Prof. Beef

Franchise hamburger restaurants have mutually exclusive goals.  First, serve meals quickly and maintain consistency across restaurants.  Second, provide burgers and fries that customers enjoy enough to return.  Most of our national and international franchises score very highly on that first point.  They either prepare the burgers and fries in advance and place them in our waiting bags or arrange them on a cold plastic tray.  Or, as many now claim, run their factory-manufactured supplies through a Henry Ford assembly line, giving their customers a "home-cooked" meal in less than one minute and thirty seconds.

These franchise restaurants are more concerned with the speed of their employees and the hipness of their advertising than with the quality of their cheeseburgers and fries.  Corporate suits know that the American public will buy any meal as long as it is hot, greasy, salty, and served as fast as customers can pull money from their pockets.  For the most part, the general clientele that frequent these establishments want food that they can eat without dripping all over their clothes as they drive the children off to daycare.

Carl's Jr., however, effectively blends these two goals.  Their burger, although once a frozen patty, had a pleasant, light smoky flavor, not unlike what we might find at a backyard barbecue.  The patty, however, was somewhat dry and topped with a slice of processed American cheese.  The bun is the standard sesame seed variety.  The condiments included mayonnaise, catsup, relish, slices of white tomato, pickles, and whole-leaf iceberg lettuce.

Their fries are very similar to the tasteless white sticks found at McDonald's.  They were hot and lightly salted but lacked any potato flavor. 

Carl's Jr. offers a better meal package than the other "Big 5," but it is still fast food and should never be confused with a product that we can hold above Chef LeMonde's head. 

Carl’s Jr

Point Total
  60

Dr Meat

Carl Karcher has taken the proven best qualities of all the fast food giants and wrapped them up into a pretty decent product.  We ordered the famous star combo and the polite and very sharp cashier gave us a number.  They have waiter service!  We filled our soft drink at the self serve fountain and had a very pleasant 5 minute 45 second wait.  The tables come equipped with salt, pepper, and napkins, most fast food places make you beg the "counter-mensan" for an extra napkin.  When the meal arrived I was impressed by the presentation.  The double wrapped burger was very appetizing.  Although the fries had a genuine crisp to them, they were still McDonald's like in their character.  The burger had great condiments, in our rating scale I had to give the condiments a 8/10!  A skoash too much mayo lead to "B-" effort.  The patty was the first of the lot that actually tasted like beef.  I really enjoyed the subtle charcoal flavor and the whole sandwich together was hot and fresh.