You’re either on team chicken bake or you're not.

January 21, 2016 10:41 AM

Lucky Peach presents the Official Costco Food Court Power Rankings.
posted by burgerrr (63 comments total)

Heresy!
posted by blue_beetle at 10:47 AM on January 21, 2016

This is correct. You really can't go wrong with a Costco hot dog or Polish dog. Maybe change it up with a pizza slice every so often. I'm not a fan of the chicken bake, but I respect it for what it is. Everything else is pretty lousy.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:48 AM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Their pizza was the first time CostCo let me down. Those Polish things are noxious. I like their poutine, but even the world's shittiest poutine would still be pretty good in my books.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:54 AM on January 21, 2016

These rankings are limited to items found in in the Costco food court only; this will exclude other ready-to-eat items found elsewhere in the store, and hot food items found in the deli (ribs, rotisserie chicken). The scope is also limited to items found in Costcos in the United States;

There is one omission, which I feel would be significant enough to change the rankings: gelato, three scoops for $1.50
posted by FJT at 10:56 AM on January 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

In what world is a $2 slice of lousy pizza a good value? Bogus.

The $1.50 hot dog and soda is probably the best value in the US. It's a shitty hot dog -- I have maybe one or two a year, and am always reminded of this -- but you sure can't beat the price.

I've actually never had a chicken bake, but I can't imagine it's twice as good as the dog and soda.
posted by uncleozzy at 10:56 AM on January 21, 2016

We had a regular tradition of getting a polish dog with sauerkraut & soda for $1.50 at the hot dog cart outside Costco back in the 80's. I do not understand how or why the usual laws of inflation do not apply here, but I'm not complaining.
posted by designbot at 10:56 AM on January 21, 2016

Costco frites avec sauce or GTFO.
posted by Kitteh at 10:58 AM on January 21, 2016 [5 favorites]

You don't get a slice of pizza you get the whole thing.
posted by atoxyl at 11:01 AM on January 21, 2016

Do not eat the BBQ sandwich. It will sit in your guts all day, making you burp up regret.

Most of this stuff isn't very appealing. Maybe if I was a teenager. I generally breeze past the food court; after all, if I buy one of their giant rotisserie chickens hot, I can get home and eat that.
posted by emjaybee at 11:02 AM on January 21, 2016

I like the Costco combo pizza rather a lot. It's not any worse than the average chain delivery and it's $10 for a whole lot of pizza. Hard to beat the hot dog deal for a single serving though.The chicken bake (and I think they also had some other sort of bake at some point?) is pretty weird and disappointing.
posted by ghharr at 11:05 AM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Do not eat the BBQ sandwich.

Mine came in some kind of cardboard corset that held it's meaty innards in place. Once removed, all that meat and juice just causes the sandwich to become a hot mess.
posted by FJT at 11:05 AM on January 21, 2016

There are Costcos out there with frites and poutine?!

For awhile, the Costco near my mom's place had these chocolate and almond-covered gelato bars that weren't half bad, but they weren't very widely available, and at some point, they just quietly disappeared.

Honestly, though, if you have the patience to get it home, you can't beat the rotisserie chicken. The half-baked pizzas they have for take home in the refrigerated section are also pretty good, since you can make the crust extra crispy.
posted by Diagonalize at 11:07 AM on January 21, 2016

Okay if we're talking about the rotisserie chicken in the ready-to-eat/deli section, then I have to recommend the chicken noodle soup and also point out that Costco offers Hawaiian-style Poke (raw tuna or cooked shrimp mixed in seasonings).

Yes, I go to Costco way too much.
posted by FJT at 11:10 AM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

There are Costcos out there with frites and poutine?!

I can't speak for America, but yes, in Eastern Canada, there are.
posted by Kitteh at 11:10 AM on January 21, 2016

I used to have Costco Polish dogs embarrassingly often (multiple times a week, “deli” mustard only), but then doctor-ordered salt reduction happened and the Polish dogs have around 1800 mg of salt when you include the bun, so now i just walk by and remember fondly the days of super-cheap instant food.
posted by D.C. at 11:12 AM on January 21, 2016

Are the food courts franchised out? I've been a guest visitor to a couple different Costcos in Chicago, and have noticed while Costco staff are incredibly nice, the food court staff are sometimes staggeringly rude, even by Chicago standards. Nobody seems to think this is amiss.
posted by lagomorphius at 11:13 AM on January 21, 2016

"In what world is a $2 slice of lousy pizza a good value? Bogus."

