When I think of Italian comfort food, Burger King comes to mind.
Mmmm…rich garlicky marinara, creamy mozzarella, and herbaceous basil. Wait a minute, you don’t think of Burger King? Neither do I but when I found out BK was putting a Super Mario Bros. twist on their menu, I just had to try it.
Wait. That’s an understatement, I must try it!
I really wanted to grab their new Italian Breakfast Burrito, which is an amusing name if you think about it hard enough, but I was too late. However, I didn’t go away empty handed because I was greeted with their new Chicken Parmesan Sandwich. Admittedly, I am biased because I have a disturbing obsession with chicken parmesan. And while the ingredients are simple, the execution is not.
Chicken parmesan is my litmus test for an Italian ristorante. It’s like how egg rolls or fried dumplings can tell me how good a Chinese restaurant will end up being. If they cannot make a staple dish, their General Tso’s chicken most likely tsucks.
Ah, but let’s not kid ourselves, this is Burger King. I’m not even going to compare the level of its Italian items to depressing faketalian Olive Garden. I would probably place the sandwich at the expectations of canned Chef Boyardee pasta. Until that creepy spider fiasco, I was a connoisseur of canned ravioli and Boyardee was the bareback cowgirl of awesomeness. Damn you spiders, damn you all to hell.
I should also note I was given the option to have the chicken grilled or breaded. Grilled? You might as well serve me sushi made with brown rice or mix twelve year Van Winkle “Lot B” bourbon with Coke. I opted for the only correct choice which is breaded and if you’re wondering what the grilled version tastes like…tough, I’m not eating that (or so I thought, more on that later).
So now that I properly shifted my paradigm, I looked at the sandwich and couldn’t help but feel sad. It looked like their normal fried chicken sandwich with some tomato paste jizzed on it as an afterthought. I couldn’t taste the “shaved” parmesan and BK’s definition of artisan style (their words, not mine) must mean shabby. And, as a final “eff you”, the mozzarella is just drooped on top of the fried ugliness.
I guess the chance to get this “grilled” should have been ominous enough but who else can say they ate a BK Chicken Parmesan? Probably the homeless who scoured garbage cans and found these half-eaten chicken sandwiches tossed out by unhappy customers.
Indeed there were a couple of slices of mozzarella but when I split the sandwich in half, you can see where one layer was placed on top of another. Both layers were pretty much unmelted. I think the cadavers in the autopsy rooms at the local morgue are warmer.
Burger King’s website states that the chicken is generously breaded but my chicken was entombed with batter. It was like eating a brick filled with white chicken meat. Not surprising, the marinara was dreadful and tasted like pasty ketchup. Those On-Cor frozen chicken parmesan family entrées in the unattractive yellow boxes taste better.
Italy hasn’t been this disappointed since pre-tomatoed Mussolini. Yeah, I was pissed. Coupled with the fact that this sandwich was also expensive ($5.89!), I was ready to chalk this up as a big fail. Alas, (overdramatic sigh) I wouldn’t be giving a fair review if I didn’t purchase another one at a different Burger King.
Try Number Due. (Get it? It’s Italian for two.)
Here is something annoying to me and I’m not sure this is the case at all Burger King locations, but if you do not specify you want the chicken grilled or breaded, it will come grilled. That makes no sense for two reasons:
1. I don’t know of any restaurant that offers chicken parmesan grilled.
2. Every picture BK has of this product, from their menu in the eatery to its website, shows that it’s breaded.
Needless to say, I didn’t indicate which one and was handed a grilled chicken version. I took a bite and was happy the cheese was melted but the chicken was spongy and bland. I returned it and got the correct artery clogging breaded sandwich.
The cheese was melted properly and this made a huge difference. The creamy mozzarella followed by the breaded chicken was excellent. The chicken was breaded with the right amount, unlike the “colostomy in your future” fried rock in my original sandwich. It was not as light as tempura (which would be gross) but heavy enough to give it that crispy bite. I could actually taste the parmesan, but suspect the cheese was sprinkled from a can versus shaved.
There was still too little of the marinara sauce, which tasted like tomato paste out the can, but the melted cheese carried the sandwich’s flavor. Also, the artisan bun the second time was devoid of weird flecky sesame seeds and other random speckles, but it didn’t affect the sandwich’s flavor.
The second Chicken Parmesan Sandwich from the second Burger King was miles better than other one I tried. That is shitty because we shouldn’t have to play Russian roulette with our Burger King locations.
I really enjoyed this sandwich even though it’s still a bit pricey for a fast food sandwich. Not sure if Little Caesars still sells their own chicken parmesan sandwich, but I believe theirs is the best fast food version I’ve eaten.
Using an old slogan of Burger King’s, my suggestion is to ensure that the cheese is melted by telling them you want to “have it your way.” And for God sakes, demand the breaded one or you will eat something horrible.
