The 'Shroom:Issue 228/Critic Corner
Director's Notes
Spring has sprung and so has another issue of Critic Corner! We've got a lovely handful of sections this month to read instead of doing any spring cleaning, and then to think about and mull over while you continue avoiding any spring cleaning!
Thank you for voting Half-Baked Reviews as February's Critic Corner Section of the Month!!! Be sure to give your love to all of our sections here, and give a shout out to our writers whether in chat or in their forum threads dedicated to their sections. Be sure to vote vote vote!
And now for my regular announcements: We've decided to implement in Critic Corner something similar to News Flush over in Fake News, where no formal sign-up application process is required for one-time or limited sections. From now on if you just want to send in a single review for something you just read, watched played, tried, whatever, you just have to send me your review privately either to me directly in chat, or in a message to me on the forum at least one week before each 'Shroom is to be released! There's no commitment or obligation to provide a full monthly section (although you absolutely can shift it into one if you so choose), just send us your thoughts on a thing and we'll feature it here! If you have any questions or curiosities about this, please feel free to ask!
As always, if you would like to help Critic Corner, we always have openings for more writers! You are free to write for sections such as Character Review and Movie Review, or really anything you'd like to do! There's no pressure to have a huge section; they can be shorter and concise! The application process is very simple, starting with reading the Sign Up page, and sending your application to MightyMario on the forum. Any idea you have is welcome, and if you have any questions or need help signing up, please feel free to reach out to myself or other 'Shroom peeps!
Section of the Month
| CRITIC CORNER SECTION OF THE MONTH | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Place | Section | Votes | % | Writer |
| 1st | Anton's Half-Baked Reviews | 12 | 70.19% | Hypnotoad (talk) |
| 2nd | Yoshi18 Reviews | 3 | 17.65% | Yoshi18 (talk) |
| 3rd | 'Shroom FM | 2 | 11.76% | MCD (talk) |
Yoshi18 Reviews
Hi everyone! Happy Spring! Warmer weather is finally in sight after 6 months! Though the only downside is…more bugs. More flies. More mosquitoes. More wasps. Yeah as you probably already hear: I ain't a fan of that shit. That's honestly the only downside of Spring/Summer and why I like Winter (because then I don't have to deal with that shit). Fall was honestly never a good season. It's the worst of Spring/Summer (bugs; mainly spiders) mixed with the worst of Winter (it’s cold). Anyway, enough ranting about how I hate bugs and want them to be extinguished forever so I can finally have a chill Spring and Summer for once. Let's get reviewing!
Mario Party 8
It's ya boy, my favorite game of all-time, GIVE A LOUD APPLAUSE TO Mario Party 8!!!!! I know I always say this but, where do I even start? It's really hard to breakdown your favorite games. Or maybe that's just me? Oh well. This game has meant a lot to me. I've already had for over a decade. I played this game the most (or it was tied with Wii Party but can't really recall anymore) out of any game on my Wii.
Minigames
Well, let's get to the minigames first, shall we? Simply the best out of any Mario Party or any party game in general (yes, I am biased). I understand why people dislike some of them (cough cough Crank to Rank cough cough Flip the Chimp cough cough due to the shitty motion controls, even with Wii Motion Plus. Oh yeah also, cough cough Cut from the Team cough cough because it's luck-based shit. But yeah we've already been through that many times before), but except for these the minigames are just awesome and have a huge replayability for me!
Boards
The boards in this game are definitely the most creative they have ever been in the entire series (Super Mario Party Jamboree came close, but not close enough). You're chasing the star like normal in DK's Treetop Temple. You're going through a whole linear path trip for a free star again and again in Goomba's Booty Boardwalk. You're locating your way through the maze in King Boo's Haunted Hideaway. You're stealing stars from others in Bowser's Warped Orbit. For my second all-time favorite; You're having a fun but disorienting train trip in Shy Guy's Perplex Express. And for my all-time favorite; You're in an hotel investment battle in Koopa's Tycoon Town! Seriously though, Koopa's Tycoon Town is the best (and most complex) board in the entire series. It'll absolutely never get boring!
My final opinion
This game is absolutely recommend (mainly if you like party games like me). The only good minor reason why you would sometimes not really enjoy the game is because of the shitty motion controls, but if you just ignore that, it's definitely the best party game ever (Wii Party came hella close).
