Royal Farms World Famous Chicken: Is It Worth A Stop?

Royal Farms World Famous Chicken: Everything you need to know

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What is Royal Farms?

Royal Farms, if you’re unfamiliar like I was, is a Baltimore-based gas station with over 300 locations, owned by Cloverland Farms Dairy.

The majority of the Royal Farms locations are in Baltimore, but there are many in Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, and New Jersey. It’s expanding past that and we’re actually getting a new Royal Farms in Wilmington, NC soon.

The gas station does sell gas, of course, but it also sells various convenience products for travelers, like drinks, packaged snacks, the (self-proclaimed) world’s famous coffee, and the (also self-proclaimed) world famous chicken.

So, is Royal Farms chicken good?

Believe it or not, Royal Farms chicken is actually really good.

Food & Wine named it one of the top 10 Gas Station Foods Across the Country That Are Worth the Detour and earned the title of “2018 Gas Station Fried Chicken” from Philadelphia Magazine.

But we, normal people who just like chicken, did like it too. It has a great crispy skin, the chicken itself is juicy, and it’s always fresh.

How does Royal Farms cook its chicken?

Royal Farms chicken is pressure cooked chicken, so it’s not fried.

It starts with fresh, never frozen chicken. That chicken is hand-breaded with a blend of secret spices then pressure cooked, which gives the texture and taste of fried chicken without actually (technically) being fried chicken.

But that breading on the outside, oh my gosh. It’s really crunchy and delicious. And it doesn’t get soggy, not even the next day, after sitting in the fridge overnight.

With lots of fried chicken, you really need to revive it in the oven. Once it starts to cool and sweat, the breading gets soggy. But not Royal Farms. The breading stays fresh and crunchy, even when we pull it out of the fridge for dinner the day after we bought it.

The chicken is really fresh. Actually, Royal Farms chicken is made fresh ’round the clock. Seriously. You can get fresh Royal Farms fried chicken 24/7.

The associate told me a batch of chicken just came out when I was there. When I asked if there were chicken strips available, he said it would take 10 minutes because they have to first hand bread the chicken then cook it for seven minutes. So there really is no chicken waiting frozen somewhere.

Those chicken strips, by the way, are what is in Royal Farms’ chicken sandwich. So it’s like Raising Cane’s in that sense rather than any other fast food chicken sandwich, which uses a piece of breaded chicken breast.

How about the sides?

The first time I ordered, I got an 8-piece meal (two breasts, wings, thighs, and legs), a side order of fries, and four rolls, plus jalapeño cheese so we could try a little of everything. If you’re asking my advice: Skip the fries and rolls.

The fries, which are potato wedges Royal Farms calls Western Fries, tasted so old, like they had been sitting in the bottom of dirty grease for a long time before they got to us. We tried them again a few years later, thinking dirty fries were a fluke, but they weren’t. The fries were still terrible.

The rolls looked similar to those heat and go Sister Schubert’s rolls. They just weren’t anything special. 

The jalapeno cheese was a hit. It was just jalapeno-flavored nacho cheese, which isn’t really anything mind blowing, but we all really enjoyed it. And couldn’t remember the last time we had nacho cheese, so sometimes just the nostalgia indulgence is worth it.

Can you just go for the Royal Farms fried chicken?

If you’re hungry for fried chicken, just go to the gas station. Royal Farms is not a restaurant that’s exclusive to gas station patrons.

There’s no drive through window for the chicken, though. That would actually be amazing. You do have to get out of the car to get food. And you do have to take it to go. There aren’t any tables and seats for you to sit inside and dine. I mean, it’s is a gas station after all.

There’s no drive through window for the chicken, though. That would actually be amazing. You do have to get out of the car to get food.

The ordering system is very similar to Wawa or Sheetz, if you’ve bought sandwiches at either of those gas stations. You go up to a kiosk and use that to place your order. You can scroll through the options, choosing between items like chicken strips, a chicken sandwich, individual meals, and family meals.

When you place your order, a receipt prints out.

You pick up your order where you placed it, but you pay at a separate kiosk that acts as a register. To pay, you need to scan your receipt and choose if you are paying with a Royal Farms credit card or not.

If you’re a member of the Royal Farms loyalty program, RoFo Rewards, you can scan your card and earn points for your order. After a certain number of points, you can earn free chicken.

At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

Problems with the Royal Farms Loyalty Card

I got the RoFo Rewards card when I got my chicken. If you know me, you know I’m frugal and I want to save money as much as possible. So even if I go to Royal Farms once in a blue moon, I still want to earn points for my purchases.

So I got the card (it’s free) and used it for my chicken purchase.

One of the Royal Farms associates told me I could take the card home and register it. That … was kind of a falsehood.

I went home, went to the website, and was caught in an infinite loop of trying to actually register the card. It wasn’t working.

I googled to see if I could find anything else out, and my search for advice was as successful as my original registration. All I found were complaints from people who also couldn’t register their cards. They left comments for Royal Farms, all of which went unanswered, and then caused more complaining.

So is the loyalty card worth it? Probably not. I mean, in theory you can get free chicken on your birthday, but if you can’t register the card to add your birthday, you’ll never get your birthday freebie.

Can you order Royal Farms online?

Online ordering is now available on Royal Farms’ website for select, participating locations.

You’re not ordering directly from Royal Farms though. You’ll order through either EZCater or DoorDash.

Royal Farms Menu

Royal Farms has more than just chicken. You can get a hot dog, all day breakfast, deli sandwiches, and more.

You can check out the entire Royal Farms menu so you can decide what you’d like to order before you get to the gas station.