Are you craving that warm, comforting goodness of a chicken pot pie but don’t feel like making one from scratch? I totally get it! There’s nothing quite like breaking through a flaky crust to find tender chicken, veggies, and creamy sauce waiting underneath. But where can you actually find a good chicken pot pie when dining out?
I’ve done the research and sampled many restaurant chicken pot pies to bring you this definitive guide to the best (and worst) chicken pot pies available at chain restaurants across America
Top Restaurants Serving Amazing Chicken Pot Pies
Let’s cut to the chase – here are the restaurants where you can satisfy your chicken pot pie cravings:
1. Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchen: The Undisputed Champion
Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchen has been serving made-from-scratch comfort food since 1979, and their chicken pot pie consistently ranks as the absolute best among chain restaurants.
What makes it special:
- Made fresh daily in-house
- Assembled by hand and baked to order
- Filled with roasted chicken, diced onions, peas, and carrots
- Creamy, flavorful sauce that’s perfectly seasoned
- Comes with a house salad
According to customer reviews, this pot pie “ain’t your freezer kind” as it’s packed with large chunks of chicken The crust is described as “exceptionally flaky” and many compare it to “mom’s homemade” version.
Pro tip Look for their weekday lunch special that offers the pot pie at a reduced price with the same generous portion!
2. Cracker Barrel: Homestyle Comfort
Cracker Barrel knows comfort food, and their chicken pot pie doesn’t disappoint. With more than 650 locations nationwide, you’re likely to find one nearby when pot pie cravings strike.
What’s inside:
- Slow-simmered chicken
- Carrots, onions, potatoes, celery, and peas
- Creamy sauce with herbs
- Flaky pastry crust on top
- Served with buttermilk biscuits or corn muffins
The portion is generous, with plenty of meat and vegetables. Some reviewers note it could use a bit more seasoning, but overall it delivers that classic comfort food experience you’re looking for.
3. KFC: Surprisingly Good Fast Food Option
You might not think of KFC when craving pot pie, but their personal chicken pot pies have actually reached cult status with many copycat recipes online.
What to expect:
- Made with KFC’s famous chicken (gives it unique flavor)
- Includes diced potatoes, peas, and carrots
- Covered in a savory sauce
- Baked with a flaky crust
- Reasonably priced
What’s interesting is that KFC uses their chicken from the previous day to make pot pies, ensuring quality meat instead of waste. While some find the gravy-like sauce a bit overpowering, many reviewers praise the tender chicken and buttery crust.
4. Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar
This pet-friendly chain makes everything from scratch, including their hearty chicken pot pie.
Highlights:
- Slow-roasted chicken breast
- Seasonal vegetables
- Hand-made crust
- Available to purchase frozen to bake at home
Reviewers particularly praise the filling as “creamy and super good” and many call it the “best chicken pot pie I’ve had at a restaurant.” The crust gets high marks for being flaky, moist, and rich.
5. Metro Diner
Featured on Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” Metro Diner offers a chicken pot pie with a unique twist – it’s topped with a homemade biscuit crust instead of traditional pastry.
What’s inside:
- Tender chicken
- Carrots, celery, and corn
- Creamy sauce
- Biscuit-style crust on top
Some customers call it the “best chicken pot pie ever” while others prefer a more traditional pastry crust. The dish is certainly distinctive and worth trying if you’re looking for a different take on the classic.
6. Claim Jumper Steakhouse & Bar
In business since 1977, Claim Jumper’s pot pie recipe hasn’t changed since they opened.
What they offer:
- Carrots, onions, mushrooms, and peas
- Creamy herb sauce
- House-made flaky pie crust
- Served with fresh fruit
This pot pie is so popular that some reviewers mention it’s often sold out. While most customers love it, a few have found it too salty or the filling too dry.
7. Marie Callender’s Restaurant & Bakery
Known for their pies, Marie Callender’s offers a Heartland Chicken Pot Pie made with chunks of chicken, seasonings, and vegetables topped with a hand-pressed crust.
Worth noting: Reviews are mixed, with some customers preferring their frozen varieties to the restaurant version. Quality seems to vary by location.
Restaurants With Chicken Pot Pie Soup (Alternative Options)
If you’re looking for the flavors of chicken pot pie in soup form, these restaurants have you covered:
1. Jason’s Deli: Chicken Pot Pie Soup
Jason’s Deli serves a chicken pot pie soup that many customers love. It contains chicken, red potatoes, carrots, celery, green peas, and spices in a creamy sauce, topped with puff pastry.
Reviewers describe it as “so flavorful” with “super buttery” puff pastry. One reviewer said it was “like eating a chicken pot pie without the crust.”
2. Potbelly Sandwich Shop: Chicken Pot Pie Soup
Potbelly’s unique take features slow-roasted chicken breast and vegetables topped with crumbles of fresh-baked pie crust.
While some customers enjoy the “thick and creamy” soup, others feel it lacks enough seasoning and has a one-dimensional consistency because everything is so tender.