And there goes another episode. I can already tell you guys that Wii Party is coming next! Also, no sorry, as much as I'd love to, I can't do Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream in next month's issue because the game literally releases just two days before the issue releases. That's always when my deadline is and I can't play a game in just 4 hours and then review it. Besides, even if I had till April 18th; Playing a game in 2 days still isn't enough to make a review out of it (not for me at least). April 16th is also the last day of my test week so after that I would need a bit of relaxation too. Anyways, thank y'all for reading! Stay safe and cya all next time!
Book Review
| This Story Might Save Your Life | |
|---|---|
| |
| Author | Tiffany Crum |
| Release date | 2026 |
| Genre | mystery |
| Pages | 368 |
| Available From | |
Hello readers, and welcome back to Book Review! This month, we'll be diving into Tiffany Crum's This Story Might Save Your Life!
This book was another Book of the Month pick, and it came in a STACKED March lineup. Their picks were serious bangers this month and I picked two, one of them being this one, which was the first one I read. Let's jump in!
This Story Might Save Your Life starts with a podcast. Joy and Benny are best friends who share a podcast together, called "This Story Might Save Your Life" (roll credits). Each episode, they discuss a survival story, whether that is getting eaten by a whale or falling out of a plane. Their back and forth banter and camaraderie have endeared them to millions of listeners, leading to live shows, major studio deals, and even a co-authored memoir between the two of them. One morning, when Benny goes over to Joy's home to continue recording an episode, he finds a shattered window in her bathroom and Joy and her husband, Xander, are missing. Benny must hurry to find Joy and uncover the truth before the police turn on him as the prime suspect.
This book was hard to put down, and that's the first thing I want to discuss about it- the pacing. The way that information is steadily fed to the reader is fantastic. You might have had an experience with a piece of media- book, movie, video games, etc.- where you, the audience, knows information that the characters in the story do not, and it can be frustrating watching them act when you know what's going on. That's not a problem here- chapters of current-day story line from Benny's perspective are followed by chapters of Joy's half of the memoir, filling the reader in on how Joy and Benny met, how Joy met Xander, and how they started the podcast. Once the reader gets all the chapters, shortly after so does Benny, so he's not in the dark for very long. Benny even knows things that the readers don't know- such as things that happened between him and Joy the night before Joy's disappearance. You definitely want to find out what happens next- Crum has crafted a great story that you just want to see through to the end so you have all the answers. It toes the line between a mystery and thriller, although I didn't get the looming sense of danger that you get from a thriller. Also a small bonus- I was able to guess one of the twists correctly, which I always give bonus points for because it always thrills me.
This book also wouldn't work without the chemistry between Joy and Benny. They truly are the best of friends- even when they fight, even when things that should be left unsaid are said, even through dangerous situations and strained relationships, they find their way back to each other. They have inside jokes, they go on double dates, and Benny is the one that has to solve the mystery of Joy's disappearance. Generally, I liked both of them, although Joy could be a little dense at times. Their fantastic friendship paves over any issues I had with Joy, and I was rooting for Benny the entire time, hoping that he would connect the dots and figure everything out in time.
This Story Might Save Your Life is a fantastic mystery that will keep you turning pages until you have all the answers. Through plenty of twists and turns, this novel is intelligent and full of heart. Benny is racing to save his best friend, and you can feel how much he loves Joy and doesn't want anything bad to happen to her. He never gives up hope, even when the heat is bearing down on him. If you enjoy mysteries or thrillers, you should give this one a shot, and if you need a book that has heart and a duo that will make you root for them the whole way through, this is a great choice to start your Spring reading on the right foot.
That's all for me this time, readers! Come back next time for a new book!
Written by: Fun With Despair (talk)
Art by: Hypnotoad (talk)
(Almost) Every Fast-food Fried Chicken Sandwich in an Approximately 5 Kilometer Radius
Ah, the humble chicken sandwich. Fried chicken breast, two buns, and whatever combination of toppings slapped between the two. Truly an icon, as far as random fast-food items go.
I'm filling in for Anton again this month because he's busy, but unlike last time I did this, back in September, not only am I not on vacation to a strange coastal land, but it's been cold as balls and I am fresh out of ideas - so here's what we have. I went around my general area over the past three weeks, popping in at the vast majority of random places within a roughly five kilometer radius of me that serve a fried chicken sandwich as a major menu item. From a critical standpoint, I've always found the chicken sandwich to be a more interesting fast food item to talk about than a burger, because there's just more that goes into it. You've got the meat, bun, etc., but also breading, seasoning, and the simple dichotomy between "real" chicken and the sludge they put into nuggets.
