Deep in the suburbs…

moblogged imageDeep in the suburbs…
We’re so STUFFED. That was surreal. Chili’s Oz is exactly the same as the US (but with slightly less crap on the walls). And YAY, we got chips with ranch!

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9 responses

  1. katie

    yummmmm yumyumyum they do good burgers

  2. Miss Helen

    Oh man! I was going to loose my chilis virginity with you. Man!

  3. Max

    Excellent! I’m a fan of the Triple Play (do they call it that there?), the Chicken Tacos (extra guac), and of course, the chips n’ salsa with a side of ranch. It’s good to know I’ll have the comforts of home, should I ever make it to Australia for a vacation. 🙂

  4. The Other Andrew

    I’m guessing this is the Chilis out in Penrith, I passed this on the way to visit some friends (lets call it an outreach) and my first thought was “That’s Max’s place!”

  5. amy

    don’t worry Helen, we will be going again…and again….and again….

  6. Kris

    Nah, Other Andrew, it was the one in Wentworthville. We stopped off there on the way to the Eastern Creek go-karts. And yeah, they had the Triple Play, Max! But no Awesome Blossom, even though you could still get the burgers that had the “strings” on top.

    I just can’t get over how weird it was being there. It was EXACTLY the same layout as the one in South Bend Indiana, down to the number of booths and the layout of the bathrooms. It only had the bare minimum of “flair” though. I seem to remember Chili’s having a lot of decoration. Maybe not to TGI Friday’s levels or anything, but they always had old signs and barbecue memorabilia, didn’t they? This one had pretty much bare walls, as if they were just moving in (or out) or something.

    Anyway, I had the Chicken Crispers along with a ton of chips and ranch… and that was pretty much my fat Pointage for the whole week, right there…

    (And Helen, we’ll definitely take you. We’ll go out to the Penrith one though so we can hit Krispy Kreme for dessert. 🙂 )

  7. Miss Helen

    Uh, I found out from Clinton who’s workmate used to work at Chilis that they pay their employees a “trainee wage” for the first 6 months and make them work insane hours that makes McDonalds look reasonable. It has made me re-rethink the way I look at american fast food chains. I don’t want to actively support that kind of thing, I’d hate for the food service economy of Australia to become like America. I’m also a little mad that we waited to go with you guys until you had saved up enough pointage, but I guess that has become reduntant with my rampant inner lefty resurfacing.

  8. Kris

    I have no doubt they do, Helen, but I don’t think that’s entirely an “American” style of running a business. Are there any Australian chains that don’t have similar practices? (Albert told me about a guy in the city who runs a chain of food places and actually had the employees agree to a lower minimum wage along with no overtime for holidays. The whole fast food industry sucks bigtime.)

    And I’m sorry we left you out! We definitely would’ve called if we were heading out your way. As it was, we just stopped off to this one for lunch on the way to the go-karts. I still need to have a proper dinner visit with margaritas and fajitas… 🙂

  9. BP

    Hey, I randomly came across this while I was looking for CHILIS online. I work at Chilis and its awesome…I’m really glad you like the food!
    The whole wage/crazy hours thing isnt really too accurate though. Yes we work odd hours (ex: 4pm – 12am) but thats a regular restaurant thing. You kinda should know what you’re getting yourself into before you apply there anyway!
    Well…yeah, Chilis just opened 85 new stores. many more to come! glad you enjoy it!