9 Fast Food Chains That Never Use Frozen Meat

To eat fast food is to be aware, on some level, that various compromises have been made on food quality. There are no Michelin-starred McDonald's, after all. This doesn't mean fast food is bad. Fast food is wonderful. No matter where you are in the United States of America, you can probably get a filling, relatively cheap meal very quickly. In addition to that, your meal is going to taste almost exactly the same every time. To achieve such uniformity of quality and price, corners are usually cut somewhere. As fast food customers, we accept a little mystery.

Still, it's nice to know as much about what you're eating as possible. Sure, many restaurants use frozen meat, and those places are still in business. If, however, you want to check out the spots that never freeze their meat — including some places that don't even have freezers on the premises — we've got you covered.

The chain that is perhaps the most proud of its fresh, never-frozen beef — or at least the most vocal. You can't see a Wendy's ad without being reminded of the never-frozen beef, and we'd bet anyone born before 1990 can still picture a smiling Dave Thomas when they hear that promise. On the company's website, things are a little more specific: the restaurant sources beef from farms near each store, the beef's temperature is closely monitored at all times, and only Prime or Choice grade beef is used. Whether you're ordering a Dave's Single, a Junior Bacon Cheeseburger, or some Wendy's secret menu burger, the beef at this chain is going to be of a certain quality. Wendy's is economical, too: The chili, famously, is made from cut-up burger meat.

What about the chicken? Wendy's proclaims to use "all-white meat chicken," which savvy readers will note simply means they use the less tasty sections of the bird. Not that a Spicy Chicken Sandwich or nuggets dipped in honey mustard aren't delicious, of course. Still, Wendy's chicken does not get the same star treatment as the beef. It turns out that Wendy's chicken is cooked and flash-frozen, then delivered to each store.

It feels like a chain named after its earnest, family-oriented roots should be against frozen meat on principle. Well, sometimes the world makes sense. Five Guys does use fresh beef to make its tasty, filling burgers. There's a trade-off, though: no matter which of the guys is working the grill, your burger is getting cooked all the way to well done.

While well done beef might be something of a bogeyman to the most enthusiastic carnivores, there are a few benefits to this policy. For one, when you order a burger at Five Guys, you know exactly what you're getting, no matter the location of your Five Guys. For another, cooking the burger to well done is a way to ensure that any potentially harmful bacteria in that fresh beef is good and gone before the burger reaches your plate. Is well done the only safe temperature for a burger made from fresh meat? No, but cooking to well done sure does cut down the error rate when you're making thousands of burgers per day.

Hey, speaking of freshness: all those potato bags stacked around the store aren't just for decoration. The chain cuts its fries in-house. So in addition to a fresh burger, you're getting fresh-cut fries, too.

The West Coast's answer to Shake Shack uses fresh beef. One way to prove that your fast food establishment's beef is fresh is to do what In-N-Out does: build restaurants without freezers. Hey, at In-N-Out? Burger meat can't even be frozen accidentally. Not only that, the chain delivers ground chuck from one of three patty-making facilities every day. All in all, the operation seems straightforward and intuitive: get your beef from somewhere close by, then use it all up before it goes bad. There's beauty in simplicity.

Bonus: the potatoes for the fries are even shipped directly from farms, then hand-cut in each store. That means that both your burger and your fries were probably hanging out on a farm very recently. How many other fast food restaurants can boast a full plate of such fresh food? Maybe the reason for all the long lines at this chain isn't In-N-Out's Not-So-Secret Menu and its endless customizations. Maybe people are simply excited about eating fresh food.

The East Coast's answer to In-N-Out uses fresh beef. This, as with many of the burgers on this list, feels obvious after one bite. That said, Shake Shack's standards are even higher than you think. The company is committed to animal welfare, with no added hormones or antibiotics used on the animals and no animal byproducts in the cows' feed. The same applies to pigs and chickens, and the company uses eggs sourced from cage-free hens. You don't have to be vegan or vegetarian to believe that animals deserve dignity and humane treatment. Shake Shack acting with care in that part of the food supply chain is a good thing.

Okay, so Shake Shack pays extra special attention to the beef. What about the chicken? Does Shake Shack fry and flash freeze chicken products off-site, like other places? Happily, the answer is no. If you order a chicken shack or some nuggets, you're eating chicken that has never been frozen. Not only that, it's cooked to order.

