There's not a whole story about this one. Kath and I went down (?) to Maple Grove (I don't know where Maple Grove is, I just trust Kath) and when she wanted to know what I wanted for lunch, I said Portillo's because they have a Maxwell Street Polish on their menu, which I wanted to try and have tried to recreate on my own, which was easy enough since it's just a smoked kielbasa buried under caramelized onions with a smear of yellow mustard.
Also, Kath wanted a chili dog. They're kind of her thing now. She also got a chicken sandwich like she got last time and I got a chili dog and onion rings to go with my kielbasa.
So we pull into the Portillo's drive-thru and they're forming two lines of cars with masked employees carrying card readers taking orders. I don't know why, maybe the speaker box on the drive-thru was busted or something. Just seemed weird.
I thought the chili dog was bullshit, Kath didn't remark on hers.
The onion rings were fresh and were sized somewhere between those bullshit Burger King things (that used to be good) and those jumbo Arby's things. They tasted sweet with a crispy batter. I quite liked them.
And then there's the Maxwell Street Polish, which I'm sure some Chicagoans will tell me I've not had the real thing unless I make it to Jim's Original because you'll find irrational food purists everywhere that will insist that caramelized onions and yellow mustard on a smoked kielbasa will taste different depending on geography, the same way there are some Philadelphians who will tell me I've never had a cheesesteak because cheap cuts of beef, peppers, onions, mushrooms, and Cheez Whiz need to be prepared in a glorified suburb of Camden, New Jersey to taste "real".
Anyway, I liked it. How the hell am I not going to like a kielbasa? My biological makeup is a hundred one percent made up of unconditionally loving kielbasa.
However, we were passing by the Portillo's later, fifty degrees (ten degrees for you Celsius folks) and pouring rain and they still had employees out there taking orders. So I took to Twitter...
Hey, @portilloshotdog, why is your Maple Grove, MN location making employees work outside in the rain? Does the speaker for the drive thru not work?— ЧАРЛИ ПАУКЕН, ОКСИЧЕН ДЕСТРОЎЕР (@CharliePauken) May 9, 2020
They've yet to respond.
Out of the four sandwiches I've had at Portillo's, I've liked one and a .250 batting average is the kind of thing that makes you look at other stats to justify keeping your wife's nephew on the team. So I liked the onion rings.
I like the Maxwell Street Polish and the onion rings. But I can also make a Maxwell Street Polish at home because, hell, I have made Maxwell Street Polishes at home and other restaurants have onion rings (which I would make if I had a FryDaddy) (no, do not get me a FryDaddy, if I don't wind up burning my apartment down, I'll just stink it up like a fucking fast food joint), so whatever points Portillo's had in their favor, they lost, and that's before we address the part where they made their employees stand outside in the cold and rain during a global pandemic.
Considering all those stats - a sandwich you can make at home, a side you can get literally anywhere else, (let's call it what it is) abuse of employees - I don't see any reason to ever go back to Portillo's.
Seriously. You fuck around with workers, you lose my dollar.
I've been waiting almost three years for an excuse to use that graphic.
Out of the four sandwiches I've had at Portillo's, I've liked one and a .250 batting average is the kind of thing that makes you look at other stats to justify keeping your wife's nephew on the team. So I liked the onion rings.
I like the Maxwell Street Polish and the onion rings. But I can also make a Maxwell Street Polish at home because, hell, I have made Maxwell Street Polishes at home and other restaurants have onion rings (which I would make if I had a FryDaddy) (no, do not get me a FryDaddy, if I don't wind up burning my apartment down, I'll just stink it up like a fucking fast food joint), so whatever points Portillo's had in their favor, they lost, and that's before we address the part where they made their employees stand outside in the cold and rain during a global pandemic.
Considering all those stats - a sandwich you can make at home, a side you can get literally anywhere else, (let's call it what it is) abuse of employees - I don't see any reason to ever go back to Portillo's.
Seriously. You fuck around with workers, you lose my dollar.
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