Now, does this actually make for an interesting subject to read about? Well, uh... that's an awfully good question you're asking there, dear reader - and it's one that I'm not sure I have an answer to. If nothing else, it serves as an excuse to get my ass out there to eat a bunch of poultry. Plus, those non-Canadians in the audience get to have a look at a couple exclusives. I won't be going to any proper sit-down restaurants though, I'm sure those would give me food better than anything on this list but that kind of thing is getting pretty expensive.
Before we begin though, a quick informational session:
For the purpose of this review, it's important to introduce a bit of a ratings scale. I'm not really a big number ranking guy, much like Anton himself, but I feel like it's the right thing to do for this article in particular because, in the spirit of complete honesty - it's difficult to really quantify something like a chicken sandwich and strike a point of comparison between the various elements without some kind of metric. They're very similar items on the whole, and while I have my doubts that anyone reading this particular review is going to travel to these particular locales in search of a snack based on my word alone, I think it's valuable to be able to quantify some of this in a way that someone who has had a similar item could look at and be like "yeah, that makes sense". There's only so many ways you can say "Ohhhhh it's crispy but not as crispy as the other one", so to nip that kind of repetitive nonsense I'm going to be working on a scale of 1-5 based on three factors, all of which might be familiar:
Taste - Is it... good? Is there a nice flavor here, or is it bad or bland?
Texture - How does it feel to eat? Is there a satisfying crunch? Is it soggy?
Value - We're talking about fast food here, so price is a significant factor. Is it cheap? Too expensive to be worth it?
Something might have great batter and sauce, but toppings that give the sandwich a terrible mouthfeel - or maybe it's really good in both departments, but it costs an arm and a leg. Maybe something sucks in all three departments, and their business deserves to be given the Old Yeller treatment. The possibilities are endless, and all of them will converge on a single, final score out of fifteen. Mind you, I could expand the metrics out further, rank these based on Virtue or Charm like the chocolate reviews, but let's be honest I'm sure none of these places are bastions of ethics or charm - though a couple have some lore to them.
Anyway, without further ado, let's dive into the chicken bucket, and see where the grease takes us.
McDonald's - Frank's Red Hot McCrispy
Yeah, let's start with this one. What do I really need to explain on this front? It's McDonald's, you know what it is. Since the very day that the Burger Clown cursed us with his presence (before being later wiped from almost all marketing), McDonald's has been a staple of fast food with a reputation for being particularly cheap and low-tier as far as they go. This place is the fast food joint, ask basically anyone in the western world to name a fast food restaurant and McDonald's will almost always come to mind first, or at least top 3. Canadian McDonald's isn't terribly different from the American version, sharing basically the same menu save for a couple items like Canada's McWraps and a couple random regional promos, and outside of a time in the 2010s where they sold bespoke customizable angus burgers which were actually very good (especially for the $7 price tag), the Canadian restaurant is mostly just as mediocre as it is anywhere else.
As it turns out, one such regional promo was running at the time; a joint venture with Frank's Red Hot, another surely familiar name to many in the western world, belonging to an iconic hot sauce that tastes like vinegar and not much else. This is the kind of hot sauce that a dad buys, the kind of hot sauce that your alcoholic buddy will toss would-be-buffalo wings in because he doesn't know any better. In reality, it's a fine substitute for a more vinegar-heavy sauce like a ketchup or something if you really want something kind of spicy. I guess. I don't dislike it, but it's hard to feel strongly about the most bog standard hot sauce out there. They've recently tried to branch out into other venues, like Frank's Red Hot flavored gummy bears, which I can't imagine being any good whatsoever, and I suppose this whole promotion is just part of that push.
They've got a couple Frank's Red Hot themed items kicking around, but I'm going to try the Frank's Red Hot McCrispy specifically. For obvious reasons.
The McCrispy has been around for a little while now, released as McDonalds' answer to people who claim the McChicken sucks dick - which it does. An altogether bigger sandwich, with more to it and supposedly higher-quality chicken served on a potato bun. What immediately stands out about this one is the special box, branded with the Frank's Red Hot logo and a couple red splats. This is the only unique packaging out of anything I tried this entire time, so it'd be a waste of time to talk about it all, but I guess this box is a nice touch. Opening the box, however, quickly reveals that they just fucked my shit up. I can't really ding the actual sandwich for this, but I did not take this thing home to eat, this is like immediately after grabbing it from the restaurant. Lettuce everywhere, just filling the box and spilling out the sides. There's a nice variety and quantity of toppings here with the bacon, lettuce, and tomato, but whoever was making this thing did not care at all, god damn. It also appears as though they just dumped the sauce on approximately one half of the sandwich and called it a day.
