Perks of new restaurant not worth tradeoff

In an area already populated by Zaxby’s, Guthrie’s, KFC and Chick-fil-A, another chicken restaurant might seem superfluous. But McDougal’s is shirking the fast-food identity of small portions and cheap prices, which serves as a unique selling point but also the source of the restaurant’s biggest detriments.

Established in 2004 in Nashville, Tenn., the Knoxville location at the corner of 17th Street and White Avenue is the regional restaurant chain’s fourth location and the first without a 615 area code.

One first notices the difference between McDougal’s and the haunts of other chicken places by the atmosphere. The building that used to serve as a Sawyer’s location still has an unlit Sawyer’s sign in the corner, but everything else looks different. Hardly an inch is not covered with album covers, University of Tennessee sports memorabilia, license plates, a deer head or a pink flamingo.

At the same time, the college dorm room-style decoration just adds to the feeling of entrapment. A sauce bar dominates one side of the restaurant, and tables leave tiny walking space for customers. It adds the atmosphere of hearing that constant murmur of a packed restaurant’s conversations, but the limited space available makes Guthrie’s or Zaxby’s look expansive by comparison.

Also, since McDougal’s food is cooked-to-order, there’s a wait time involved. This Sunday night trip to the restaurant, the order took around 15 to 20 minutes to arrive at the table, an uncomfortable amount of time to wait in a cramped restaurant, especially for, say, a quick lunch. The time dwarfs that of the speedy Guthrie’s or even the average Zaxby’s, but unlike those two restaurants, the chicken strips presented were scalding on the first few touches.

While Guthrie’s, Zaxby’s and Sawyer’s have “the plate” or “the box,” with its promise of chicken strips, fries, cole slaw and Texas toast, McDougal’s has the small chicken platter and the large chicken platter at the top of its menu.

The $6.99 small chicken platter consists of three chicken strips, fries and a piece of “Tennessee toast,” while the $7.99 large chicken platter ups the ante to five chicken strips.

Adding in the price of a drink with a large chicken platter, the bill ends up being over $10, which could sound steep on first glance. However, the chicken strips are significantly larger than the same dish served at other joints.

A mound of fries accompanies the plate, with a piece of “Tennessee toast” on top.

One must question the choice of not having the traditional cole slaw side with the meal. Tommy McDougal, the owner of the restaurant, chalked it up to past experience with “the plate” at chicken restaurants.

“I noticed that I was a person that always wanted to substitute my slaw for extra toast or extra fries,” McDougal said. “So I said, ‘Screw it, no slaw.’ It’s just a waste. Keep it simple: Get more fries. You want more toast? Sure. We’ll charge for the toast.”

It’s worth noting that a substitution of an extra piece of toast seems more feasible than what must be double the fries. The result is a challenging-looking plate: a mountain of chicken fingers and an avalanche of French fries. One wonders whether he or she will finish.

“We got bigger fingers,” McDougal said. “Size does matter, hand-cut fries. We’re not fast food. We’re fresh food.”

It also doesn’t leave much room for variety in what should be a full-course meal, something a restaurant striving to be more than “fast food” should consider. Large portions of one or two things are associated with snacking. A meal is an ensemble.

Look at KFC’s Variety Big Box Meal. It offers a drumstick, a chicken strip, a box of Popcorn Chicken, two sides, a biscuit and a drink for around $8 including tax! That’s a lot of food, and the small portions and eclectic mix makes for something that customers can pick and choose and not get bored with.

Another problem with the chicken platter dinner is that, while the experience of going to McDougal’s will stick out in a person’s mind, the actual meal will not. The chicken strips are juicy and filling, perhaps too filling. The “small” chicken platter is more appropriate than the large one for an average person’s appetite.

The fries are salty but not particularly tasty, something for absent-minded munching but not devouring. The unnecessary, Five Guys Burgers and Fries-esque amount of fries will probably result in a small village of potatoes in the trashcan as leftovers.

The restaurant also advertises “free ice cream,” leaving a reader waiting to hear the catch. There is none. A sign reading, “Free ice cream. Just ask,” hangs behind the cashier. Asking brings you a free two-ounce cup of vanilla ice cream.

“It’s the small things that we do that build a cult following, a loyalty,” McDougal said.

The restaurant’s innovative sauce bar also adds variety to the choosing of condiments, even if that variety doesn’t exist in the signature platter. Eight choices of sauce include original, buffalo, tearjerker, HoneyBee, gold, old smokey barbeque, citrus chipotle barbeque and McDougal’s sauce. There’s also ketchup, honey mustard or ranch for the traditionalists.

The sauce bar saves those copious eaters of Zax sauce the extra cost.

“I’m a sauce person,” McDougal said. “I want my sauce lined up. I like to dip. I like to mix things. I don’t want to be nickel and dimed.”

Other menu items include wings, chicken-finger sandwiches, grilled-cheese sandwiches, salads and more. Sides include fries, Tennessee toast, cole slaw, celery sticks and extra pickles.

Even if the restaurant has problems, it deserves a round of applause for not sticking to the formula: “the plate,” whose taste is so relatively indiscriminate between all the restaurants that the only decision-making involved is cost or distance.

And the national chains’ atmospheres will fade quickly out of the memory, but the sights and sounds of McDougal’s will linger.

Whether you like or hate McDougal’s restaurant’s take on serving chicken to the masses, one thing’s for sure: It’s not “just another chicken restaurant.” But the unique atmosphere and large portions are not worth losing the speed, cost and variety of the other fast-food chicken restaurants.