Ate at the intentionally spelling deficient Chick-fil-A for lunch. The walls are adorned with the franchise's history, including their claim to have introduced the world's first chicken sandwich more than 35 years ago. Can this be right? The chicken sandwich is that young, or do they mean their particular type of chicken sandwich? Surely the chicken sandwich isn't a recent culinary innovation. Regardless, their chicken sandwich is the best around by a long shot.
On a movie-related tip, look for my predictions of the Oscar nominees later tonight.
This may be way late, like over 8 years late, I just want to clarify something with my own research.
ReplyDeleteThe Sandwich, not chicken sandwich, but in general, was named after professional gambler John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich. Legend goes that he would, as he was playing cards, demand his manservant to bring him slices of roast beef between two slices of bread so he wouldn't have to walk away from a winning hand. It soon caught on with other gamblers so they requested "The same as Sandwich", so the name stuck.
Fast forward to about 1946. Truett Cathy at a restaurant called the Dwarf House in Atlanta, GA, invented the first fried(on public record) chicken sandwich. It was the same as Chick-Fil-a sandwiches today, all it was is pickles and bread and meat. It became a smash for the restaurant, and in 1967, opened his first Chick-fil-A in Atlanta.
While Cathy didn't invent the chicken sandwich outright, as most were probably grilled chicken sandwiches at the time, I would give him a bit of credibility to the claim that he did invent the first fried chicken sandwich.