Despite that it tasted alright. The name "McCrispy" is a bit of a misnomer unless it's referring to the fact that it's breaded to begin with, because there isn't much in the way of crisp to be found here. Outside of what's provided by the vegetables, it doesn't have much in the way of distinct texture, and the chicken is fairly dry. The batter has a nice, peppery kind of flavor but the interior is just separated nugget meat, not unlike the McChicken albeit larger and with a bit more to it. The tomato tasted surprisingly fresh, and despite being slopped all over the place, the lettuce was an alright addition, but taken as a package deal, the quantity of the toppings almost made the sandwich as a whole taste cold and paradoxically less fresh. The bacon meanwhile was useless, paper-thin pre-cooked stuff that was also cold. Didn't taste like anything, didn't need to be there.
For all the hyping-up that they gave the hot sauce, much like I expected it was only on about half the sandwich, and therefore while it added a decent amount of tangy bite and a little kick to that half, I really think that if you're going to sell something branded after a hot sauce, the chicken needs to be at minimum tossed in the sauce wholesale, not just lightly drizzled in such a pathetic fashion. It's also a bit strange that they just put the regular hot sauce on this, because one of the other Frank's items on the menu was a honey-hot dipping sauce for nuggets - which surely would've been better on the sandwich, right?
Well, whatever. It only cost about $8, with a combo with a soda or coffee being $13 - making it one of the cheaper items on today's list while still being pretty filling. I guess you get what you pay for in this case, and I didn't pay for much.
Taste ---- 
Texture - 
Value --- 
Total: 9/15
Chicken On The Way - Chicken Sandwich
A bit of a local icon in my city, Chicken On The Way began in the 1950s as a remote-service restaurant and food truck business, hence the name. You get chicken. On the way. Nowadays, Chicken on the Way exists as a couple of takeout restaurants with no delivery save for DoorDash or one of the other instruments of abject evil that are available for public use, and boasts perhaps one of the worst looking websites I’ve seen in the last two decades. Also notable is the basement of their original, still-active location - which has turned into a bit of a local “meme”, as it’s been purported to contain everything from a sex dungeon, to a drug den, to some kind of haunted paranormal something-or-other. Sadly, none of this appears to be true, and the basement indeed just holds a variety of supplies in a vaguely storage-roomy fashion. In fairness though, if I was to run a sex dungeon or drug den out of the basement of a greasy chicken joint, there’s two things I know for sure: Firstly, I’d be shut down by the health inspectors before the end of the week, and secondly, I’d probably run that kind of thing out a secret sub-basement, with the regular basement serving as a ruse to deter prying eyes.
Maybe John Chickenontheway is a kindred spirit, and the truth is still out there.
I actually really used to love Chicken On The Way, it was one of my favorite places to pop in and grab food. Before the pandemic, you could get a massive bag of chicken and fries for like ten bucks. Nowadays… not so much. They’re gotten more expensive, and their chicken has kind of gone downhill. Their chicken sandwich is actually fairly new as far as their menu goes, one of the rare new items they’ve ever added period, so I was kind of interested to see if it was any good. A combo meal with the sandwich cost me about $15 (and was also the only option to purchase one of these), which is kind of standard for Canadian fast food of any real quality, and while they did let me pick a flavor of mayo to put on the sandwich (Spicy or Tangy, I took Spicy) they actually gave me far fewer fries than if I’d ordered the combo with chicken strips and fries, which is also $15 and comes with gravy. Considering that combo comes with three strips, all of which combined are larger than the sandwich, this feels a little like a ripoff. What, I’m losing out on fries and paying extra for… the bun? Great. It didn't even come with a drink, which is insane.
At first glance, this sandwich looks to be a relatively average size, but picking it up quickly reveals that this piece of chicken is pretty anemic, with nothing to it in terms of bulk or weight. The batter doesn’t look to be anything amazing either, in general looking more like something you’d buy in a Walmart and cook in the oven than anything fresh cut and fresh fried like Chicken On The Way claims to serve. Opening it up also paints a pretty dire picture, with some of the thickest “coleslaw” I’ve yet witnessed in my mortal life just unceremoniously dumped on the bun like they spilled a bagged cabbage salad and left it there. Couple sad looking pickles underneath too, for good measure. Now, look. I genuinely believe that coleslaw or some other kind of crunchy topping can really enhance the feel of a sandwich like this, even if it doesn’t add much. But with that in mind, eating this was, and I cannot state this enough, a terrible experience.
