worst fast-food burger joint

Their salad bar has Legionnaire's Disease 24/7 or your money back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkjxvgjkKgU

don't know most of these but In'n'Out def the most overrated that I've been in. probably the worst fries I've ever had at a burger chain, practically inedible, and the burger was average at best. I was taken there because it's a Californian institution apparently.

Five Guys has the worst ambience i can imagine for a national chain launched with considerable fanfare, and recently at that. bleak, fluorescent, dead. i've been in some sad, gross Checkers locations that smelled like mold and bleach simultaneously, but nobody is trying to put Checkers over as a super-yummy burger experience.

― I Am Fribbulus (Xax) (Doctor Casino), Wednesday, December 8, 2021 9:56 AM (fifty minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I have fond memories of the Big Buford as a super-yummy burger experience. These memories are probably 20 years old, but I also respect Rally's battered fries as the antithesis of the misguided "we just cut potatoes directly into the fryer" puritanism.

a young steve jobs sits on the floor of his unfurnished living room, slicing potatoes directly into a fryer

Slightly off-topic but while we're talking "do chains go downhill," I loved IHOP as a kid but the food has absolutely sucked every time I've been in one in the last ten years, did it used to be good and is now bad, was it always bad and I was just a tasteless kid, or does it vary a lot location by location and I just live in a bad IHOP zone now?

― Guayaquil (eephus!)

I ate an IHOP in Manhattan about four years ago after not having been in one since the '90s and was absolutely shocked at the badness of it. Instead of the classic "international" style pancake dishes that had been my go-to back in the day, such as the Swedish pancakes w/lingonberry jam, they had these fake, ridiculous dessert-like concoctions that they give names like "Mexican pancakes" or whatever. The menu was dumbed way down and the decor of the place was much tackier than it used to be. I'd say your perception is correct.

I do love fast food locations that have their own unique weirdness amidst the normal homogeneity you see among chains.

not that the concept is different, but either the employees, or the layout of the store, or the clientele, or the in-store decorations are different.

like the old KFC I used to go to a few houses ago, it always had questionable decorations in the store at Christmas time, things you would normally think twice about.

Like one time they put this motherfucker up

https://i.ibb.co/jgn5rtJ/Screenshot-20211208-140713.jpg

wait it was Popeye's, not KFC. but they seemed to be inviting Santa into the ladies' room

Chili's is another one I could've sworn was pretty decent in the 80s and 90s but was absolute shit when I went with work ppl 10 or so yrs ago. Idk maybe it's just that my palate got sophisticated?? It was all Denny's-level gross quasi food.

Restaurant profit margins are razor thin at best, so why use genuine lingonberries when you can just slather grape jelly on everything

love grape ribs

I have fond memories of the Big Buford as a super-yummy burger experience. These memories are probably 20 years old, but I also respect Rally's battered fries as the antithesis of the misguided "we just cut potatoes directly into the fryer" puritanism.

― accordion folder full of Zoobooks (Sufjan Grafton), Wednesday, December 8, 2021 10:54 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

There's a poem in my next book titled, "Buford Special," because I've never been able to get over a place calling their specialty burger a Buford. What in the fuck is that.

Perhaps named after Buford T. Pusser, the real life sheriff portrayed in the Walking Tall films?

or Bufo bufo, the common toad

Is there someone called Buford involved with the company, perhaps? Someone's child, maybe, or an early manager?

maybe Big Buford is what you call your butt after you gain twenty pounds from eating that damn burger

I cannot find, for the life of me, the reason for the name. I've been googling for like five minutes lol.

There's now a Super Loaded Buford, tho, if anyone's interested.

the original commercial has no clues:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SW6rgXwLYbM

lol the description says the commercial features two guys saying it was named after their Uncle Buford, but they don't say that in the commercial!

I'm now imagining a late 80s tv show where two detectives (Neanderthal, the table is the table), search for Big Buford, a missing hamburger magnate.

the trail went cold, Tabes. (takes off trenchcoat). i just don't know. maybe we never find 'im.

It's a great name. My brother and I use it all of the time to express appreciation, e.g. "Can you pick up this Christmas gift for me? I'll owe you a Big Buford."

It is, but it's also *funny*, so much so that it sounds a little bit like something in a Tim & Eric sketch.

maybe it should be typical film noir but a universe where the money is Big Bufords

Big Buford is the sickest drummer. Yes wasn't the same after he left.

Some sources say Rally's was founded in Tennessee, which is where Bufurd T. Pusser was a sheriff, so that really could be it. Although other sources say Rally's was founded in Louisville, KY, so I dunno.

There's also a town in Georgia named Buford.

perhaps the burger was big and Jim Patterson was a fan of alliteration

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I got gout after this thread, asshole

oh wait, i started it

...

asshole.

haven't had many of these but jack in the box the worst of what I've had.

my favorites of this list - off-topic I guess- are probably a&w and white spot

Jack in the Box is unspeakable

Do not wind the crank

IHOP was only good when you could smoke in there. 2AM, drunk, the glass smokers cave filled with secondhand nicotine - tastebuds are irrelevant anyway.

just want to chime in and say i love Cook Out, Cook Out rules. also we had a Rally's where i grew up in the South and it was definitely a level or two above McD's/BK/etc. Rally's was good!

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Not sure how scientific this polling is, but BK wins in a landslide... I'm a little surprised, but I haven't been there in years

I thought I voted for Sonic, but I guess I just decided to shoot my mouth off instead. Well anyway, fuck Sonic.

haha me too! add another one for Sonic

Same

Silent majority

i also voted for sonic wtf

Stop the Steal!

White Spot kind of an unfortunate name

I don't understand why Burger King polled the most votes in this. My nearest Burger King - which I went to a few days ago - rules, while the McDonald's in the same town blows goats. I've eaten in a lot of Burger Kings and the worst experience I've had is getting a burger that wasn't terrible but could have been better, and felt a bit thrown together. MacDonald's on the other hand always seems to be disappointing - some places trend towards undercooking their burgers and slapping them together so the burger in its bun looks like it's been sat on, while in other places the burgers and buns are dry. Generally I think that McDonald's was much better in the mid to late 80s.