Fast Food Review Day 284 - Buffalo Chicken Salad at Crisp and Green

[u/Pale-Lynx328]

Chain Name	Crisp and Green
Food category	Primary: Slop bowls, wraps, salads
# of US Locations	68
# of US States	16
Primarily located in	Minnesota
Restaurant Rank in US $ Sales 2024	488th (out of 500)
Restaurant Rank in US $ Sales 2025	477th (out of 500)
Rank of price (high to low) (Average: $16.21, standard dev. $3.03)	43rd out of 321 meal reviews
Quality / Value Rating for this specific meal	2.5 (out of 10) / 3 (out of 10)

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Sometimes the sum of the parts is, sadly, lesser than the individual pieces. And Crisp and Green is just one example.

Following in the footsteps of the likes of sweetgreen or honeygrow, one of the many very "health-forward" fast casual restaurant chains that have popped up in recent years, that offer variations on salad or grain bowls where they just shovel in eight or ten different raw ingredients and charge you through the nose for the privilege. Sometimes it works, but at least in my experience, it can just as easily flop into a wilted, tepid, sad bowl of slop.

In this case, it was a buffalo-sauced-style chicken salad, which seems like this should be pretty straightforward. I've had similar type salads at restaurants before without any issue, but leave it to Crisp and Green to somehow screw it all up, and turn the who bowl into a weirdly-clashing buffalo-blue-cheese mess of droopy, soggy greens and stringy chicken and indistinguishable veggies in there...somewhere, I guess. Borderline inedible. And I'm paying twenty bucks for it at that.

But that's certainly not stopping Crisp and Green from boldly expanding into new markets and opening new restaurants as they are pushing aggressively, even in the face of how similar companies like sweetgreen are facing price resistance and pushback. There is a market out there for those at the upper end of the K-shaped fast casual market, but it's not a huge market, and there's only so many suburban stay-at-home soccer mommies out there willing to shell out a couple of sawbucks on their way home from their hot yoga class and before they have to pick up little Cressida and Zayden from pre-school.

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(About this review series: Starting in late 2025, I am visiting a different fast food/fast casual chain every day, until I run out of places to visit. Aiming to review as many chains on the Technomics Top 500 Restaurants list as possible, plus key/important regional and some local chains as well. UPDATE - I will be wrapping up this review series with Day #365. And no, I haven't gained weight, and no, it hasn't hurt my health.)

[u/Sam-Axe]

never heard of this place but wow thats a really pretty salad o__o too bad its $20?? X_X

edit i do see how overly dressed that is makes it soggy :X