The chicken itself is unspeakably dry, like biting into something that’s been sitting under a heat lamp for a solid five hours, and there’s almost no flavor whatsoever. If the chicken, the batter, or any part of this was actually seasoned at any point in the process, it also at some time ceased to be seasoned before I took a bite. I’m also not sure the lady who took my order understood when I asked for the spicy mayo because there was definitely none of that here. I don’t even know if I’d really call it tangy mayo either, it honestly tasted like tartar sauce. I guess that’s tangy? This ended up giving the entire package the flavor of a fish sandwich more than anything, a fish sandwich with the consistency of old boot leather. That's not even touching on the coleslaw. If the texture and flavor of the sandwich was already awful, this cranks that factor up to 11. These pieces of cabbage are so thick, large, and dense that they compliment the boot leather meat with a nice rubbery boot sole finish, while simultaneously layering another bland, unimpressive flavor onto the pile. The bun is pretty much just a store-bought brioche instead of anything specialized or baked in-house, the kind you can buy a bag of for under five bucks at your given supermarket of choice, and predictably the pickles were watery and pathetic, as though they themselves were fully aware of their shameful display and had sought to drown themselves in an ocean of their own tears for this offense.
This was miserable, I barely finished it. The only saving grace was the fries (which have always been pretty good), but I'm not going to really give this any points for that - mostly because if I started ranking the sides I'd have to actually order sides at every place and I'm just not that dedicated to the idea of talking about a bunch of fast food french fries that barely differ from each other.
Literally why is this even on the menu? Who is ordering this?
Taste ---- 
Texture -
Value ---
Total: 4/15
A&W - Nashville Hot Chicken Cruncher
A&W is a somewhat of a Canadian oddity with a degree of lore behind its existence. If you live in certain areas of the United States, you've probably seen an A&W around - but rest assured, this is pretty much an entirely different restaurant in every single way, which is a boon indeed considering the general consensus seems to be that American A&W is among the worst in its class in many ways outside of the famed root beer. I couldn't tell you on that front really, but I'm looking at the menu now and it certainly looks at least somewhat foul, or at least unappealing in some other unquantifiable way. In the 1970s however, specifically the Canadian branch was bought by archetypical shady megacorp Unilever, splitting off from the American version entirely. Unilever then sold it to a collective group of franchise owners in 1995, which turned out to be a good thing because ever since then, A&W has basically become the gold standard of Canadian fast food (and to many, fast food in general) thanks to their generally high food quality and commitments to sustainability and relatively ethical meat sourcing.
A&W serves up primarily beef and chicken in the form of sandwiches and burgers, while also boasting a relatively robust breakfast menu and pretty decent coffee - both of which attract a very large quantity of elderly people almost every morning, with the restaurant consistently packed every morning with geezers lining up for fried eggs, pancakes, sausages, and the like. Like I said, it's kind of an oddity. Very diverse offerings, but most of them considered solid, unlike a significant amount of even more iconic places like Tim Hortons, which sucks at both breakfast and regular food while also having bad coffee, or McDonald's, which basically survives on the fact that it's too big to fail more than any inherent quality.
Like I said, they've served some variety of chicken under their "Chubby Chicken" label for a while, but one of their more recent menu additions is the "Chicken Cruncher" line of sandwiches, which trades nugget-style separated meat for a traditional fried and battered chicken breast on a bun. By more recent, I mean in the past couple years. They don't really change their staples much at all, so this existing as a permanent menu item is kind of an anomaly in and of itself.
I figured I would get the "Nashville Hot" Chicken Cruncher, because I tend to prefer these things spicy. The sandwich itself was $10, and the combo came out to $16 - which I ended up getting because I wanted root beer and onion rings, the latter of which are known for being flat-out the best you can get anywhere in the country. The sandwich came on a standard brioche roll, albeit nicely toasted and warm unlike some certain other places. There wasn't much in terms of toppings, just a splattering of mayo and a very nice, peppery honey-hot sauce atop the chicken itself. Somewhat unusually, the pickles are placed underneath the chicken at the bottom of the sandwich, which I was concerned would make the sandwich difficult to eat due to the potential for a soggy or slippery bun, but the bun was thick enough that this wasn't a concern at all.
