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It’s more about the experience than the food at the two-day pop-up Los Pollos Hermanos — that infamous Albuquerque fried chicken restaurant from cult favorite show Breaking Bad and its prequel Better Call Saul. To publicize this week’s return of Better Call Saul, the restaurant — which serves on the show as a money laundering and meth-related front — is doing a tour throughout the U.S., stopping in New York City on Sunday, April 9 and Monday, April 10 only, at 243 Pearl Street.
Yesterday’s arrival was predictably met with long lines and lots of excitement (Gothamist even reported that some fans were already lining up four hours before it opened), despite the fact that it’s really more of a mini museum than an actual restaurant. The only thing on the menu is curly fries with three dipping sauces, even though the menu in the recreated space shows rancheros plates, breakfast tacos, burritos, burgers, and more. The good news is that those curly fries are free, and you’ll also walk away with a logo-ed cup of water and an “I Tried the Curly Fries” sticker, so your Instagram post will definitely look good.
Which was exactly the draw, because 1,900 people showed up on Sunday, with a 45-minute wait for fries at 10:45 a.m. on Monday (making those suckers that arrived four hours early look a little silly) and lots of social media chatter. Despite all that, the Los Angeles pop-up was “way crazier,” according to spokesperson Angie Shabilla. If New Yorkers are going to skip work, chances are it’s for a 1:05 p.m. game at Yankee Stadium over curly fries from a pop-up.
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Los Pollos Hermanos in NYC
The third stop on a tour that includes Austin and Los Angeles, the pop-up follows an earlier one — Walter’s Coffee Roastery in Bushwick in September. If you can catch Los Pollos Hermanos, it’s open here in NYC until 8 p.m. tonight. Plus, actor Michael McKean, who plays Chuck McGill on the show, is stopping by at 3:15 p.m.
