The One Arby's Side We'll Never Order Again

We all know the real star of the show at Arby's. They're the franchise whose commercials proudly declared "we have the meats" — Ving Rhames told us so himself, and we're certainly not going to accuse the former Marsellus Wallace of lying. But while we all have a place in our hearts for their alarmingly thick roast beef sandwiches, no fast food joint is complete without some sides. That's why we at The Takeout tasted every side available at Arby's and ranked them all from worst to best. Number one may not surprise you — who doesn't love those curly fries? But the fact that their worst side is their jalapeño poppers might catch you off guard.

Frankly, you'd assume Arby's would make great jalapeño poppers. Arby's has always been a chain that specializes in indulgent Americana: roast beef sandwiches with cheese, barbecue, curly fries, their other side offerings of mozzarella sticks and baked mac and cheese bites, and so much more. Jalapeño poppers seem like they would fit right in. (Other chains, like Wendy's and Potbelly's jalapeño popper chicken sandwiches, have tried getting in on the action.) But when we tried Arby's poppers ourselves, we were less than impressed.

Arby's jalapeño poppers, like most poppers, are stuffed with cream cheese and deep-fried. That sounds like a difficult recipe to mess up, but they managed to do it anyway, all thanks to some subpar cream cheese. "The cream cheese is a little coarse, almost grainy," we wrote. "It doesn't taste like cheese, and only barely feels like it texturally." That meant the cream cheese in these jalapeño poppers is neither particularly creamy nor particularly cheesy, leaving us with ... well, not a whole lot.

The poppers are also served with something called "Bronco Berry" sauce, which we didn't have much use for, either. Although there's nothing wrong with melding savory and sweet — these mozzarella sticks with a raspberry melba dip are proof — we were put off by this particular iteration. "The sweet and spicy jelly tastes deeply unsettling when paired with the grainy, un-cheese-like jalapeño bite." In short: just get the curly fries.