I left a review of Kentucky Fried Chicken several years ago as it was one of my favorite fast food stops when on a road trip. I can state today however that I seldom go to KFC because it pales in comparison to Popeyes when it is available.
Popeyes was founded in Arabi, Louisiana, a suburb of New Orleans. It first opened its doors on June 12, 1972, as “Chicken on the Run”. Owner Al Copeland wanted to compete with Kentucky Fried Chicken, but his restaurant failed after several months. Copeland reopened the restaurant four days later as Popeyes Mighty Good Chicken. By 1975, the company had been renamed as Popeyes Famous Fried Chicken. Copeland started franchising his restaurant in 1976, beginning in Louisiana. The chain expanded to Canada in 1984, and opened its 500th restaurant in 1985. Unfortunately there is only one location in New Hampshire this one in Salem.
Our entire family has fallen in love with the product. The chicken is moist and very crunchy with a delicious flavor as good as many southern chicken restaurants in my opinion.
It is the chicken that brings you and although I have not had one the chicken sandwich has quite the positive reputation. Check out this ASMR to get your appetite going.
My mother grew up in a small town on the Maine coast, Eastport. We would spend many a summer vacation growing up visiting my grandmother who still lived in town. A highlight for us was the trip up to Calais, Maine on our way into Canada for the day. We would always stop at a little shop not too far from the border crossing for fresh roasted peanuts. These were always the best peanuts you could buy; salty, freshly roasted and absolutely delicious. BERNARDINO’S NUTS came to existence over 100 years ago when Luigi Bernardini emigrated from Lucca, Italy to Calais, Maine. Luigi began the legacy of deep frying extra large Virginia Redskins in vegetable oil and they quickly became a local staple. A recent trip to Maine I was disappointed that I could no longer find the shop in Calais. On returning home I did a quick google search for “Calais, Maine Peanuts” and found the web site. The founder’s great grandchildren still run the business and although no longer located in Calais still provide the same high quality product through mail order.
Sometimes when bad things happen you can turn them into experiences of a lifetime. I was relatively young when the plant I was working at as Quality Supervisor shut its doors after over 100 years of operation. I took my severance package and seeing that I was not tied down to returning at a given time I packed up the van and headed to Alaska from my home in New England. I took my elderly parents with me since they had both recently retired paying them back for all of the family trips they took us kids on when we were young. We headed north up through Vermont passing over the border to Montreal. You can click the links for more in depth posts on each attraction. In Quebec we picked up the Trans Canada Highway and headed west averaging 600 miles per day.
Into Alaska and the end of the Alaska Highway at Delta Junction and then on our way to Tok where a meal of caribou sausage and salmon chowder in a bread bowl was our welcome to the state.
Instead of repeating the route south along the Alaska Highway we took the Cassiar Highway south. We passed by Bear Glacier and made our way to the charming communities of Stewart, British Columbia and Hyder Alaska.
Badlands National Park was next on the agenda. This again was one of my mother’s favorite parks as it was a setting of many of her historical fiction novels she liked to read.
A visit to my aunt and uncle in Cohoes, New York and then home. It was good to see New England and home after many months on the road but the memories of the trip will last a life time. My parents would both pass in a few years and I was glad I could give them this trip in their final years.
