483678 Sun Jan 27 16:35:02 -0800 2008 22 32 Chains 0 3338673 I have been hitting a local Roy Rogers lately and must have forgotten that they make very good fast food. My parents would take us to either RR or Burger Chef when I was a child (McDonald's was forbidden) but I stopped going for some reason. I was thrilled on my recent visits to find that their fries are probably the best fast food fries I have had. Large fries are still called "a holster". They make great fried chicken and I am addicted to the Double R Bar burger (the burger is topped with ham and cheese). The roast beef is good as well. The Fixin's bar has the usual suspects but adds BBQ sauce and horseradish sauce. I am just curious why there are not many of these around any more. I can't imagine, given the choice, that one would hit up a McDonald's over Roy's. Does anyone else still frequent this place? Sun Jan 27 16:35:02 -0800 2008 18385 CDouglas 1 3339080 I didn't know they still existed. I used to eat fairly regularly, though not frequently, as Roy Rogers when I was a kid. I think it was the first Roy Rogers that my Dad would take me to, in Falls Church, Virginia. Cheeseburger, small fries, small orange drink. I remember when I was big enough that my Dad would finally let me order a medium orange drink. Eventually, in my teenage years, I loved that I could get all of my favorites in one spot. A large roast beef with cheese (plenty of horseradish sauce), fried drumstick, small fries, large orange drink. Or you could go with the small roast beef and a 2 or 3 piece chicken dinner. Given the choice, it'd be Roy Rogers every time I wanted some such thing. Sun Jan 27 18:40:57 -0800 2008 3338673 80141 ccbweb 1 3339154 Sometimes the Chinatown bus that shuttles between Boston and NYC stops at a combination Sbarro's/Roy Rogers in a town right on the Massachusetts/Connecticut border. RR food there is greasy, lukewarm, and has an "off" rancid taste to it. Blech. I wonder if there are any high-quality ones? Sun Jan 27 19:08:16 -0800 2008 3338673 11275 Prav 2 3339260 I read the information on the Roy Rogers web site and it appears that the locations in highway rest stops are run entirely separately from the other remaining Roy Rogers. Virtually all of the restaurants were sold, first from Marriott to Hardee's, which turned some into Hardee's stores and sold the rest to McDonald's and Wendy's. At some point recently, one of the original franchisees had the 8 remaining Roy Rogers not in highway rest stops. It appears they're working to grow the business again and are opening new stores that they now control. High quality...no idea, personally, as I haven't been to any of them in ages. Sun Jan 27 19:49:43 -0800 2008 3339154 80141 ccbweb 1 3339171 Roy Rodgers locations have disappeared tremendously form the New Jersey landscape. There may be only a handful left, while they were very prevalent through the early 90's. When the leases ran out, landlords increased the terms for renewal and RR for whatever reasons faded into the sunset........ After the purchase of RR from Marriott to Hardee's Corporation, the quality suffered.......I miss their Chicken(Ma Parker's?) Sun Jan 27 19:16:01 -0800 2008 3338673 123497 fourunder 2 3339236 >>After the purchase of RR from Marriott to Hardee's Corporation, the quality suffered.......I miss their Chicken(Ma Parker's?)<< Pappy Parkers Sun Jan 27 19:42:21 -0800 2008 3339171 12471 jlawrence01 3 3339280 JL, the absence of the grease after all these years affected the brain cells..... thanks for the correction. Sun Jan 27 20:00:20 -0800 2008 3339236 123497 fourunder 4 3339516 After ten years with Marriott, you remember those things. And my wife located my old Hot Shoppes Cookbook this weekend. Sun Jan 27 21:57:29 -0800 2008 3339280 12471 jlawrence01 1 3339283 Raise your hand if you were in the Buckaroo Club... There's one in NYC right across from Madison Square Garden. Haven't been there and it doesn't look good. I grew up on them in Maryland like you. Never went to McDonalds. Always RR...I liked the roast beef... According to the website, none of the franchise locations I used to go to seem to be around anymore. Those were the days though. I liked the milkshakes and those goofy little ice