Hardee's before Carl's Jr bought it.

Was the menu different? Any remnents of BurgerChef ?

I remember in the early 90's they would sometimes have a promotional deal on 'Big Chef' burgers. They were just a single but like a 1/4 pounder with the thousand island sauce and lettuce. They were two for two dollars (I should know as I ate enough of them ), but besides that, i'm not much help.

It was much better. Burgers were smaller, none of this 1/3 pound crap for every burger they sell except the kids meal. They had good fried chicken at one point. Their breakfasts are the main draw for me, and those haven't changed.

There were no commercials with Paris Hilton!

Their chicken was as good or better than KFC's extra crispy at just a little over half the price. Their Frisco Burger had an onion flavored mayonnaise that was really good and totally different than anything else around, and it was on real sourdough bread.

We had the original Sandy's hamburger chain ( http://www.geocities.com/sandyshamburgers/ ) store open here in Peoria in 1958, which had grown to 240 locations by 1972 when they merged with Hardees. As a result, Hardees had a long history here and was strong competition for McD when Carl Jr. came marching in. We were one of the test markets for the Carl Jr. products when Carl Jr. bought Hardees and replaced the Hardees name with the Carl Jr. name. He ended up very close to totally killing it here, before he woke up, changed the name back and brought back some of the original menu items. Over half of the former Hardees in the Peoria area are now closed, with many of the buildings still standing empty, while Wendy's and probably Burger King are now doing more business than Hardees. Even Steak 'n Shake with its higher prices is probably now ahead of Hardees in sales.

IMO they went to hell when they d/ced cooking from their (original concept) air grill. That was well over 20 years ago. Their breakfast menu is the only reason I have ever patronized them for since then, and that is only every four to six months or so.

We still have an old fashioned Hardee's here in western PA...It's in a small town called Millvale (a suburb of Pittsburgh). It's been there for 30 years. The food is good and I like it above all other fast food places, especially the breakfast menu.

Here's the strange part...This place was a pioneer in drive through windows: They installed this contraption.....See, the drive through window was on the wronge side of the building, so the window was on the passenger side of the car, so they built this conveyor/chain driven thing, that held a tray of food...The employee placed the food filled tray on this conveyor, it travelled up the wall, over the car and down to the DRIVERS side of the car. (Picture the vacuum tube system of a bank drive thru, but on a larger and slower scale. Alas, this ultra cool food delivery system has been replaced by the conventional type......BUT, the saga continues....

There is an Arby's here (that used to be a Hardee's) that had the same drive thru system...It broke years ago, but Arby's was too cheap to get it fixed, so they use a wicker basket on a stick (like a church collection plate) to collect the money and pass the food through the passenger window to the driver. It's like going to church and getting a roast beef at the same time.

But I digress....I like Hardee's.

Kenny DFM

Does anyone remember the Hardees Husky Hamburger (it was my favorite).

BITD, their "char-broiled" burgers was their claim to fame as far as I remember - a favorite of mine back in the early 70's. Not sure why they got away from that but I stopped eating their around the same time. When their chicken came out it was pretty good and real cheap - but that was in the early 90's so not that long ago.

I think their current menu is pretty sound. If you have to eat fast food, I prefer an "upscale" menu ala Hardees thickburgers/chicken sandwich, arby's, steak and shake..etc over a dollar menu any day.


edited to add - I had forgotten they purchased burger chef...another favorite of mine as a kid back in the 60;s