So what’s a diner with Champagne tastes and a beer finances to do? Perhaps head to the not going vacation spot of Popeyes, the place the fast-food chicken chain has presented a new menu merchandise designed to scratch that four-star itch we’re jointly feeling. The emblem this week started providing its well-known highly spiced chicken sandwich slathered with a mayonnaise whose kick comes no longer simply from crimson jalapeño however “winter black truffle,” an component that straight away connotes white tablecloths and eye-popping expenses.
Truffles, the ones bits of fungus prized internationally — hunted within the wild through specifically educated pigs and canine, mythologized, bought at public sale and frequently shaved over dishes through waiters on the maximum unique eating places — are synonymous with luxurious. Like caviar, diamonds and personal jets, they’re a shorthand for wealth, and no longer the type of “stealth wealth” that says itself to simply the ones within the know — they’re a standing image intended to be observed.
Popeyes is providing the sandwich for $5.99 (that’s what I paid at my nearest location; costs range), pitching it with a advertising and marketing marketing campaign inviting shoppers to “lean in on being lavish” and a sweepstakes to win a seek advice from to the logo’s crusing “yachtsteraunt” pop-up. To win, persons are requested to post movies to social media appearing how “fancy” they’re once they devour the sandwich.
At a time when the wealth hole feels extra like a canyon, one may see one thing sinister in a large company urging its working-class shoppers to imitate the trimmings of the elite. But let’s suppose the brand new Popeyes overture comes with a wink, a little bit of mocking of the crooked-pinkie ethos of the 1 %. Because if we will’t consume the wealthy, once in a while it’s a laugh to fake like we will consume like them, proper? And the brand new pieces are a collaboration with Truff, the condiment corporate recognized for its playful high-low mash-ups, together with a collaboration with grocery staple Hidden Valley Ranch dressing.
But socio-economic implications apart, the larger query (for the proletariat and bourgeois alike) is how does the brand new Popeyes sandwich if truth be told style?
I attempted it and, briefly, I wouldn’t give it the time of day, even though that did manage to pay for a probability to flash a Rolex.
Part of the issue is that the Popeyes authentic highly spiced chicken sandwich, which bureaucracy the foundation of the brand new iteration, is as with reference to fast-food perfection because it will get. It went viral in 2019 — growing traces out the door and goading its competition to (unsuccessfully) attempt to most sensible it — for just right reason why. The chicken patty, rusty-hued with smoky spices, has extra crags than a Swiss Alp, and its amiable partners, a slather of mayonnaise and a few pickles, upload simply the suitable backup notes.
To me, the addition of the Truff was once as unwelcome as some jerk rolling up in a limo asking when you’ve got any Grey Poupon. The condiment, a highly spiced mayonnaise, tinted crimson through the aforementioned crimson jalapeño, got here in a beneficiant smear to each the highest and backside of the sandwich’s brioche bun. But its taste did the liked sandwich no favors. First, I must observe that the flavour of truffle is hard to explain. It’s frequently stated to be earthy, woodsy or comparable to mushrooms, falling into the umami-heavy class of tastes (which is any other notoriously hard-to-pin-down observe). But the Truff suffered the destiny of many low-quality truffle-infused oils that eating places once in a while use to get extra bang out of the scarce fungus.
Instead of the component’s trademark delightful funk, I used to be met with a tinny, off-putting — and overpowering — tang. It appeared to combat with, no longer supplement, the spices within the chicken. And the combo of pickles and acrid truffle was once much more of an peculiar pairing.
I reluctantly then attempted the blackened-chicken model, any other sandwich that I in truth have loved in its vintage shape, and located extra of the similar: Another completely just right factor ruined through an needless lily-gilding. Another derivative, which added a slice of indeterminate cheese and a few strips of chewy bacon, was once much more of a mish-mashed mess.
The novelty issue of experiencing cakes at a drive-through isn’t even sufficient reason why to offer it a take a look at. Popeyes isn’t the primary fast-food chain to inject truffle into its lineup. Wendy’s tested a burger and fries infused with the decadent taste in 2016. And Shake Shack closing yr rolled out a white-truffle menu.
So, my recommendation to any person confronted with the query from a Popeyes affiliate — “Would you like to try our new Truff menu?” — could be to channel everybody’s favourite out-of-touch elite, Lucille Bluth. In one episode of “Arrested Development,” she was once requested through a waitress at a down-market eating place whether or not she most popular “a plate or platter.”
“I don’t understand the question,” Bluth sniffed. “And I won’t respond to it.”