cream sundaes too. Sun Jan 27 20:01:08 -0800 2008 3338673 10903 Silverjay 1 3339892 There are still a handful in the Washington DC suburbs. I've found their chicken just a little too salty for my taste, but their burgers are alright. Roast beef is still decent; not the injection molded beef resin they sell at Arbys. One thing on the Roys menu that I find unusually revolting is their breakfast eggs. They're definitely not fresh eggs, or even the cryovac preprocessed eggs they use at Mcdonalds. They're some kind of hideous faux egg "product" with the consistency that's a cross between weatherstripping, foam pipe insulation, and Dr. Scholl's Air Pillow insoles. I have no idea what planet they get this stuff from, but they need to put it back on the rocket and set the controls for the heart of the sun. "Pappy Parkers fried chicken brings the farm to you." I miss Hot Shoppes. Mon Jan 28 06:21:52 -0800 2008 3338673 12359 monkeyrotica 1 3345087 Ah the Double R Bar! I grew up on those things at the Roy Rogers across the street from my high school (W.T. Woodson, Fairfax, VA). The Hardees changeover eventually wrecked it and I moved out to Minnesota. Several years later, I was back for a visit and found a Roy's that was still around (sort of towards Fair Oaks Mall maybe?) I didn't even need to look at the menu -- I knew what I was after and ordered a Double R Bar. The counter guy and manager guy both looked at me like I just walked into McD's and ordered a Double Whopper. They had no clue. I'm sure it's one of those foods that just isn't as good as I remember, but I would love to eat one for old times' sake. Tue Jan 29 12:14:38 -0800 2008 3338673 11110 MSPD 2 3346222 Have you been recently? The Double R Bar is still on the menu. http://www.royrogersrestaurants.com/index.cfm/Mode/Object/Container_ID/406/Source/Community/Container_Top_Level_ID/384/Object_Id/2553/Is_Link/yes Tue Jan 29 16:40:20 -0800 2008 3345087 12359 monkeyrotica 3 3347704 Yes, I see that they've revived the item. My visit was a few years ago during the Hardeesification of Roy's and during that time, the Double R Bar had been discontinued for quite some time. It's great that it's back on the menu. Wed Jan 30 07:44:47 -0800 2008 3346222 11110 MSPD 4 3348095 All the Roys in my area that were converted to Hardees are closed. But the three stores that remained Roy Rogers remain. Wed Jan 30 09:17:00 -0800 2008 3347704 12359 monkeyrotica 1 3346338 "I can't imagine, given the choice, that one would hit up a McDonald's over Roy's." I ate a lot of fast food in Manhattan in the '80s. when the Roy Rogers chain was at its peak. I thought back then that McDonald's tasted worlds better than RR, no contest. Virtually every item on the RR menu - seemingly at all locations - was uniformly over-the-top too salty. And I distinctly remember that the RR restaurants themselves tended to be badly managed and maintained. Good riddance. Tue Jan 29 17:21:59 -0800 2008 3338673 16564 Arthur 2 3347417 Come to think of it, they do tend to go crazy with the salt on the fries and particularly the chicken. I wish they'd go back to making the cashiers wear little cowboy hats and bandannas and greet people by saying, "Howdy, pardner! May I take your order!" If only more franchises would make their transaction experience as humiliating as possible. The singing at Cold Stone Creamery just doesn't cut it anymore. Wed Jan 30 06:03:11 -0800 2008 3346338 12359 monkeyrotica 1 3350911 I live within 5 minutes of the only one in Ohio (I Think) and rarely eat there. Just not my thing I guess. Just not very good IMO. Poor service, dingy looking, dry roast beef, tastless burgers, and kinda looks dirty inside. I'm surprised they are still open honestly. it's always empty. maybe it's just this one, I don't know. BTW, it's in Mt. Carmel Ohio (Cincinnati area) right off I-275 if ya drive through and want to try it. Wed Jan 30 22:26:27 -0800 2008 3338673 153163 Ranger05 1 3352735 None in the Boston area- but I have relatives in Ohio, and we visit frequently. we take Route 90 all the way- and if we leave the Boston area early in the am, we hit a roy rogers on one of the rest stops on the NY thruway around lunchtime. Always get chicken thighs- so greasy and salty, but a