18 fast-food chips tasted and ranked from worst to best

March is officially Chip Month at Good Food, which means lots of upcoming chip-related stories such as hand-cut versus frozen, a deep-dive into “chipflation”, and chefs’ favourites across Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

It also means I volunteered to write the definitive, absolute, ironclad, highly subjective ranking of every major national fast-food and takeaway brand.

A top 10 list of independent fish-and-chippers, chicken shops and burger joints is under way, but this was more pressing to get out after I overheard a teenager on the train claim that Red Rooster had the best chips. Madness.

Chips were tasted at the source across two weeks (home-delivered chips are not optimal chips) and judged according to overall taste, seasoning, texture (both inner and outer), temperature and appearance. All prices are for a regular sized serve.

Of course, the difference between a good and bad chip will also come down to form on the day, so stay out of my inbox, Hungry Jack’s fans, all six of you.

18. Pizza Hut, $4.45

At the beginning of this mission, I had Pizza Hut pegged as the dark horse for a top-three placing. Maybe the chips would be fried to order rather than wallowing under heat lamps (because how many people are ordering chips with their Hot Honey Pepperoni Lovers Stuffed Crust?) and perhaps there would be some fun Arnott’s Pizza Shape-adjacent seasoning. Nope, wrong. Pizza Hut, it turns out, oven bakes its chips, which are simultaneously burnt and undercooked. A powdery texture and negligible seasoning don’t help either.

17. Domino’s, $6

There isn’t a word in English to describe the texture of Domino’s chips. You certainly can’t call them soggy, but you can bend a long one over on itself and it won’t snap. Baked not fried, like Pizza Hut, but ranking slightly higher for tangy “pizza salt”. (Also, I might be the first person to walk into a Domino’s and order chips and nothing but chips. I had to lie and say my wife was pregnant and “craving your crinkle cuts, specifically”, so I didn’t seem totally unhinged.)

16. Betty’s Burgers, $6.50

These are a nothing chip. Bog-standard seasoning, dull texture, boring taste. I couldn’t pick them out of a line-up of chips from, say, the kiosks at Eastern Creek Speedway, Moorabbin Air Museum and AMF Bowling.

15. Red Rooster, $3.95

“Chicken salt on chips,” screams a sign in the drive-through of my local Red Rooster. “We made it a thing.” Did you, though? The owners of Mitani Chicken Salt might like a word. In any case, Red Rooster chicken salt tastes more like powdered stock cubes than the radioactive-yellow stuff – the good stuff – chained to the counter of fish and chip shops across the country. Plus, the chips could do with a longer spell in the fryer.

14. Hungry Jack’s, $3.95

For reasons unknown, Hungry Jack’s increased the thickness of its chips a few years ago, and the width now lands somewhere between McDonald’s and KFC. To quote aromatic hand-wash peddler and Greek fabulist, Aesop, “If you try to please all, you please none.”

13. Grill’d, $6.90

Almost, but not quite. The flat, wide shape is similar to a steak-cut chip, which everyone knows is the worst kind of chip after curly fries. Then you’ve got the mixed-herbed seasoning, which isn’t offensive, just silly. Is Grill’d trying to market itself as healthy by whacking some old rosemary on its chips? Mates, if you want people to think you’re healthy, maybe don’t serve chips (and burgers and tenders and onion rings).

12. Zeus Street Greek, $4.90

More silly mixed herbs. But I dig the visible salt crystals, and the chips have a super fluffy interior. Would eat again.

11. Taco Bell, $4.95

To be honest, it’s really all much of muchness around this section of the list. If you miss McDonald’s El Maco shaker fries, these are for you.

10. Guzman y Gomez, $3.70

Skin on. Zippy chipotle seasoning. Respectable crunch. I can’t imagine many people ever crave GYG chips like they do with the next entrant, but this is a solid all-rounder interpretation of the form.

9. KFC, $3.65

Here’s a phrase that’s never been said: “I love KFC chips – they’re always so crunchy!” Like, I don’t know, just fry them half a minute longer? KFC’s seasoning is flavour-enhanced like no other salt on the market, though, and if the chips weren’t so limp and undercooked so often, Colonel Harland would crack the top of this list. (NB: I’ve found that Edlyn brand chicken salt is close enough to KFC seasoning to approximate the taste with properly fried chips at home.)

8. El Jannah, $5

Everyone talks about the toum, but the real star of El Jannah (besides the charcoal chicken, pickles and competitively priced bag of bread) is the gravy. Holy fat drippings, Batman. It’s rich and smooth and warm with black pepper, and a flavour tastes more than a little like KFC’s enhanced seasoning. Anyway, we’re not here to rate gravy – this list is about chips. The ones at El Jannah are fine.

7. Oporto, $4.50

Because Portuguese-style chicken chain Ogalo hasn’t opened outside NSW, I’m limited to only ranking its rival Oporto for this national taste test. Unlike its chilli sauce, Oporto’s chips are actually well done. Satisfying crunch, addictive seasoning, contrasting textures: tick, tick, tick.

6. Nando’s, $5.95

A surprise placing. Until this taste test, the last time I set foot in a Nando’s was in 2010 on my birthday at an outpost next to Melbourne’s Forum Theatre. (To clarify, Wilco were playing and we had 10 minutes to eat before the show.) It will likely be another 16 years before I order its chicken again, but the chips are properly bronzed and seasoned with a peri-peri salt that I’m giving serious thought to buying for home use in a potato salad.

5. Schnitz, $6.90

Pretty sure these are just Edgell’s diamond-cut beer-battered chips, but I’m going to allow it. A Schnitz chip made with Tasmanian russets is consistently crunchy, and “Tom’s secret seasoning” has agreeable punch. For what it’s worth ($3.90 according to the online menu), Schnitz gravy is second only to El Jannah’s, too.

4. Chargrill Charlie’s, $8.90

This ranking is largely based on taste and texture, not value, but it should be noted that Chargrill Charlie’s regular chip serving is huge. A small bag, inside a bigger bag, overflowing with thin, hot, crisp fries. The seasoning is usually bang-on, but buyer beware: these are chips that must be eaten within minutes of leaving the fryer. Charlie’s chips will get soggy fast, such is the plight of the shoestring.

3. McDonald’s, $3.95

Look, I also wish they weren’t this high. But you can’t deny the Golden Arches knows its way around a deep-fryer, and given how many millions (billions?) of dollars have been spent to make its chips delicious (stringent potato specifications, ideal frying times, oil blend) they should probably come in at number one. When they’re good (that is, fresh and salty) they are very good indeed.

2. Gami Chicken, $7.90

I’m not sure if Gami will like being labelled “fast food”, but it serves takeaway Korean fried chicken and there are more than two dozen locations across Australia, so here it is. It also sells some of the crunchiest fries I’ve encountered, thanks to a light, golden batter that makes each chip taste like the edge of a potato scallop (or potato cake, depending on where you’re reading this). I’m talking about Gami’s standard-issue finger-thick chips, by the way, not the “sweet snowy” shoestrings, which could almost be a dessert.

1. Five Guys, $9.50

Ding, ding, ding. This is how it’s done. There are only five Five Guys in Australia, but the US-founded burger business gives such a damn about its chips, it had to be number one. Fresh – never frozen – Victorian potatoes are hand-cut, twice-fried in peanut oil, and dusted with a Cajun-style seasoning if you ask, but they don’t really need it. These crisp skin-on chips actually taste like a potato, and come scooped in a plain brown paper bag (within a larger bag) that can withstand a liberal splash of malt vinegar from the condiment station. Good work, multinational chain.