Taking a bite, the batter on the chicken somewhat lived up to its name. I wouldn't really call this a "cruncher" on a metaphysical level, but it does have a crunch to it, and the flavor of the chicken is pretty good. Relatively moist, juicy, and complimented very nicely by the sauce, which was the real star of the show. It's somewhat traditional as far as hot chicken sandwich sauces go, but a lot of times if you actually want to get something like this and not just spicy mayo on a bun, you have to go to an actual restaurant and pay like $20. Unfortunately, this experience is kind of marred by the bread-and-butter sweet pickles, which aren't watery or bad-tasting or anything, but are just too large and thick-cut to where they're almost as big as the actual chicken portion of the sandwich. This, along with their placement at the bottom of the sandwich where you typically taste first, leads to them undercutting the flavors of the chicken and the sauce, making the sandwich mostly just taste like pickle with a vague hot chicken aftertaste. It's a little sad, because if they just fixed this one aspect - cut them thinner, put them on top, - I don't know if I'd say that this would become a favorite, but it'd be extremely solid, especially for fast food.
Instead, this one's just okay. I think you can certainly do a lot worse than the Chicken Cruncher, though I kind of think $10 for just a sandwich at a fast food place is kind of pushing it, especially when there's not much to it besides pickles, sauce, and an average-sized piece of chicken.
Taste ----
Texture -
Value ---
Total: 8/15
The Burger's Priest - Chicken Low Priest
Another weird one, The Burger's Priest is a Canadian fast(?)-food chain originating from Toronto. It's arguable whether this place counts as fast food, catering to the same sort of mid-range as a Five Guys or similar burger joint, but generally it's a pretty solid option and mostly well-regarded, if consistently and inexplicably exclusively running out of the most annoying-to-reach locations with bad parking and even worse walkability. This place has kind of a funny story behind its name and theme, with the founder having been in seminary school training to become a man of the cloth, only to drop out and instead dedicate his life to hamburgers. I can only imagine that more was going on behind the scenes there, because some of the branding for this place gets a little irreverent with the concept in a tongue-in-cheek way rather than being like, an unironic religious venture. Their signage proclaims boldly that they're "REDEEMING THE BURGER, ONE AT A TIME", and I've been to this place enough times to say that I guess that generally holds water.
The Burger's Priest has pretty good food, at relatively reasonable prices. Cheaper than the likes of a Five Guys, with some interesting variations and options that cater to a lot of different tastes. They have food ranging from some standard burgers, to the "High Priest" (a much higher-quality version of a Big Mac), the "Holy Smokes" (a burger topped with crispy fried jalapenos and spicy sauce), the "Vatican" (an absolute monster stacked between grilled cheese sandwiches), and a variety of vegetarian options including an Impossible Burger and even a deep-fried cheese-stuffed portobello cap patty substitution in case you don't eat meat but also don't want to eat hyper-processed slop.
And then of course, their chicken.
They have three chicken sandwiches for offer, but seeing as how I'd basically only had spicy variants so far, I decided I would go for the "Chicken Low Priest" - mostly because it was said to contain their "secret sauce" in addition to other toppings like lettuce, pickles, onion, and cheese. Every chicken option cost the same here, about $10, $15 or so for the combo, which I picked up because it came with fries and a bottle of soda and I was thirsty. Again, I'm not going to really talk about the sides, but the fries were more plentiful than Chicken On The Way, and I actually got a drink so the value factor is already better there. The sandwich was likewise a pretty good size for the cost of it, probably the best of the $10 price point sandwiches so far in that sense.
Curiously, this sandwich has absolutely nothing on top save for pickles, just a blank empty brioche bun. Like A&W, it's lightly toasted at least. All the toppings are localized to the bottom, where the chicken rests atop a bed of sauce, onion, lettuce, and cheese. Unfortunately, this meant that by the end of my time with the sandwich, the bottom half of the bun became extremely soggy and began to fall apart, leading to me having to finish it with a fork when the bun dissolved. This is particularly sad because everything else about this was genuinely pretty great before it got ruined halfway in by the encroaching sog. The ingredients seemed very fresh overall, and the pickles in this one were both flavorful and crisp without being overwhelming. The chicken was moist and properly crispy, with chunky batter caked in crunchy bits - the ideal venue for any budding chicken-based heart attack.
