Realizing that it has by this point sufficiently wigged out its consumer base with the 8-month-old red pigtail campaign, Wendy's is retiring the surreal spots in favor of a slimmed-down "It's waaaay better than fast food. It's Wendy's." platform.


Sadly, the company has not yet released an estimated timetable for the image's withdrawal from our nightmares.


READ: Wendy's Drops Red Pigtail Ad Campaign

READ: Wendy's Baconator Review

A while back, we'd posted a clip of Patton Oswalt's comedic assessment of the KFC Famous Bowl as a "Failure pile in a sadness bowl." Turns out he'd never gobbled one down.

Until now.

"The Famous Bowl hit my mouth like warm soda, slouched down my throat, and splayed itself across my stomach like a sun-stroked wino. It was that precise combination of things, and so many other sensations that did not go together. At all."

Read more at: A.V. Club Taste Test Special: The Bowl At The Howling Rim Of Famous-Ity



And we had this to say:

Fast Food Review: KFC's Famous Bowls

While I'm generally icked and irked by the omnipresence of McDonalds' franchises spilling over the globe like love handles on an airplane seat divider, I have always been delighted by their regional offerings. In Baltimore, we'd brave the Howard Street branch with the cracked glass and the permanently-lodged wall bullet to get our limited-time fix of the McCrabcakes. They were pretty darned passable, and at $2.99 or so, infinitely more student budget friendly than those at the Charles St. crabeterias that would have taken one look at our paint-splattered clothes and sent us off with our claws cracked.


I've sampled McLobster Rolls in Maine, have heard tell of McPoi in Hawaii, and know y'all have McSweet Tea in some points South, so I'm assuming that individual franchisees are allowed a small bit of leeway with the local fare. Might y'all be so kind as to share what regional food items you've seen Ronald offer up? Serve it up in the comments section below.


(UPDATE: I just remembered that in the Orly airport as I was leaving Paris, I saw that the McD offered a choice of a sweet or salty breakfast. I call that win-win.)


(Photo snapped by my pal Craig on a train in Japan. It doesn't say what's been done to the pork, or how it's formatted, so I'm gonna go with "Porkburger".)

Take a bite of AOL Money's Fast Food Ads vs Reality photo gallery. It offers conclusive proof that the KFC Famous Bowl (with which I have a documented obsession) does, in fact, look like something pre-consumed for your convenience.

Comedian Patton Oswalt has a bucket 'o things he wants to say 'bout the KFC Famous Bowl.




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Fast Food Review: KFC Famous Bowl

Switched reports that a waiterless, fully automated restaurant called Bagger's has opened near Nuremberg, Germany. Food is ordered via touch-screen, and delivered to the table down a series of spiraling tracks. This likely negates the need for tipping, but it probably kinda bytes when you need some extra ketchup.


Read The Article

This just in:

Special Delivery: Scent of Freshly Prepared Kentucky Fried Chicken to Tempt Taste Buds of American Officeworkers

"Forget television integrations or corporate naming rights, Kentucky Fried Chicken's first-ever "scent-focused" pilot program teamed KFC with corporate mail rooms nationwide. Along with carrying inter-office mail, overnight packages and bills, mail carts in Washington, D.C., Chicago and Dallas delivered the aroma of freshly prepared Kentucky Fried Chicken during pre-lunch mail drops.

Through the pilot program, KFC worked with an online company, a business-to-business consulting firm and a non-profit, to include a $2.99 Deal -- a plated meal including KFC's world famous chicken, a side item and a biscuit -- on the actual mail carts that pass the offices of hungry workers."


We're curious as to exactly HOW said lunch plate is attached to the mail cart. Duct taped to the handle? Sliding around atop stacks of inter-office manila envelopes, dashing gravy and grease all over TPS Reports? Inquiring minds want to know.

If the KFC Kart should happen by your desk, would you be a doll, and send us a pic and/or post in the comments? Theeenks.

Guilty Pleasures: Fried Chicken

Fast Food Review: KFC Famous Bowl

Special to AOL from Dr. Don Kinsman

"This here ain't chili, son. This here's soup." I don't know if that quote was really delivered, or if it is apocryphal, but some people around Cincinnati say a Texan passing through once uttered this as he tasted a bowlful at one of Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky's hundreds of chili parlors.

To be honest no one will ever confuse the chili Cincinnatians have loved for over 80 years with Texas style chili, or any other style chili for that matter. Cincinnati chili, truly a dish unto itself, first appeared on the scene in the 1920s when Greek and Macedonian immigrants started modifying the stews of their homelands. What they came up with doesn't have big hunks of meat in it and it certainly is not going to take the top of your head off with hot spice; maybe a mild mouth glow depending on where you go and how the chef is feeling that day. To be brutally honest about it, the Texan was sort of right in what he said. Cincinnati chili is used more as a sauce for putting on top of things than eaten straight -- and putting it on top of things is something the citizens of Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky do to the tune of over 2 million pounds a year.

My friends have a running joke about my weird machismo when it comes to restaurant ordering. If there's cold calves brain, fermented bamboo curry, or pickled goose web on the menu, it's gonna end up in my mouth. It may or may not go any further than that, but at least I've tasted it. However, despite my fearlessness, there's an item about which I've got endless (admittedly morbid) curiosity, but have yet to sample – the KFC Famous Bowl.