It's a $2 (double) slice of pizza THAT MAGICALLY CURES HANGOVERS.

(I also really like the strawberry sundae but only when I'm splitting it 3 ways with my kids, that is waaaaaaaaay more fro-yo than I am capable of eating alone. Plus they only want the ice cream parts and I like the strawberry parts so it works out well.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:14 AM on January 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

In Canada they had a Montreal Smoked Meat sandwich for awhile. It was the most hateful thing on earth. Shitty stale ciabatta (ciabatta!) and meat like product, that may have trucked through Montreal at some point.
posted by Keith Talent at 11:15 AM on January 21, 2016

IKEA has a cheaper and better Hot Dog + Drink combo (in Canada at least).
posted by blue_beetle at 11:18 AM on January 21, 2016

One of my favorite items at Costco, when it's on sale, anyway, is the 4lb. jar of Jelly Bellys. I bought one last year and somehow have managed not to eat the whole thing yet.
posted by uncleozzy at 11:22 AM on January 21, 2016

One should probably mention, if only to lament their loss, the ice cream bars that Costco used to have at most locations. They were just a square hunk of vanilla ice cream on a stick, but when you ordered one they would unwrap it, dip it in molten chocolate, and then roll it in toasted almonds. It was the most wonderful food on earth. But I guess they weren't cost-effective or whatever.

At this point, my favorite Costco pleasure is ordering two hot dogs for lunch (yep, I'm a fat slob, sue me) and – since you get one soda cup for every hot dog you order – taking my spare soda cup, turning around, and saying to everyone in line / hanging around: "Hey – I've got a spare soda cup that I don't need. Does somebody want it?" It's weird that giving away something so tiny and inconsequential can be fun, but there you are.
posted by koeselitz at 11:23 AM on January 21, 2016 [8 favorites]

i know i added the "teamcb" tag to this but i feel compelled to clarify that i am not in fact on #teamcb and instead heavily in favor of the all-beef hot dog, particularly covered in yellow mustard and raw onion
posted by burgerrr at 11:29 AM on January 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

I have strong feeling about this but...

guys, I just learned from the article that you can get a $1,500 piece of Wagyu beef from costco.

Incentally, the hotdogs are $6 a pound, this is $136/pound. So you can either get 250 pounds of hotdogs (1000 hotdogs!) or the Wagyu at Costco.
posted by blahblahblah at 11:39 AM on January 21, 2016

If anything the chart undervalues the hot dog because, like, back in the day, my sister and I squeezed a whole other serving of value out from the hot dogs -- eat the sausage first with whatever condiments you want, then load up the empty bun with toppings. You could basically make a (super-salty, breath-pleasing) salad from the raw onions, pickles, ketchup, celery salt, mustard, and pepper from the topping bar.

If they have food samples on the floor that day, that's three courses with left-over soda for $1.50 plus gas money.
posted by joyceanmachine at 11:40 AM on January 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

you know I actually like Costco's everything slice. it may not be excellent pizza, it is at best, pedestrian pizza. but it's adequate pizza for $2, and the value of this cannot be overstated in the context of not shopping at Costco whilst hungry.

I mean I am as much of a fan of $400 Costco shopping sprees as the next guy but yeah.

n.b. consider that this is viewed through the lens of someone living in the howling wilderness of shitty pizza that is suburban metropolitan Boulder, Colorado
posted by lonefrontranger at 11:40 AM on January 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

The hot dogs are good in that very bad way. At that price point you aren't just out of ethical and sustainable territory, it is probably made out of people or something recycled. But they taste good so I order them.

