Untitled Document

Places: KFC and Boston Market
Items: Chicken Pot Pies
Prices: $3.49, $4.99 respectively

Nowhere in sports do we get a Boston vs. Kentucky matchup. Yet here in our first annual Lunch Bowl, we Lunch Guys are pitting Boston Market against Kentucky Fried Chicken. At stake is the prestigious title of national chicken pot pie champion.

Nowhere else in the world of lunches can you dine on items as unique as the pot pies at these down-home chains. In the heart of winter, a good pot pie can warm even the coldest of lunch hours. So in this face-off, is it Boston or Kentucky that scores the most points for its pie?

Tom: Just looking at these two pies, you’d swear they were made by the same person – I mean factory. While we’d all like to think Grandma is in the back of the house rolling out pie crusts, in reality both pies were probably baked months earlier in a corporate commissary the size of Arkansas. Just think, somewhere people make chicken pot pies for a living. No matter, we eat them for a living. What was impressive was that these are real pies—big and heavy—not some little school-lunch sized item. I half expected four and 20 blackbirds to come flying out of them. They also have an identical look, with their crimped aluminum pie holder overwhelmed by the golden brown crust. Even after my first bite where I broke a piece of crust off each and dipped it into the piping hot creamy broths, I still thought they were the same. Their crusts were subtly delicious, buttery as movie popcorn and flakier than Britney Spears.

The small difference came in the heart of the pie. Both were packed with nice hunks of potato, carrots and peas, but Boston Market uses more chicken and has a few green beans thrown into the mix.

Chris: Tom, Tom, Boston Market has a lot more than a few beans to make this clearly the superior pie. In one bite, the Boston Market pie restored my faith in this dish – a faith I had lost after too many frozen Swanson pies. When done right, the recipe itself is genius, combining a meal with dessert. It’s like injecting a Twinkie with clam chowder or putting a White Castle patty on an Oreo. The Boston Market crust was randomly spilling over the sides of the 6-inch pan, making me believe my server’s claim that it was baked fresh on site. Inside, I loved everything you did, Tom. Could you believe the size of those chicken chunks – thumb-sized, at least. So rich and warm, the only thing missing was a fireplace to cozy up to.

The KFC pie is the exact same size, but it’s inferior in every other way. I’ve got no problem with that since it is $1.50 less. The crust is a touch denser and drier. The carrots are bits instead of circles. The peas are a duller green. The cream is more paste-like. Overall, it has an air of reheatedness about it. But if my stomach is screaming “pot pie,” KFC will satisfy the jones.

Tom: Chris, both of these are very good. Boston’s had more meat but it wasn’t a better taste. Dare I say it was a dead heat. Maybe the Colonel is really from New England.

Chris: Dead heat?! OK, I’ll concede that I enjoyed the actual taste of KFC’s chicken more thanks to superior herbs and spices, but comparing the total pies is no contest. Boston Market is the clear winner for a decadent meal so rich, I should limit myself to one per winter.