A hamburger, theoretically, is a simple thing. One reason fresh beef is so good is because the best burgers usually aren't much more than meat, cheese, sauce, and bun. Fatburger understands beauty in simplicity. The establishment is proud of the fact that it has not changed much since the 1950s. After all, according to Fatburger, the restaurant is the last great hamburger stand. Why change? If you're going to bill yourself as the last great burger stand, you'd better deliver. Thankfully, Fatburger cooks burgers and chicken from fresh. Employees hand-press each patty, ensuring uniform quality every time.

Fatburger in the U.S. is entirely concentrated in Southern California. Fatburger Canada is Canadian-owned, and boasts of using Alberta beef. There seems to be a correlation between using fresh meat and having a relatively small reach, in terms of location. If fresh beef is a concern for you and none of the restaurants on this list are close by, maybe look for a local spot.

They love beef in Texas, and Whataburger has always been aware of its customers' discerning tastes. The Texas chain has a commitment to fresh beef, dating back to its initial years as a neighborhood burger stand. Each burger is cooked to order, and Whataburger takes beef seriously as the foundational menu item. Maybe that sounds like Burger Restaurant 101, but using fresh beef in fast food takes commitment on the logistical side of things.

Whataburger has invested millions of dollars in its food supply chain. The burger joint has warehouses in San Antonio, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, and Phoenix, ensuring the kind of farm-to-table supply that you'd normally see at much trendier spots. Whataburger walks the walk on fresh beef, and the company takes care of its other ingredients, too. All of the burger accoutrements — lettuce, tomatoes, and even bacon — come from farms in North America. The cheese is made with milk from cows raised on farms in the U.S. Even the french fries began life as potatoes in a field on U.S. soil.

Chester's simply has to serve fresh chicken. When a fried chicken joint includes fried gizzards and livers on its menu, you know that place cares about chicken. Sure, buy a whole chicken and break the bird down into component parts. That's economical. Wings are great, everyone loves a drumstick, thighs are delicious, and breasts are the big piece. Boom, job done. To include livers and gizzards? That menu decision comes from a place of care. A respectful desire to use every part of the bird. It would be completely incongruous for Chester's to use frozen chicken.

There are other touches that set Chester's apart. The chain uses a proprietary marinade and hand-batters each piece of chicken that gets fried. The batter comes from an old family recipe. The shortening used to fry the chicken is Chester's own blend. In short, Chester's does everything quirky and singular that you would expect from a Mom-and-Pop chicken spot. Right down to using every piece of the bird.

The Wisconsin chain uses fresh beef, and cooks each burger to order. Culver's takes pride in burger preparation, conferring the title of grill master to the burger makers. That honorific might not require a CIA education, but it is a serious title nonetheless. Just ask anyone with a father-in-law. Grill masters at Culver's take its craft seriously. They have a rule to never flip a burger more than once, which keeps the burgers juicy. With this level of attention to detail, it would be silly to toss a frozen beef puck on the grill. 

Culver's is basically a monument to all things cow. That's fitting, for a restaurant chain born in Wisconsin. Still, the abundance of menu items derived from cattle is staggering. The flagship menu item is called the ButterBurger (don't worry, it comes with cheese). To complement your burger, you can order a side of cheese curds and a milkshake. Using frozen beef would be disrespectful to the cattle farmers whose work makes a place like Culver's possible.

Raising Cane's is a fast food chain that serves chicken fingers. Oh, and fries, coleslaw, and a special sauce. Other than that? Chicken fingers. You can ask them to give you a sandwich, but it will be a chicken finger sandwich. Given this highly specialized menu, you would hope that Raising Cane's doesn't use frozen chicken — if that were the case, why not grab a bag from the grocery store yourself? Happily, Raising Cane's does not use frozen chicken. The chicken finger spot has a company ethos of "one love," which is both a vision for workplace culture and a nod to the restaurant's singular menu. "One love" includes an vow to never use frozen chicken tenderloins.

The chain is built on a fanatical love for chicken, but that's not the only animal inspiration for Raising Cane's. If you're wondering if "Cane" is a name, well, yes. Cane was the name of founder Todd Graves' yellow lab, who was always hanging around the restaurant. What could be more comforting than eating a basket of chicken tenders at a restaurant with a smiling yellow lab for a mascot and namesake? Knowing that the restaurant is serving never-frozen chicken tenders, of course.