“We ran it as a special a few times, and we were planning on making it a blue plate special one day of the week or something, but people demanded it. “When we first started doing that dish we didn’t necessarily intend on it being on the regular menu,” Haigler says. The dish has gained fame at a handful of local establishments - and even Waffle House featured it as a special on New Year’s Day - but when the trend hit Charleston, it did so in an unsuspecting, dimly lit dive bar on King Street eight years ago.Įarly Bird’s version of chicken and waffles has been a big seller but was added to the menu only about three or four months ago. Regardless of where it began, you need not travel all the way to Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles in Atlanta or to Harlem for the Sunday gospel brunch at Sylvia’s Restaurant in order to get a good ol’ heapin’ helpin’ of fried, syrupy goodness. But Roscoe is originally from Harlem, so it looks like that city might deserve most of the credit. (in “Going Back to Cali”).Įarly Bird Diner’s chef/owner Dexter Haigler admits he first heard of Roscoe’s chicken and waffles from Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown, while Fuel’s chef/owner Justin Broome got wind of it in his travels out West. Roscoe’s House of Chicken & Waffles in Los Angeles has also had a hand in spreading the chicken and waffle gospel, especially since the institution’s signature dish has been famously noted by the likes of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air as well as Ludacris (in “Call Up the Homies”) and Notorious B.I.G. “And I’d like to think it was Atlanta because of Southern-fried chicken - and my Southern bias.”
“There’s definitely a point of contention where it started: Harlem or Atlanta,” Leigh-Ann Gobel, A.C.’s manager, says. Indeed, it’s a classic soul food star from the 1930s with a debatable origin story that boils down to two cities vying for the chicken and waffle crown. Of course, chicken and waffles pre-dates its appearance on A.C.’s brunch menu, as I eventually learned. Fried chicken, fluffy waffles, sticky syrup - the ingredients were simple, but the combination was sublime. Back in the day, I spent an alarming amount of time at A.C.’s Bar and Grill and was convinced that they had invented this strangely good combination. Brunch in Charleston got real about eight years ago when a big dish called chicken and waffles showed up.
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