Cuisine Review

By BlueZero
05 Mar 2012 08:01

I had been planning my first trip to Knott's Berry farm in Buena Park for a while. An associate told me about how he visited the theme park with his family and would always got to the restaurant since it's a better value than theme park food. Little did I know that a few weeks later, I was going to be celebrating the 75th Anniversary of Mrs. Knott's Chicken Dinner.

Personal Background:

With my limited Orange County knowledge, I had always wanted to go to Knott's Berry Farm for the theme park, but never found the chance when I was younger. I had never heard about Mrs. Knott's Chicken Dinner until February of 2012. This is coming from someone who knows more about theme park dinning attractions than the average fellow. Until this review, I hadn't had fried chicken in a long time. The closest chicken I eat is rotisserie and buffalo wings. I decided to visit Mrs. Knott's Chicken Dinner for a Sunday lunch/brunch before I headed into the theme park on a full stomach.

Ambiance:
After paying for parking, we walked over to the restaurant around 11:30 AM. At this time, there were no long lines stretching around the building. We just walked in the front door and talked directly with the hostesses.


I was happy to be instantly seated in the dining room to the right of the entrance way. The dining room had the right classic look to make me feel like I had gone slightly back in time. Most of the people in the restaurant at the time were older folks and large families with younger kids.

Food I Ordered: All-Day Menu Meal included the following:

Appetizer Course
Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

The chicken noodle soup was acceptable for being homemade. Most other chicken noodle soups I have had are extremely greasy with large flat noodles floating around and very tiny pieces of chicken. The Mrs. Knott's chicken noodle soup was luckily less salty than I was expecting and had real pieces of their chicken in it. As you can see from my photo, the top soup layer almost had the consistency of a chowder.

I enjoyed the soup more than my friend's choice of cherry rhubarb which was a little too sweet for me. As my disclaimer, I think this was the first time I have had rhubarb so I have nothing to really compare it against.

Farm Fresh Mixed Green Salad (Italian on the side)
The salad was subpar since it's a traditional American salad with mostly iceberg lettuce, carrot strips, purple cabbage and small mini tomatoes. I requested the Italian dressing on the side since I don't like using all the salad dressing. Most people who eat the salad probably order it with Ranch dressing where the flavor of the Ranch carries the dish. The Italian dressing had some redeeming flavor, though not enough to save the iceberg lettuce.

Hot Buttermilk Biscuits
The biscuits were definitely homemade since I could taste a little bit of the flour and the texture was airy. They were very filling and I could barely finish two before I knew I had to save room for the main course.

After traveling all this way to Knott's Berry Farm, it would have been blastphemy if I hadn't put the Knott's Berry jam on the biscuits. Trust me when I say the jams taste better when they are eaten in their home restaurant even though they are the same packages you could eat at any restaurant they are served. The strawberry and boysenberry jams are just as good as I've had in the past.

Fried Chicken (default all dark meat)

Mrs. Knott's Famous Fried Chicken
The Traditional Favorite**
Served with mashed potatoes and Knott's country gravy

I started tasting the fried chicken leg first since it's always my favorite chicken area with lots of dark meat. The fried outer skin had the correct balance, not too little time in the fryer and not too much time time where the skin would have dried out. I'm guessing the kitchen staff are still frying the chicken the same way Mrs. Knott's did when she opened the restaurant. The fried skin exterior didn't look like most fried chicken I've seen come out of a deep fryer. The kitchen chefs probably hand-fry each piece for a shorter time to maximize the moisture and flavor of the chicken.

As I worked my way though each piece of chicken, I was having more and more trouble finding room in my stomach. By the time I reached the final piece of chicken, the breast piece, I couldn't finish it. If I had been eating the same chicken dinner later that day, I'm sure I would have worked up and appetite to finish it.

Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
The mashed potatoes were excellent with a light and fluffy texture. They managed to stay very moist even the sections not covered in gravy.

The gravy was also good though I think the gravy portion was a little too small for the mashed potatoes. My mash potatoes to gravy ratio was quickly pointing to danger as I was running out of gravy. Luckily this obstacle did not hinder me from finishing all the mash potatoes and gravy. I had to redeem myself from not finishing that last piece of chicken.

Sweet Kernel Corn
I reluctantly tasted the corn because no one likes letting the fried chicken get colder. The corn was acceptable. It was better than corn out of a can, though I really don't like kernel corn. I would have preferred corn on the cob since it is more "American" and fits better with fried chicken.

Boysenberry Pie

After a much needed break, the waitress came back to remove my finished plates and take our dessert orders. While I was tempted to go with the "plain as apple pie" choice, I knew I would be failing in this review if I didn't choose the boysenberry pie since the boysenberry was created at Knott's Berry Farm (or so their menu told me).

I was greeted shortly later by a wonderfully large slice of boysenberry pie. The pie slice was easily double other pie slices of other restaurants. It's times like this when I'm glad Americans have distorted portion sizes.

The boysenberry pie filling was thick enough to not escape the pie shell as I cut out a piece with my fork. It really is as dark as it appears in my pictures; the one where I took a flash reveals the hidden flavor zones inside the fruit. The boysenberry filling was lovely, a true taste I savored as I dug in for more.

The pie crust was perfectly light and flaky. I'm not a big fan of pie crust in general since it serves a higher purpose of containing the inner filling. The Mrs. Knott's pie crust was above-average. It earned extra points for being homemade and not being too dense where I would need ice cream to finish it off.

I can safely say upfront this was the best boysenberry pie I've ever had. As a pie eater, my usual top suspects I interrogate on my plate are pumpkin and apple. Speaking of apple, I also had a chance to taste my friend's apple pie and the apple filling was also tasty. I could tell the apples filling was handmade with a slight hint of cinnamon. It was like an upgraded apple crisp dish filling in my mouth. Both pie flavors were winners, though the boysenberry easily won the Best in Show award for taste. It deserves its place as one of the restaurant's signature dishes.

Service:
Our waitress was friendly and showed up promptly just after we were seated. She didn't rush us and let us take our time to decide which sides we wanted. She was able to bring out each of the courses at the right time and keep my water filled, which is extremely important while eating salty foods.

The service slowed down about the time we were ready to order dessert. This wasn't a big deal since I needed some time to digest some chicken and make room for my pie. It's difficult for me to eat a lot of food early in the morning (*cough 11:30 AM*) and we were well served up to the point we left at around 1:00 PM.

Overview

The fried chicken was delicious even though it had been over-hyped by my colleagues. The meal portions were excellent for the $15.90 pricetag and I left the restaurant extremely full. The star of the meal for me was the boysenberry pie hands down; the fruit filling had outstanding flavor with the pie crust being flaky just I way I like it. While I would not likely drive to Buena Park just for Mrs. Knott's fried chicken, I am tempted to make a return trip to get some more delicious boysenberry pie.