Zaxby's Tastes Eerily Similar to Another Popular Fast Food Chain

And I'm not the only one who thinks so.

Since my big move to the South, I've made it a point to try as much Southern cuisine as possible. One of my latest experiences was with a seafood boil, which really highlighted how different Southern food is compared to what I was used to in Colorado. What I didn't expect, though, were the regional differences in fast food. From Cook Out to Jack's (which I learned is very different from Jack in the Box), there's a whole world of fast food here that I didn't even know existed.

So, you can imagine my surprise when I tried the Southern fast food powerhouse, Zaxby's, only to find that it tasted exactly like another fast food place I used to drive almost an hour to reach back home.

Does Zaxby's Taste the Same as Raising Cane's?

On a recent trip back to Alabama after visiting a friend in Florida, I decided to stop at Zaxby's for a quick bite. I'd never tried it before, so I was pretty excited to dig into my chicken tender meal. But as I took my first bite, I had to pause. Something about the taste was oddly familiar. Then it hit me—this Zaxby's chicken tender tasted almost exactly like the ones from Raising Cane’s.

Now, I get it—chicken tenders universally taste the same. How different can a chicken tender be from one restaurant to another? But anybody who's a fellow Caniac knows that Raising Cane's tenders are like a gift from the food gods. So how could Zaxby's tenders taste just like those of a restaurant nowhere near it?

Curious, I decided to do some digging.

Turns out, I'm not the only one who's noticed the similarities between the two. Plenty of people online also agree that the tenders at Zaxby's and Raising Cane's are nearly identical. Of course, the sauces are different, but when it comes to the chicken itself, it's a heated debate on social media.

“Is Raising Cane's a carbon copy of Zaxby's or vice versa?” one user asked on a site similar to Reddit. “The food tasted about the same (obviously so since it's chicken fingers) but cheaper than Todd Graves’ version of chicken fingers.”

Most people seem to agree—either Todd Graves, the CEO of Raising Cane’s, was inspired by Zaxby’s or straight-up copied the tenders. While I don’t think you can truly “rip off” a chicken tender, I can understand the loyalty people feel toward their favorite local chain.

Whether or not they taste the same, I know I’ll be grabbing more tenders from both places in the near future.

Read the original article on All Recipes.