Zaxby's — Restaurant in Sugar Land

I'm taking a star away from my first review for the quality issues I experienced in my subsequent two visits.

Firstly, a little about me. I lived in Macon, GA for about 15 years. Macon is right up the road from Statesboro, GA (where Zaxby's was founded) and those Macon stores were some of their first ones outside their home metro. From more than a decade of frequenting Zaxby's outlets in Georgia, my expectations are that the food will be tasty, fresh, and quick(ish). And this outlet one kinda fails on all points...

The first time I came here, about seven months ago, I was eager for a familiar taste of home after several months of chowing down on kolaches, tacos, burritos, and all the rest of the rich Texas food scene. My chicken fingers were overcooked, the crinkle fries were mushy, and the cole slaw had obviously not met proper refrigeration standards. Eh... It's a new store, right? Stuff happens when you're new. I'll come back in a couple months. Three stars.

About three months ago, I come here, make a simple order and then proceed to wait 25 minutes before getting up and leaving. The restaurant was not busy but in the time I waited only three orders came out to the dining room. From the exasperated look on those customers' faces, I believe their wait had, also, been unreasonably long. Disgusted, I left without a refund and muttered my kiss of death for a place, "I guess they don't want my money." But I'm a reasonable guy. I decided to give them one more chance.

Which leads me to today's outing. A Buffalo Blue Zalad with Nuclear (rather than original). Did the salad taste fresh? No. Did I get the expected proportions of fried onions, tomatoes, and carrots? No. Did I get Nuclear? No, someone mixed it up and I got Tongue Torch. Shaking my head...

Look, I hate to leave a Zaxby's with a bad rating because I enjoyed the brand so much while I was back in Georgia, but, honestly, this store just does not execute up to the brand standard--which is shocking to me. If I was involved in Zaxby's at a corporate level, I would want my first few franchises in such a huge market as Texas to be stellar. I would not want to start off on...

When i saw this new restaurant in my neighborhood i thought “Great. Another uninspiring chicken based restaurant”. However because it is in my neighborhood I thought I’d give it a try. I packed up my 2 kids and got there early for dinner. After trying to figure out what the menu was about I ordered chicken fingers and traditional wings with sweet and spicy sauce. While waiting for my order I proceeded to lead my hungry brood to a booth. The table was dirty. No problem just go to the next one. That one was dirty too. I thought about cleaning it myself but thought better of it. The manager must have noticed my hesitation because she ordered the front girl to clean it. By then I’d already moved on to a table at the back of the room. When i went to pick up my order, i was confused by the amount of food. I took it anyways but halfway through eating i realized that one order was wrong and they gave me extra. Then we tried the fingers, wings fried and sauce. Heres the verdict. Fingers weren’t dry but weren’t as moist as Cane’s. By itself the breading didn’t have much flavor and required sauce. Breading was rough jagged. Zax sauce was mild and lack punch. I prefer Cane’s sauce and Chik Fila sauce. Tried their zesty sauce which has horse radish and preferred that. Also additional sauces are 25 cents, which is ridiculous. Other chicken places sauces are free. Traditional wings are ok. Meat was a little dry. Breading is same as fingers. My sweet and spicy sauce was just sweet. Fries were cut larger. Lacked crispness and salt. May have been sitting around for bit. Service was friendly but inexperienced.

I asked my son if he’d want to come back and he said...

The first time we visited we ordered a family pack of chicken strips and wanted half plain and half Buffalo. When we arrived home with the order we realized we only received plain and only one Zax's sauce for 20 strips. We found the order to be hot and the fries are seasoned which was a hit. Having returned today we were informed we cannot split flavors on orders, which explained how we had only received the plain. The lady who took our order did let us know there is a basket of fries option when we were ordering which saved us money and gave us the perfect quantity. This order had taken about 30 min to receive.

Today we did individual plates and found the toast, chicken and fries to be warm and not hot. Since it was 4:30pm we had hoped for a fresh order. We received the order within 10 minutes. The person who had theirs tossed in sauce thought the sauce cooled their chicken further. That person also had to receive ranch instead of the Zax sauce they wanted. The sauce ones were drowning in sauce and the sauce got onto the fries too.

After two visits we've determined that if you are after chicken strips and sides to go to Raising Canes. If you want sauced or rubbed chicken strips then go to Pluckers.

We may return, but only will stick to just plain chicken, Zax sauce, and fries. The family order was a decent enough price. We'll see if we can require a fresh order which may help.

It's a new building so it's visually nice. It could be kept cleaner...