If you have read my Jollibee post, you would have known that Arnold’s was my next stop for fried chicken. So finally, I made my trip down to the Cityplaza outlet and got to try the famous Arnold’s fried chicken that many have been raving about. Was it worth it? Let’s read on to find out!
Firstly, like mentioned before, the location is downright bad. I mean, all locations are totally not near the MRT stations at all. Well, maybe they wanted you to burn some calories so that you will order more when you reach the stall to make your walk down more worth it :O
Anyway, if location is an issue to you, they have several outlets as well, one of which will definitely be close to where you live. Especially now that they just open one at Jurong West. So all those NTU students, lucky you.
If you’re talking about ambience, I would say that this is almost as sketchy as Lucky Plaza. Or even sketchier since this is not even in the town area. But I would say that the aroma of fried chicken IMMEDIATELY hit my nose the moment I entered the building – which isn’t a bad thing AT ALL.
At 5.30pm, there was already a queue, which is very very very unusual since I never knew Singaporeans ate dinner so early (in fact we chose this timing in order to avoid the dinner crowd but we ended up part of the dinner crowd). But guess what, later at 6pm, the queue BECAME EVEN LONGER. I think the management really do need to consider having expansion to this outlet. I feel like the cook is the bottleneck to this whole process. From the time we ordered, it took us 15 mins to get seats, and another 15 mins to get our food. So overall each order is delayed for 30 mins, which means slower turnover. And this is the timing with a smaller crowd already. Wait till 7pm, I think people will have to wait for an hour before getting their seats and food. But then again, the good side is that we know that our food is made to order.
Okay, enough rambling about the location. Let’s get straight down to the food. Here is what we ordered:
- Whole Spring Chicken (with 2 sides – we changed the coleslaw to mashed potato and kept the fries) – $12.90
- Cajun Fries – $3.60
- Fried Bun – $0.60
We actually wanted to order the criss-cut fries or the onion rings, but the whole potato platter was not available for ordering, which to me I think makes no sense since it is the weekends and a wise businessman would have known that it is the most crowded and the time where everything from the menu has to be available. Just like that they lost $3+ worth of orders. Assuming there are 500 people (which they definitely would have more than that) – that is $1500 + worth of orders.
#1 Spring Chicken
First thing first, the chicken was FRESHLY FRIED – which means piping hot. And that is what is important for fried chicken. Who would like their chicken to be sitting out there for hours and then having them lukewarm? And I really think their chicken was not “re-fried” as in fried once before and then fried again when the customer orders to make it hot. This really seems like it has been made to order because of the tenderness of the chicken. And boy, was that meat tender. The thigh and the wing was almost falling off the bone kind of tender. No sauce was necessary. It was that good. The breast was slightly on the drier side (as with all breast meat) and we had to dip it in sauces (chili, ketchup, mash potato gravy) when we reached the breast meat. But the flavour was still good.
This batter is not the same as the other fast food chains, maybe cause we ordered the Spring Chicken. If you ordered their 2 piece meal, you may probably get the same crust and batter as the regular fried chicken. But they mentioned that the Spring Chicken was their Must-Try item so we ordered that instead. This is more like the western stall at the coffeeshop kind of fried chicken, but definitely tastier. The skin had no “flour bits” like the rest of the other fast food chains and it is more like the one piece crispy skin of the chicken that has been dipped in flour once and not twice kind of skin.
I’m not saying it is a bad thing, it is just a different experience and taste. But the flavour is really good. I would say the marination is also totally different. This too has a homely kind of feeling – like chicken fried by your mother, but better unless your mother is Arnold’s wife.
#2 Sides
The normal fries were GOOD. It does not taste like regular fries. You know how people say that Long John Silvers and McDonald have their own distinct taste to their fries while the others taste almost the same? Well, Arnold’s fries has their own distinct taste as well. It is unlike the other fast food chains and they are very good. Additional point to note, they were freshly fried too – so hot and crispy = yum!