The secret sauce here was an interesting and tasty mustard-y mayo type of thing that is difficult to describe. It wasn't exactly a creamy honey mustard, but it wasn't far off. It's most similar to the sauce on the McDonald's Big Arch burger honestly, the one currently being memed about in the US because of the frankly bizarre advertisement from the CEO, which actually debuted in Canada for a limited time last year and was a burger I thought was surprisingly pretty good. For about 2/3rds of the sandwich, I was loving it, but it became kind of cloying by the end in a way that wasn't offputting but made finishing it kind of a slow process in spite of the good flavor. I'm not going to be too hard on it though because I'm also like 90% sure that the sogginess (of which this sauce was also a significant culprit) was the real major factor in my problems with this sandwich towards the end.
Ultimately, there's very little that's unholy about this one - but taking a couple steps to deliver the sauce from evil (by putting it on top instead) would go a long way towards this sandwich's consecration.
Taste ----
Texture -
Value ---
Total: 10/15
Mary Brown's - Spicy Big Mary
This one serves as a bit of a callback, sort of. Mary Brown's is a Canadian fried chicken chain that originates in Newfoundland, an iconic Half-Baked Reviews Special Episode locale. Originating as a Canadian branch of "Golden Skillet" (an American chicken joint I have literally never heard of in my life", the two guys who bought the rights to open Canadian chains were forced to change the name on account of Golden Skillet being an extremely generic name, and thus already taken by a different company. They figured that, for some reason, the move to make was to name the restaurant after the founder of Golden Skillet's wife - and thus Mary Brown's was born. I couldn't tell you how well-known Mary Brown's actually is as a franchise, but they're not exactly uncommon. Pretty much every city has one of these, with major cities having a ton. It's kind of like the Canadian equivalent of KFC, and much more popular and widespread here than those are. I can't even think of the last time I've seen a KFC.
When I was a kid, I remember there was a Mary Brown's a ways down the street that we used to go to fairly often because they were allegedly pretty cheap and pretty good, but we always got the big box of proper fried chicken back then, never the sandwich. Until more recently, when they opened one near where I live now, I didn't even know they had a sandwich - though I suppose that's a given with these places. More and more Mary Brown's restaurants have been popping up recently, and there's a good chance that at least some of this success can be attributed to the recent push for people here to buy Canadian products. Or maybe KFC is just that bad.
Their signature sandwich is the "Big Mary", ostensibly a riff on the Big Mac but with literally no resemblance to that burger whatsoever outside of the existence of a bun, and the most notable thing about this sandwich (or Mary Brown's in general) is the tradition of "Big Mary Mondays", which refers to the fact that a Big Mary is only $5 on each Monday, including holidays or any other such events. This is a spectacular deal, especially considering the sandwich normally goes for ten bucks at both Mary Brown's and other related establishments. Obviously, this is only an occasional thing, but if it's a Monday and you're hungry, there's not much competition at that price point at all.
Unlike the entire rest of the roster so far, this sandwich comes on a sesame bun rather than some brioche-adjacent type of thing. A nice change, but one that doesn't really contribute in either direction. It's not terribly impactful one way or the other.
This one is pretty minimalistic as far as toppings go - what you're getting here is spicy mayo, pickles, and not much else. The chicken, however, is evidently a battered, fried, and seasoned breast as opposed to the glorified frozen nuggets sitting between some of the other buns. From the moment you look at it, you can actually tell that there's very little in the way of processed slop with this one, unless you count deep frying in general, which I mean, fair enough. I don't know what you'd have expected though. This might not be the review for you in that case.
After a couple bites, I was happy to find that there was almost nothing to complain about with this one at all. Out of every sandwich thus far, it had the best pickles, and the chicken was extremely juicy, with fluffy, crispy batter that itself was flavorful enough to where, for once, it was a highlight instead of something that was just there for the sake of being there. Some of these places have a lot to learn from Mary Brown's, especially regarding those pickles, which manage the difficult task of being pretty sizeable without being watery, overwhelming, or any other flavor of "slightly gross" that some of the others had to deal with. I'll nitpick a little bit and say that the basic sesame seed burger bun it's served on kind of started falling apart. That might just be a consequence of the sauce though. I'm starting to think that toasting the bun is the secret to success on this front, and so far only A&W has bothered.
Overall pretty great. Most of my complaints would be insane nitpicks, and you really can't beat five dollars for this when the vast majority are selling at ten - even if it's only one day out of the week.
