White Castle (sorta) Open in Orlando

[number six]

As we wait for the World's Largest White Castle to be completed, they've opened a Ghost Kitchen which has apparently thus far been a nightmare to actually get anything from:

White Castle’s ghost kitchen near downtown Orlando has temporarily closed for orders and will re-open Thursday, but only for pickup.

The goal is to keep fans from being disappointed in the new service, which launched Tuesday and brought the chain’s famous sliders back to Florida for the first time since the 1960s. White Castle vice president Jamie Richardson said the restaurant, which does not have a dining room, sold out within a few hours Tuesday.

“The number of orders exceeded our wildest dreams, especially for a virtual kitchen,” Richardson said in an email.

Asked by the Orlando Sentinel about how robust was the response to the opening Tuesday, Richardson wrote back, “very.”

The restaurant will not be doing delivery through Uber Eats when it reopens, but plans to offer it soon, according to Richardson. Customers can order pickup starting at 10 a.m. at order.whitecastle.com.

Next time I'm in Orlando (and after the problems have been worked out) I'll give this a go as I love White Castle.

[Niloc]

I've heard there is one opening in Tampa too;

White Castle - 3810 West Neptune St, Tampa, FL 33629

No idea on the time frame for that though. It'll be interesting to see if it succeeds, Tampa seems to be the place were fast-food chains go to die.
Whataburger, most of the Sonic locations, Bojangles, Captain D's and of course Krystal went nuts expanding and then shutting down most of the new places they opened all within a few years, and they're pretty much the same thing as White Castle so...

[tufnel1530]

No way....

I lived near one in Brooklyn and totally miss the screaming diarrhea they tend to cause.

Ill be there.

[number six]

Florida sucks for fast food chains because we're in the extreme corner of the country which makes distribution reach difficult. Thus the only chains we tend to get are usually ones that originate from this part of the country or the mega-chains like Wendys or McDonalds.

For instance when I visit Oklahoma they have so many fast food options it will make your head spin but they are also center of the country so they get a splash of everything.

Having more White Castles than just Orlando makes sense because once again if you are setting up distribution there might as well try more than just the one location. Now will White Caste gain a foot hold where Krystal did not? Clearly White Castle is better and the vast majority of the state's population is Yankee transplants that miss those square little bastards.. so perhaps they have a better than average chance.

There were White Castles in Miami back in the day, my mom still speaks highly of them but why that flamed out I have no idea.

[Niloc]

It's got a chance. It's burgers, which everyone already knows, plus a small twist.

If they're opening up 1 in Orlando and 1 in Tampa, that's the smart way to go. Not 50 at once in the same city.

On the other hand, Whataburger only opened a few, had a good reputation coming in, and closed fairly quickly in Tampa.
I don't mind that one closing though, didn't seem to have anything new or different at all.

I've got to wonder if the quality of the Whatburgers in Texas is better than the ones they opened here.
Their big selling point seemed be "our burger is 1/4 lb.!" - and it's like... yeah, so what's special about that?
When I got one it tasted like mustard and onions and nothing else.

[number six]

Yeah i dont know about Whataburger, I was never impressed with them. When I'm further west I usually go for stuff like In and Out Burger or Jack-in-the-Box which I think are both pretty good versus Whataburger.

I wish we had more mexican fast food chains, there's so many good ones out west and all we have is 14 million Taco Bells and 1 Del Taco in Orlando.

[Niloc]

Yeah, I like Jack in the Box, though it's been years since I've been to the West coast. Good variety if nothing else. They used to have a really good blueberry milkshake too, though I think that's long gone.

I agree on the Mexican places. We've got the Moe's & Chipotle - but stick a damn drive-through on them. Taco John's was pretty good out West, definitely a step up from Taco Bell and they had fajitas.

[k7]

,,,which launched Tuesday and brought the chain’s famous sliders back to Florida for the first time since the 1960s.

not your quote, but not correct. there was a white castle in pompano beach in the mid 90s (commercial/dixie hwy). i'm sure that wasn't the only one...

[Clark]

Hooray for gut bombs in Florida as we grew up with them in Indy.

[JaxGator]

I haven't eaten at Krystal for years, but I do still occasionally buy the frozen white castle burgers.  I'd love for them to open one up in Jacksonville or St Augustine.

[HammysHangout ( Hammy )]

I've heard there is one opening in Tampa too;

White Castle - 3810 West Neptune St, Tampa, FL 33629

No idea on the time frame for that though. It'll be interesting to see if it succeeds, Tampa seems to be the place were fast-food chains go to die.
Whataburger, most of the Sonic locations, Bojangles, Captain D's and of course Krystal went nuts expanding and then shutting down most of the new places they opened all within a few years, and they're pretty much the same thing as White Castle so...

hmm.. I never heard of WC being inside a strip mall? aren't they usually stand along facilites?

[HammysHangout ( Hammy )]

Interesting concept of "Ghost Kitchen" .. looks like an old industrial storage building.

[tufnel1530]

I haven't eaten at Krystal for years, but I do still occasionally buy the frozen white castle burgers.  I'd love for them to open one up in Jacksonville or St Augustine.

Krystal is f-ing gross and not in a good way like White Castle.

The frozen White castle are better than Krystal.

[toastbot]

Krystal is f-ing gross and not in a good way like White Castle.

The frozen White castle are better than Krystal.

I guess I'd have to have them back to back to be able to tell the diff

I microwaved a pack of the frozen ones in the breakroom where I used to work once.

Once.

It stunk the breakroom up for the rest of the day, and my manager forbade me from ever doing it again.

They tasted ok, but yeah, after coming into the breakroom from a room where someone HADN'T microwaved a bunch of hamburgers, I could see his point. 

[JaxGator]

Yeah I'm not huge on either, but if I had to pick one it would be frozen white castle over fresh Krystal.