The mashed potatoes, on the other hand, were just average. The gravy had no herbal flavour (unlike the Jollibee one) which may not necessarily be a bad thing (because if you remember, I didn’t like the Jollibee’s gravy). Although the gravy is average, it did go well with the flavour of the chicken, which is more important that just having the mashed potato stand out. But of course, if you could get a unique taste to your gravy and at the same time make it complement the chicken and fries, then it is definitely a bonus. But one stall can’t be good at everything right? So I would just recommend the mashed potato to be eaten with the chicken or fries, rather than just ordering this specially to be eaten alone on its own.
#3 Fried Bun
The fried bun honestly looks pretty oily, and it was. The bun itself was a little dry. BUT I really liked the flavour of the bun – it was somewhat like dinner rolls: slightly on the sweeter side. AND I LOVE THE FACT THAT THE BOTTOM OF THE BUN WAS CRISPY WHILE THE TOP REMAINED SOFT. Like how did they do that?!? It blows my mind.
I would totally order this again, for $0.60. Worth it.
But to those who doesn’t like bread, maybe you can order this once to try it out. The texture itself – not moist enough for my liking, but the flavour = I loved.
#4 Cajun Fries
To be honest, I found these fries to be mediocre. Besides the fact that it was freshly fried, I don’t have much comments on this. There are spices on these Cajun Fries, BUT considering that the normal fries were that good, I kind of expected more from this one – but no. I guess the ordinary ones are the ones that usually blows your mind. I wouldn’t recommend people to get this because I feel even the McDonald’s ones are better than these and for the same price, I would rather you spend it on McDonald’s curly fries.
The chili sauce and ketchup were average – I think this time it is really the Maggi branded chili, unlike the one at Jollibee.
Overall, I would say this definitely has more value than Jollibee. If you recalled from this post, the meal I had at Jollibee wasn’t that filling (at least for me). But I left this place feeling full as hell – $12.90 for one whole chicken is $7.50 for half a spring chicken (almost the same price as Jollibee’s 2 piece chicken meal). I can guarantee you that you wouldn’t need to eat ANYTHING after that.
If you’re talking about strictly flavourwise, I would say give both a try. I can’t rate either of this higher than the other (because they are both very different in terms of batter and the way of marination and frying) – one is more fast food fried chicken, the other is more coffeeshop kind of chicken.
But considering in terms of both value and flavour, I would say Arnold’s would win – like I said, I left feeling full.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get to try their potato platter – I would want to try their criss-cut fries and also the onion rings. I think I would also want to try their coleslaw next, since I read many reviews saying that their coleslaw is supposedly nicer than the regular ones. Well, we shall see.
The downside to this is that it was slightly too oily for my liking. Like the bread was oily (literally drenched in oil) and the chicken had oil oozing out from the bottom (when I transferred half the chicken onto another plate) – as though they didn’t have time to use paper towels to at least soak up some of the excess oil. Maybe the next time round you can use your own tissue to place at the bottom of the empty plate first before transferring the chicken so that you wouldn’t be too appalled by the dripping oil coming from the chicken.
Overall Rating:
It is a place I may return to, but if I do, I’ll bring at least 3 people to share the entire spring chicken. Yes, it is absolutely worth the money – especially the whole spring chicken. But because it is a VERY heavy meal, hence only 3.5 flags instead of 4 flags. Also, I honestly don’t think that the sides are worth the extra money because the simple fries itself were good enough.
Things to try:
- Spring Chicken (Stick with the normal fries, or maybe even order double portion of it – totally worth it)
- Fried bun (Just try them once. I didn’t think I would like them but I did)
If you’re thinking of home delivery (since there are always long queues) or want the details of all the outlets/ menu items, here is a link of their website!
Do try it out and let me know in the comments what you think of Arnold’s Spring Chicken or if you have already tried and have any recommendations!
Clarice The Cheapskate Critic 