Taste ---- 
Texture -
Value ---
Total: 13/15
7-11 - Chicken Sandwich
Wow, another place almost everyone knows. Great, that saves me the pain of having to explain the concept of a 7-11 with any kind of real depth. Cheapo gas station convenience store, always staffed by people who clearly don't give a damn and frequented by clientele that feels much the same about shopping there. Nobody goes to a 7-11 because they want to, they go to a 7-11 because they're drunk and it's three in the morning and nowhere else is open. Been there, done that. Over the past several years though., 7-11 (at least in Canada) has been making moves to try and improve their image a little bit and turn themselves into an actual business people might want to go to. Largely expanded food options, cleaner stores, a self-checkout, and some of them even serve alcohol.
Does this actually improve the experience of going to a 7-11? Surprisingly... yes? Kind of? Not the alcohol, who the hell is drinking at a 7-11, but the rest.
They've served chicken for a while at 7-11s historically. Not all of them, and it varied heavily in quality from location to location, but it's been a thing, at least. Usually it was just strips though, often the kind of dried-out ancient junk you find at all such places. Nowadays, you can find whole fried chicken pieces, wings, pizza (also has been a thing for a long time, in fairness), potato wedges, and a surprising variety of other random hot food items. Most are them are still largely sitting under some variety of heat lamp, which wasn't the most encouraging thing in the world, but it looked at least like they were trying.
I actually didn't even know 7-11 had a chicken sandwich, nor would I have bothered to try it for this considering it's a gas station, but then I saw the price. This sandwich comes in at the cheapest yet by far at a $7 regular price - and it comes with a drink and bag of chips for completely free, no strings attached. This is an absolutely killer deal that gives you an entire combo for only two dollars more than the Mary Brown's special. Normally I don't count the combo into the overall value or quality, but it's literally free here so I have to factor it into the price. Even without though, it's still very affordable. We're still talking about an actual gas station here though, so whether or not that's actually any kind of selling point here remains to be seen.
When they packaged this up for me, I was pretty surprised though - it looked surprisingly good. Same brioche bun that graces the vast majority of these, but a pretty hefty piece of chicken that dwarfs basically all the others besides Mary Brown's and... maybe Burger's Priest? Far beyond what I expected. The toppings by default are also nearly identical to specifically Mary Brown's, which makes me think that it might be what they're going for in a specific sense. Not a bad one to emulate, if nothing else. Could be a lot worse. For lack of a better word, the chicken looks a little... flaccid in comparison to Mary Brown's though, a little less crispy, a little softer. Probably a side effect of sitting out underneath the lamps for a while.
As it turns out, the Mary Brown's comparisons were apt - because this was startlingly close to that sandwich in every way beyond just the toppings or size. This includes the meat quality, which defied all expectations of cheap gas station food and was ostensibly real chicken and not the mechanically separated junk nugget I was frankly dreading I would get. It's not particularly crispy, nor is it that flavorful, lacking any real seasoning in or on the batter, but hell, it was still pretty good just by virtue of not being the bare minimum for what counts as meat. The spicy mayo and the pickles were basically the same as Mary Brown's as well, though 7-11 does have a condiment station where you can pick your own stuff out in addition to what they give you - so it's up to the buyer to customize their own sandwich after the fact if they desire, which could be a blessing or a curse depending on how decisive you're feeling.
I misjudged you, 7-11. There was absolutely nothing wrong with this one at all, while coming in at the best value of the entire list. It wasn't really anything particularly special, but I would eat this over most of the other items on the list - especially at the downright charitable price they're offering it at.
Taste ----
Texture -
Value ---
Total: 11/15
Conclusion
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit surprised by some of these for better or worse, especially that last one, but on the plus side, even the worst of these didn't come out of the kitchen raw and give me food poisoning, so I guess it's a win. I expected at least one of those. Food is getting pretty expensive here, with even some of the cheaper options starting to skyrocket in price, so it's reassuring to know that even in these times, I can spend five to seven dollars and get something reasonably worthwhile. I also learned to never order the sandwich from Chicken On The Way, which is a life lesson that many should learn - in case your journey takes you to this accursed land.
Anton will be back with you next month - hopefully with a subject more interesting with this one - and I will once again return to my slumber until I am needed again. In the meantime though, I think I'm going to go get a burger. Or Chinese food, or sushi or... I dunno man. Anything but chicken. Get me outta here.
| The 'Shroom: Issue 228 | |
|---|---|
| Staff sections | Staff Notes • The 'Shroom Spotlight • Poochy's Picks • Poll Chairperson Address • 'Shroomfest • Credits |
| Features | Fake News • Fun Stuff • Palette Swap • Pipe Plaza • Critic Corner • Strategy Wing |