On the other hand I got one of the take and bake pizzas recently, and it was disgustingly greasy and salty. That is a mistake I won't be making again.
posted by Dip Flash at 11:41 AM on January 21, 2016

Yes, Costco in Japan has amazing bulgogi bakes! As awesome as that sounds, the best part about the food courts there is that everyone lines up their carts off to the side and out of the way in neat, orderly rows.
posted by mshrike at 11:45 AM on January 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

and by "howling wilderness of shitty pizza" I mean this is a place where I can go be charged $4 at Abo's for a lukewarm, limp, doughy slice of fail and regret that only a college student stoned to the point of vibrating would consider edible.
posted by lonefrontranger at 11:46 AM on January 21, 2016

IKEA has a cheaper and better Hot Dog + Drink combo (in Canada at least).

Yeah, but if it's Ikea, then it's Meatballs. MEEEEEEAAAAAT BAAAAAAALLLLLS!!!

At Costco, seriously the ONLY thing is edge chicken balls. They're definitely three it for times better than the pizza or hot dog.
posted by happyroach at 11:55 AM on January 21, 2016

edge chicken balls

How did you get a copy of my PornHub search history?
posted by uncleozzy at 11:57 AM on January 21, 2016 [6 favorites]

Lucky Peach is a peach. I recently subscribed and opted to get a bunch of back-issues and they are amazingly interesting. Also, just last year they finally launched a website and they publish many of their great articles there as well.

The Guide to Chinese Dumplings
A Guide to Thailand’s Noodle Soups
How to Not Cry While Cutting Onions
etc
posted by misterpatrick at 11:58 AM on January 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

I'm not much of a Costco shopper, but a guy on my bowling team got 3 packs of 120 piece Slim Jims for Christmas. By the Monday after Christmas he had finished 120 of them. The rest were gone by the first week of January.
posted by slogger at 12:07 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

I feel the hot turkey sandwich is getting a bad rap here. The one I had was gosh darned delightful.
posted by Flexagon at 12:09 PM on January 21, 2016

One should probably mention, if only to lament their loss, the ice cream bars that Costco used to have at most locations.

This. They were awesome; they went away, came back for a while, have now gone away again. Too labor-intensive? Or they needed the vat-of-dipping-chocolate space for the brisket sandwich fixings.

gelato, three scoops for $1.50

Sadly, has just been discontinued at the 2 Costcos near us that had it.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:16 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

By the Monday after Christmas he had finished 120 of them. The rest were gone by the first week of January.

How? How do you eat that many Slim Jims? That's an entire day's worth of calories just from Slim Jims every day for two weeks. What does that do to your digestion? To your aroma?
posted by uncleozzy at 12:17 PM on January 21, 2016 [6 favorites]

derail, but 2nding lonefrontranger
posted by 7segment at 12:17 PM on January 21, 2016

I fucking love hot dogs of all varieties (owner of hot dog themed jewelry right here), but those Costco dogs are something special.

I used to live in a place where Costco was the closest food store within walking distance and after a long day a $5 rotisserie chicken that you tear apart and eat with your hands was sometimes just what the doctor ordered. Kind of surprised not to see that on the chart.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 12:17 PM on January 21, 2016

True story: I went to the Poutine Cup this summer, where local restaurants served up their versions of poutine, which were then voted upon by potato-stuffed diners. Fully half the people I talked to at the event asked where Costco's stand was.
posted by Kreiger at 12:21 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Costco remains one of the few places you can purchase a gallon tub of mayonnaise, a $20,000 engagement ring, and a casket all at the same time

That's some serious rule 34 potential right there.
posted by TedW at 12:22 PM on January 21, 2016 [10 favorites]

OK, no one has stepped in here to defend the chicken bake so I will proudly acknowledge I am on #teamcb -- I used to even buy the frozen chicken bakes which I would heat up at home when it was freezing, but I think that product has been discontinued. (I'll admit the food court chicken bakes were definitely better and heftier than the freezer chicken bakes).

sometimes you just want gooey dough and chicken and bacon and cheese in a wrap with a side of dressing and clogged arteries, you know?