guilty pleasure on my trek to Ohio. Never had their fries or roast beef, though. Thu Jan 31 12:12:08 -0800 2008 3338673 11057 macca 1 3354048 As best as I can reconstruct it, this is a brief history of RR and where it is today. The chain was started by Marriott in the late 60's as an updating of their Hot Shoppes coffee shop chain which had fallen out of fashion. They had about 650 RR locations at the peak, some company and some franchised. They lost interest and sold most of the chain to Hardees in 1990, but kept the stores in rest stops along the toll roads in the Northeast and the rights to the name for that purpose. In addition, a few franchise locations, mostly in Maryland north of DC, refused to go along and continued as RR stores, apparently based on their original contracts. These were mostly owned by the Plamondon brothers, sons of the head of Marriott's restaurant division when RR was created. Hardees changed the locations it could to Hardees, but didn't succeed and finally sold the locations to McDonalds, Boston Market, and Wendy's. Marriott, meanwhile, split off Host Marriott including the RR's in the travel plazas, which continued the RR locations and added others such as Sabarro as a franchisee (this is why you still see these along with RR in travel plazas). Host Marriott was eventually bought by Autogrill S.p.A. , and Hardees was bought by Imasco, which eventually sold it to CKE, parent of Carl's Jr., but at the time of that sale Imasco held on to the rights to RR. This is important--see below. The result was that RR was reduced for many years to about two dozen old franchise locations around Maryland holding on mostly on their own, and a group of locations in travel plazas which were totally a different company--the two shared only the name and a few similar menu items, but were (and still are) completely unconnected. This is perhaps why one reads such different impressions of "Roy Rogers" food, depending on where the writer has eaten. More recently the Plamondon brothers have acquired the rights to RR from Imasco. They are now building it up into a larger company-owned and franchised operation, presumably with the old recipes and attention to quality, so more locations are coming into existence. The travel plaza stores, meanwhile, are still owned by Autogrill and have no connection to the Plamondon company. Thu Jan 31 18:47:05 -0800 2008 3338673 10668 johnb 2 3354079 This post has brought back some VERY fond memories of college in the Washington DC area in the 70s. There was a Roy Rogers within easy walking distance of my dorm, and on those nights when my roommate and I could not deal with another serving of mystery meat from the cafeteria, we would mosely on down to Roys for a Double R. When you finished your fries and licked the Horsey Sauce from your fingers, the sign on the door wished you "Happy Trails" as you departed. To this day, certain friends of mine wish each other "Happy Trails" when we say goodbye, and its a special piece of nostalgia for us. Thu Jan 31 18:58:45 -0800 2008 3354048 102895 Cheflambo 2 3354687 For those on Long Island, there is still 1 remaining Roys in Shirley. When Hardees tried to change all of the Roys to Hardees and failed, for some reason this one location remained a Roys, and if you look at the Hardees web site, its the only site listed in metro NY...still great food too. :-) Its WAY out though, on the way to the Hamptons... Fri Feb 01 02:52:06 -0800 2008 3354048 79887 joelfreak 2 3355397 Thanks johnb - very in depth and interesting information. The Roy's I have had the best experiences with are all in Frederick, MD. The Germantown location is rather hit and miss. I seem to recall that there were several "saddle seat" children's seats at each location when I was small. One was really lucky if he/she got to sit in the saddle for lunch. Fri Feb 01 08:31:52 -0800 2008 3354048 18385 CDouglas 3 3380730 The saddle seat was a pretty neat idea for a child. Now days they would have to be equipped with seat/shoulder straps, OSHA approved legs, a surrounding cage along with front and side airbags. All children would also have to wear a full shielded helmet, as now used in rodeos Sat Feb 09 12:53:35 -0800 2008 3355397 125375 Big N Fat