When dissected, there's much to love. As my good pal John Devore of Maxim Radio's The Devore & Diana Show says, "It's all the good s&*! you want to eat – all together in one bowl!" True – corn, chicken, cheese, rice, biscuits, gravy (mmmm...gravy...) and mashed potatoes are delicious in their own right, but all a-glop together, it...well it just seems like something for which I'd have been reprimanded for stirring together on my plate as a kid.


But, there are things we do to better ourselves as people – rounding out our experiences and broadening our horizons and whatnot. Today was going to be the day my taste buds and the Colonel's unholy creation went mano-a-tongue-o in the culinary coliseum, but Mother Nature intervened. A tornado in my home borough of Brooklyn left most of NYC un-navigable by public transportation, and I couldn't get to a KFC. Divine intervention? You tell me. Use the comments section to share your impressions of the KFC Famous Bowls, and I'll happily post the highlights.


And enjoy this stunning review by blogger Jeff Kay.


McRegional Foods

Breaking Fried Chicken News!

The Proof Is In The Pictures

Fast Food Trends We're Predicting

Fast Food Trends We'd Love To See

Fast Food Review: Wendy's Baconator

Confessions Of A Fried Chicken Freak

Okay, so my notions started getting a l'il fancy free while I was writing Fast Food Trends We're Predicting. Feel free to chime in with your own.


Trans-Fat Monitoring Ankle Bracelets


In light of New York City's controversial trans-fat restaurant food crackdown, we wouldn't be at all surprised to find grill jockeys forced to sport Lohan-style fat monitoring ankle bracelets on the job. "Alert! We're detecting high levels of palm oil at Location #5974. Initiate remote Fryolator shutdown procedure." Gotta protect the dining public by any means necessary.


Soda Sommeliers


Now that bottled water mania has flooded every sector of the market, and ultra-haute restaurants are hiring "water sommeliers" to optimize the non-alcoholic fluid intake of their diners, we're expecting some trickle-down. Seeing how Coke and Pepsi have both recently extended their brands, introducing vitamin-enhanced, black cherry & vanilla, coffee-enhanced and other variations to the mix, we're fully expecting a necktie-wearing gent to stroll up to our Chili's table saying, "Tonight, we're featuring an exotic, mid-caffeinated diet blend that pairs beautifully with the Awesome Blossom." any day now.


Salt Options


Even plain ol' table salt is getting a shake-up. High-end chefs are no longer content with Morton's or kosher crystals, but rather pairing their fare with hand-harvested Black Hawaiian and Bamboo Jade sea salts. As if drive-thru orders aren't muddled enough, we're semi-terrified of a future where diners are forced to specify "The #2, Emperor-sized with a Diet Coke and...honey, do you remember if your sister wanted the Fleur de Sel or the Papohaku White on her fries?"


Nothin' But Bacon


The introduction of Wendy's six-slice Baconator behemoth sandwich simply confirms the American people's longtime love affair with the crispy, salty, fat-drenched stuff. When are our nation's restauranteurs going to just go whole-hog and open a chain called Nothin' But Bacon? Franchise options will include an on-premises cold smoker, and a cardiac unit in a shed out back.

Pulled Pork as a Condiment


In keeping with the pig-powered trend, rumor has it that White Castle has been testing out pulled pork sandwiches in selected locations, and we've spotted it as a menu option on Wendy's thisismyburger.com fantasy sandwich generator. While we're thinking that the texture might still at this time be a regional preference (Sorry – no McShredder on the menu yet.) we wouldn't be at all surprised to see it popping up on toppings lists at burger joints around the country. You know – seeing as bacon is so busy and all.


Fast Food Trends We're Predicting

Fast Food Review: Wendy's Baconator

Guilty Pleasures: Bacon

Guilty Pleasures: Burgers

Get Great Burger Recipes

In solidarity with the upward and outward growth of fast-food chain mega-burger offerings (and hence, the munching public), Wendy's has introduced a multi-meat menu item called The Baconator. The website describes it as, "Six strips of hickory smoked bacon piled high atop two 1/4 lb.* patties of fresh, never frozen, beef. Complete with two slices of American cheese, mayo and ketchup for a mountain of mouth-watering taste." I describe that as "daunting".


Brooklyn's Ali D., my operative in the fast food field (and, thank goodness for her arteries and digestive system, a yoga instructor) reported today's Baconator Lunch to be, "An unbelievably tasty and well-balanced sandwich. Equal hits of bacon, beef, and cheese. Yum!" and her post-consumption state as "PMS-ing, bloated, and satisfied."


I somehow doubt that I'll be venturing out for one at any point in the near future, so I put it to you, dear readers, to share with me your Baconator experiences. Use the comments to share with me your bacon-based hopes and desires, and whether or not the Baconator came close to fulfilling them. I'll live all vicariously and whatnot, and post some of the more entertaining replies in a follow-up report.



Fast Food Review: KFC Famous Bowls

Fast Food Trends We're Predicting

Fast Food Trends We'd Love To See

1796 Bacon Recipe | Bacon Cotton Candy | Guilty Pleasures: Bacon | Fast Food Review: The Baconator | Product Alert: Bacon Chocolate Bar

Guilty Pleasures: Burgers

Get Great Burger Recipes