GO CHICKEN BAKES!!!
posted by andrewesque at 12:27 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

I confess that I've never had a chicken bake, the pull of the hot dog is just too strong.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 12:29 PM on January 21, 2016

and now that I've been doing some googling I've even discovered that people have imitation chicken bake recipes! cannot wait to try making this...(since I don't actually have a Costco membership anymore)
posted by andrewesque at 12:29 PM on January 21, 2016

I disagree with the placement of the Berry Smoothie & Combo Pizza slice, but the $1.50 Hot Dog w/ Soda reigns supreme, so all is right with the world. (Polish dog, brown mustard, sauerkraut, onions. Let the softness of the bun mold around everything until it is one.)

The day that price changes is the day we know that we have lost what it means to be America.
posted by CrystalDave at 12:51 PM on January 21, 2016

I feel the hot turkey sandwich is getting a bad rap here. The one I had was gosh darned delightful.

My experience with the turkey sandwich mirror's the article writer's: Awful. I hurt my gums trying to eat that thing, the bread and cheese were so crusty from sitting under the lamp.
posted by Barry B. Palindromer at 12:52 PM on January 21, 2016

Flexagon: “I feel the hot turkey sandwich is getting a bad rap here. The one I had was gosh darned delightful.”

You must have been lucky. The thing about this is that it is highly variable. As Barry says above, they make those things and then let them sit under the heat lamps for hours. Sitting under a heat lamp may be fine for pizza, but something with tomatoes and pesto mayonnaise? Ugh. Most of the people I know who like the hot turkey sandwich won't even get one if they don't see somebody just putting it out right then, because it's not palatable otherwise.
posted by koeselitz at 1:05 PM on January 21, 2016

The $1.50 Polish and Drink combo (load that baby up with condiments, they're free!) is really just phenomenal value and also pretty dang tasty. Where else can you get an entire prepared meal at that price point? It's a no-brainer.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 1:09 PM on January 21, 2016

I was actually Team Carne Asada Bake myself, for the brief shining hour it was on the menu board of my local Costco. Think of it as a decent burrito with guacamole inside the shell of a Chicken Bake. So sorry it didn't catch on. But not as sorry as when the food court's beverage bar switched from Coca-Cola products to Pepsi.
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:30 PM on January 21, 2016 [3 favorites]

Dipflash: The hot dogs are good in that very bad way. At that price point you aren't just out of ethical and sustainable territory, it is probably made out of people or something recycled. But they taste good so I order them.

They used to be Hebrew National, which was even more amazing, now I think they're 100% beef but not sure if they're still Kosher.
posted by Carillon at 1:35 PM on January 21, 2016

I was also slightly disappointed when my local food court switched their hot dog/polish supplier from Vienna Beef to 'housebrand', but the change in quality was barely noticeable ... still, when buying a bunch'o'weiners inside the store (a semi-annual purchase), I prefer to get the Hebrew National.
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:38 PM on January 21, 2016

They used to be Hebrew National, which was even more amazing, now I think they're 100% beef but not sure if they're still Kosher.

I remember from some documentary piece that Hebrew National tried to raise the price due to the price of supplies, and Costco told them "no thanks, we'll do it ourself"
posted by ArgentCorvid at 2:15 PM on January 21, 2016

No one has mentioned the churros yet? The ones that took the edge off whilst I was still hundreds of miles away from Dsineyland with no other reasonable options? Also, they are a superior replacement for the deadly departed soft pretzel which, I recall, was one of the original items along with the hot dogs when the food court was not a court but a cart outside the warehouse.
posted by ericales at 3:14 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

> after a long day a $5 rotisserie chicken that you tear apart and eat with your hands was sometimes just what the doctor ordered. Kind of surprised not to see that on the char

It's only food from the food court (which is just a window in my Costco, what is this "court"). That's why it doesn't have the poke, either.
posted by The corpse in the library at 3:21 PM on January 21, 2016

I like to get the Costco hot dog so I have a reason to use the chopped onion dispenser (also known as The Onion Wheel in our household). Costco the only place that has these?

I secretly want my own Onion Wheel for home use.
posted by dayintoday at 3:23 PM on January 21, 2016 [6 favorites]

I'd flip the cheese and pepperoni, but I can't really argue that cheese pizza is the best value, so while I'd like to rank the pizza higher there's not much to quibble about. I haven't had their churros but I'm surprised they ranked so low.

