should probably eat in a day in the poor earlier, soooo.), and she said the milkshake was great. Hoonestly, it looks like ice cream to me. A large, 20 oz cup of ice cream. I tried it. It was thick, tasted like Oreo ice cream.
All this food was $10.
For what it is, you can't beat it. After a week of fine dining and seafood and beach food at the beach, well, it wasn't that. It's fast food. It has it's time and place. Spending $10 dinner on the way home from vacation when you spent like $2000 is in a way satisfying in itself.
If you have a large crew, kids, etc. and need a place that has something for everyone, on a budget, this might be the place. Would I eat there a lot if I had one at home? Probably not. But I could see the occassional run to Cook Out for a mess of cheap food, after some experimentation with the huge menu.
As I finished typing this, I also finished my daughters milkshake. Mmmmm. That thing is well worth a couple bucks. Far cheaper than a lot of other places' milkshakes.
Oh, and their sweet "Huge" tea for $1 is good too. Cheers. read more