The Burger King Chicken Parmesan Sandwich won’t blow your mind (maybe your arteries and heart), but I do think it’s a great option if you don’t feel like eating a Whopper or have always dreamt of having onion rings with your chicken parmesan.
(Nutrition Facts – 470 calories, 15 grams of fat, 2.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 85 milligrams of cholesterol, 1600 milligrams of sodium, 46 grams of carbohydrates, 7 grams of sugar, and 37 grams of protein.)
Item: Burger King Chicken Parmesan Sandwich
Purchased Price: $5.89
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Burger King
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Melted mozzarella on breaded chicken. Burger King offering something different from the norm. The sandwich is a hit, but it depends on the BK you go to.
Cons: Grilled chicken parmesan sucks. Expensive. Having to specify which chicken you want is stupid. The sandwich is a hit, but it depends on the BK you go to.
I enjoyed it, but mine lacked marinara sauce as well. It’s as if Burger King thinks we’re all wearing white jumpsuits.
Mine was a huge disappointment… barely any marinara on it and a slice of refrigerator cold parmesan cheese is not what I was expecting after seeing teh advertising introducing this sandwich.
That’s pretty darn disappointing for the price. I still may try it if I have money to burn.
The sauce was weak, but it still tasted good.
Didn’t Burger King have a similar sandwich years ago? It was the oblong chicken sandwich? And that wasn’t half bad. But I measure fast food chicken parm sandwiches based on Duchess in Connecticut. Theirs is very good (with plenty of marinara!).
Well Jen they did have a similar type of sandwich that was with the oblong piece of chicken…
I did not like that one as much as I saw the person making the sandwich used like a ketchup bottle to squeeze the sauce out.
Isn’t this just a round version of their occasional/seasonal “Italian Chicken Sandwich”?
I could do that at home for cheap I mean come on I could get a chicken breast, do the egg wash, bread it lightly pan fry it, get a can of 50 cents tomato sauce add some herbs and garlic, put the chicken back in the sauce and top with mozzerella cheese, get a bun which is dirt cheap $1.69 for 8 buns. Toast the bun ofc and then put the chicken in and spoon a little bit of sauce.
I agree Alek. I buy dirt cheap chicken breast and take out the bone, pound it out a bit for uniform thickness. Then I “wash” in spicy Italian salad dressing and dredge in panko bread crumbs with some Italian seasoning and grated Parmesan mixed in. Fry in olive oil and add sliced mozzarella at the end until melty and gooey. Use any good brand of spaghetti sauce (heated) for condiment and good rolls from the local grocers deli. It’s less than half the price of BK and three times better. Makes excellent tailgating food and can be easily prepared at the stadium. You’ll make some new friends!
I promise I actually read this review, but what I really took away from it was “oh thank god there was no picture to go with that spider Chef Boyardee article”.
i,too, have an obsession for Chicken Parm,and am lucky enough to have had the good(from New york and New Jersey restaurants,respectively;the bad(i fucked up and ordered one from denny’s) and the ugly( any restaurant in Ohio), i will definitely try this one, just because, and your article was fucking hillarious.
Hi Jeff, nice review, I enjoyed it, thank you!
I had a buy 1 get 1 free coupon for this. The cheese was unmelted in mine also. The official picture from BK shows sauce smothering the top and bottom bun. When I got home with my food, there was just a small squirt of sauce on the top half of the bun, and none on the bottom half. It was pretty disappointing.
I was hoping for something similar to when Subway had a chicken parmesan sandwich.
Awful! Breading was near burned and the oil it was fried in was OLD! Hard tasteless blOck of chicken. Asked for extra marinara, got very little sauce. Cheese was tasteless / sandwich very dry! Nothing like advertised. Can and will do
Better at
Home with recipe above. Do NOT buy it!!!
The best ever!!! I dont know what burger king you all are going to but mine was as good as it looks on t.v!!!
Its pricee at BK than McD, cuz stupid people don’t know how to share their support. People keep going to McD, so BK has to costa lil more to compenstate for the less customer traffic.
I purchased a Chicken parmesan sandwich and a large fry. The sandwich was $5.19 and the paltry amount of fries was $2.19. This has to be a joke. I drove past a Chick-Fil-A and several other fast food locations to pay $5.19 for a chicken sandwich that wasn’t close to the price of a Chick-Fil-a sandwich or several other options.
At least you received a sandwich that somewhat resembles chicken parm…
The last two times I’ve gone through our local BK drive thru, I got a sandwich with a slab of crispy chicken, lettuce, mayo, and two tomato slices…
I always have to argue with the manager because they put american cheese on the sandwich. I’m sorry… but mozzerella cheese is not yellow. EVERYTIME I have to argue, which is sad, because I like the sandwich. I’m paying $8.00 for a meal that I have to argue over… makes me want to stop going there! This is the Burger King in Savannah, Georgia on Abercorn Street/White Bluff! Sad!