3 Most Popular Fast Food Restaurants

Zagat Survey released their review on the 3 Most Popular Fast Food Restaurants for 2011.The National Fast Food Restaurant Survey is held every year to identify which amongst many fast food chains is mostly preferred by consumers. Quick serve restaurants compete for excellence in different areas such as quality of food, value for money, service, drive-thru, and child friendliness. Served foods and drinks are also evaluated and rated by consumers according to taste, health value, and price.

Last year’s survey includes 103 food chains as voted by 6,064 customers. The survey process is a typical diner will eat in a fast food restaurant at least once every week. Using the infamous Zagat’s signature thirty-point scale, diners will rate these restaurants according to food, service, and facilities. All types of food and drinks being served will be evaluated, from breakfast meals to burgers and frozen yogurt to French fries.

And here are the results of the survey.

For the 3^rd successive years, Subway is crowned king amongst the 3 Most Popular Fast Food Restaurants. It owned the Most Popular category in addition to that; Subway also bags the Top Service and Top Healthy Option award. Customers keep coming back for their huge, mouth-filling freshly made sandwiches and their very famous, budget-friendly five dollar footlong sandwich. With the growing population on overweight and obese individuals, people are becoming more conscious of their food intake. With products being marketed as fresh and healthy, and their tag line “eat fresh”, Subway just responded to the publics crave for convenient yet healthy food.

Subway's foundation product is the submarine sandwich better known as the "Sub", a soft, long roll baguette stuffed with combination of meats, vegetables, and cheese. The restaurant chain also offers salads and wraps also baked goodies such as doughnuts, cookies, and muffins. Menu products vary between markets and countries, however in almost all branches worldwide Subway serves its signature sandwiches. These are Steak and Cheese, Italian BMT, Chicken Teriyaki, Meatball Marinara, Subway Melt, Subway Club, Chicken and Bacon Ranch, and Roasted Chicken Breast.

Ranked number two in the 3 Most Popular Fast Food Restaurants is the biggest fast food chain in terms of global presence – McDonalds. Although they ranked number two when it comes to popularity, the 72-year old hamburger joint took home honors for best tasting and best value breakfast sandwiches, value meals, French fries, child friendly restaurants, drive-thru service, and overall value.

Serving on a daily basis an estimate of twenty-six million customers in United States alone and an estimate of sixty-eight million worldwide, McDonalds truly is the first name that will come to mind when it comes to quick serve burgers and fries. Majority of its restaurant chains offer both drive-thru service and counter service. The restaurants are also designed to cater both smoking and non-smoking diners, thus it has both indoor and outdoor seating.

The station for ordering, paying, and picking-up orders of a drive-thru service is often separate. Though in most countries paying and picking-up of orders is combined one station. The drive-thru service first originated in 1975 in Arizona. Some McDonald’s restaurants also feature spacious indoor and sometimes outdoor playgrounds which makes the fast food chain child friendly. The very first PlayPlace was introduced in 1987 in United States. With positive feedback from customers, the management decided to include the ball tanks and slides with the familiar crawl-tube design in every McDonald restaurant. McDonalds is most famous because of their signature BigMac burger.

Grabbing the third spot for being the most popular fast food restaurants of 2011 is Wendy’s. Founded in 1969 by Dave Thomas, Wendy’s also holds the third spot for being the world largest quick serve burger chain with an estimate of six thousand six hundred fifty locations. Ranked first is McDonalds serving an estimate of thirty-one thousand locations and second is Burger King serving an estimate of twelve thousand locations. Their menu includes hamburgers, salads, French fries, chicken, chili, baked potatoes, and of course everyone’s favorite – the Frosty.

If McDonald is know for their BigMac and Burger King has Whopper to offer, Wendy’s is known for their square-cut burger patties which are raw and fresh not frozen, better known as the Big Classic. Health conscious diners prefer their fresh salads which you can mix according to your taste. Some restaurants have salad bars where you can choose salad ingredients and dressings.

Another customer favorite is Wendy’s pure quarter pound ground beef grilled on its own oil served on a Kaiser bun added with condiments such as lettuce, onion rings, sliced pickles, ketchup, mayonnaise, and mustard. Tasting the meat you can tell that it is lean and pure ground beef with salt or anything added on it to make it taste better. Considering taste, value for money, and health contribution, Wendy’s truly deserved to be included in the 3 Most Popular Fast Food Restaurants of 2011.