I'm not crazy about the CB, but I've had them. Too much of a gut bomb for me.
posted by Room 641-A at 3:29 PM on January 21, 2016

Why would you pay for food at a Costco when you can get 2,000 calories worth of samples for free?
posted by randomkeystrike at 3:40 PM on January 21, 2016 [3 favorites]

I liked the (dearly departed) freezer case Chicken Bakes better than the ones from the Food Court.
posted by Megafly at 3:42 PM on January 21, 2016

I very rarely make it into Costco (I'm in Victoria BC) but when I do I'm all over the chicken strips and fries. Both very high quality. Chicken is whole breast meat.
posted by jimmythefish at 4:30 PM on January 21, 2016

I've had the hot dogs a few times at the Costco near my parents in OC--not great hot dogs, by any means, but perfectly sufficient as hot dogs go.

No one has mentioned the churros yet?

My first job was working a churros cart at Knott's Berry Farm. As a result of the trauma caused by having to clean that cart at the end of every shift (you try getting sugar out of metal crevices at 12 AM), I have since spent the last twenty-five plus years of my life sternly rejecting even the bare idea of churros. This is all a preface to observing that my mother threatened to buy me churros the last time we were at Costco, no doubt as some esoteric form of maternal revenge for a forgotten childhood transgression.
posted by thomas j wise at 4:35 PM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

Why would you pay for food at a Costco when you can get 2,000 calories worth of samples for free?

... because some of us shop during slow periods like weekday evenings at 7pm to avoid the rabid howling mobs? they don't have samples of anything out most of the times I've been there tbh.
posted by lonefrontranger at 5:33 PM on January 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

.... Oh dear God am I ever on #TeamChickenBake. I don't know what it is about them, because objectively they're maybe actually not very good? But I would eat one every single day if I let myself. Sometimes more than once a day, probably. I have even been known to have one for breakfast, because why not start your day off with an 800-calorie hand grenade of sodium, carbs, and grease? Their hot dogs are quite good and an excellent value, but I almost never end up getting one because Chicken Bake.

And I will add my voice to the chorus lamenting their discontinued ice cream bars. I'm not too proud to tell you I literally cried the day I found out they didn't have them any more, because I'd been having a shitty week and I'd decided that was the only thing that could possibly make it better, and I'd made a special trip to CostCo for that one purpose, only to be reminded that we are ultimately alone in a cruel and Godless universe. They weren't cost-effective? Yeah, I bet. They only charged $1.50 for the damn things. They could easily have doubled that price and I wouldn't have thought twice about it. But no. Bastards.

But I forgive them though, because Chicken Bake.
posted by webmutant at 6:04 PM on January 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

My kids always go for the strawberry sundae, but we ask them to make it with the chocolate ice cream rather than vanilla. If the kids are busy eating that in the cart, they're less likely to talk me into buying $50 of ice cream that won't actually fit in our freezer.

I get the churro because it's easy to eat while pushing a cart. The food court is always too packed to sit down.
posted by belladonna at 7:05 PM on January 21, 2016

The poutine from the Costco near BC Place was unironically one of the highlights of my short trip to Vancouver.

7-11 and AM-PM (occasionally??) have a deal of a 1 liter fountain soda and a 1/4 lb hot dog plus fixings for $2. The quality can vary based on how long the dogs have been on the rollers, how fresh the buns are, and the variety and freshness of the condiments, but if you run across a spot that has that shit on point it is an amazing deal.
posted by clorox at 11:12 PM on January 21, 2016

It so happens that I went to Costco today, and did so hungry. I came away with a rotisserie chicken and a box of frozen chicken bakes, among other things. I would reopen the investigation of their demise if I were you.

For the first time ever, though, the rotisserie chicken was flavorless and dry. This comes as a major blow, as Costco chicken has historically been the only brand with edible breast meat. At least they've started stocking Aussie Pies in bulk, so the trip wasn't a complete loss.
posted by darksasami at 1:36 AM on January 22, 2016