Chili's: still a bad choice for food

i am not a fan of chain restaurants. let's face it: the food is not fresh. it has to be shipped in from far away lands, from far away times, and kept frozen for who-knows-how-long. then, it is thawed-to-order and dressed up as "adequate edible," either with heavy sauces or salty breading and fried (which is better than the former, i must admit).

so imagine my dismay when an old high school friend suggested we meet up at the local Chili's for drinks and a bite. i agreed, sure i would find something on the menu to choke down. the atmosphere isn't terrible, but if you blindfolded me and dropped me in a Chili's, it would probably take me a good bit of an hour to figure out it wasn't a Ruby Tuesday's, or TGIFriday's, or some other gimmicky upscale-ish cookie-cutter town watering hole. the bottom line is: who fucking cares about the atmosphere of a Chili's? no one. nothing sets it apart from the rest of the chains.

onto the meal. they have these new chicken crispers, with like four different flavor variations on the breaded/fried chicken deal. i went with the honey-chipotle crispers, thinking to myself, "the chicken is fried. at least it will be cooked. the breading will add some crunchy texture. then the honey-chipotle glaze should give an okay flavor." i was have always been a fan of chicken fingers, they're kinda a ne'er-go-wrong in restaurants; who can fuck up a chicken finger if it's cooked properly?

i have the answer to that question: Chili's can. as i sunk my fork into the first crisper, i found that the breading was not crisp at all. this began distracting me from my dinner date, as i continued to assess the form of the chicken: was it pink? was it warm? was it chicken? deeming it semi-worthy of my boisterous stomach, i began eating. the actual chicken meat itself was ok. the breading and H/C sauce, however (which there was a bigger ratio of than chicken), was under par, at best. in my mouth, i could better tell the texture and why my fork had told me the breading didn't seem crisp; i got the impression that the kitchen staff poured the H/C sauce onto my chicken and let them sit for about 20 minutes under heat lamps before bringing them to me. soggy breading: heinous. the best part of the chicken was the overcooked ends, where i got a false sense of crisp. after the disappointment, i nibbled on the salty fries. then i scraped the corn-on-the-cobb OFF the cobb, and ate that, in hopes of chasing away all the bad from the 5 bites of chicken "crispers" i took.

like i mentioned, this bad meal really distracted me from my dinner partner. i was not a happy camper. i usually do not hesitate in sending back bad meals, but my etiquette sense kept me from doing so, since i had not seen this person i was dining with in 15 years. next time i am forced to eat at Chili's, i vow to get a milkshake and dinner rolls.