Disappointing Chicken Pot Pies to Avoid
Not all restaurant pot pies are created equal. Based on customer reviews, you might want to skip these options:
Boston Market’s Chicken Pot Pie
Despite being known for rotisserie chicken, Boston Market’s pot pie receives consistently poor reviews. Customers complain about:
- Bland, milk-like sauce with no flavor
- Tough, cakey crust
- No bottom crust
- Unusual inclusion of green beans
One reviewer gave it a 6/10 rating, noting that while the chicken was juicy and vegetables seemed fresh, the sauce had “no flavor” and tasted like milk.
What Makes a Great Restaurant Chicken Pot Pie?
After analyzing dozens of reviews and tasting many pot pies myself, I’ve identified what makes a restaurant chicken pot pie worth ordering:
- Fresh ingredients: No frozen or processed components
- Flavorful filling: Well-seasoned gravy that’s not too thick or thin
- Tender chicken: Moist, not chewy or dry
- Properly cooked vegetables: Soft but not mushy
- Flaky, buttery crust: Golden brown with some crispness
- Made to order: Baked fresh, not reheated
My Personal Recommendations
If I’m craving chicken pot pie and don’t have time to make it at home, Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchen is my go-to choice. The combination of fresh ingredients, generous portions, and that made-from-scratch quality is unbeatable.
For a quick option, KFC’s pot pie is surprisingly satisfying. And if I’m in the mood for something a little different, Jason’s Deli’s pot pie soup with those buttery puff pastry bits hits the spot.
When is Pot Pie Season?
While you can enjoy a pot pie year-round, there’s something special about digging into this comfort food during the fall and winter months. Most restaurants offer chicken pot pie as a permanent menu item, but some may feature it as a seasonal special during colder weather.
Final Thoughts
There’s nothing quite like breaking through a flaky crust to discover a steaming hot, creamy filling of chicken and vegetables. While homemade pot pie might still reign supreme, these restaurant options can definitely satisfy your comfort food cravings.
Next time you’re wondering “what restaurants have chicken pot pie?”, remember this list and head to one of the top-rated spots for your fix of this classic American comfort food.
Have you tried any of these restaurant pot pies? Which one is your favorite? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!
Worst: Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchen
Across YouTube, youll find many different appearances of Cheddars Scratch Kitchen representatives going to various cooking shows (mostly on local news channels across the country) and teaching viewers about its chicken pot pie. While all publicity is good publicity, if you have a keen eye, these cooking demos may just turn you off from the dish. If the pile of cubed rather than shredded chicken didnt do it, perhaps the overly gooey filling would.
Rather than a more enclosed pot pie, this version has filling inside of a bowl with a pastry cooked over the top. Its really just glorified soup. The cream sauce looks decadent, and the veggies look perfectly softened for the occasion, but it reminds us more of a soup than anything else. So, why this issue? The food needs to be what it promises to be. That is, if its a soup, be a soup. If its a pie, it just needs to be a pie. Otherwise, in a restaurant like Cheddars, which promises to be all homemade, it ends up feeling like corners were cut. Understandably, the goal is to get food out in a timely manner, but surely we can do better than a pie that is actually just soup with a hat.
Best: Hash House a Go Go
If youve been to Hash House a Go Go, theres a good chance you remember a very key part of the experience: The portions are absolutely huge. In general, weve found that one regular-size meal could easily be shared between two adults, and you might still have leftovers for the following day. Chicken pot pie offered here is much the same. Youll find it on the menu called the “Big O Chicken Pot Pie,” and like everything else, its large.
Like many other menu items at Hash House a Go Go, the plating of the meal is what makes it extra special. While we arent a big fan of pot pies that do not deliver on promises, at Hash House a Go Go, when you order, you know its going to be a little bit different, so the change feels more intentional. Rather than being encapsulated in the crust, with this pot pie, the crust will set a little off to the side of the filling. That crust is really more of a pastry that youll be able to break off and eat with your pot pie filling. Unlike other pot pies, its not as runny, but instead has more of a casserole-like filling. One thing is for sure: The veggies are ultra bright and generous, as is the chicken.
We love local diners, and thats what Metro Diner promises to be. Even still, this once truly local diner (starting as one location in Jacksonville, Florida) is now a chain with locations in many parts of the country, though a majority of them are in Florida.
Metro Diner has a robust menu, full of tempting brunch favorites. The chicken pot pie is among the many lunch and dinner options in a menu stuffed with classic American meals. Like other pot pies among the worst, this is not a classic pot pie. One Reddit user discounts this type of pot pie: “Remember: If it doesnt have crust on the bottom, it aint a chicken pot pie. Its chicken stew with a hat and delusions of grandeur.” Thats whats happening with Metro Diners pot pie, but the problems here go even deeper. In fact, while some reviewers say they enjoyed it, there were also several complaints that it needs more veggies.
Jasons Deli is a sandwich shop with many locations. Youll find a menu full of sandwiches, salads, pastas, and huge baked potatoes. Theres also a selection of soups, and thats where youll find another of our picks for a great chicken pot pie.
Now, we fully recognize that this pot pie is not traditional, but what makes it better than other pot pies that are simply soups with hats is that this option is never claiming to be a pot pie entirely. Its labeled as a soup, under the soup section on the menu. Its a soup that calls itself a soup. Were all for honesty here. You can also ask for a puff pastry to go along with it to offer a similar flavor to a pot pie. For those who want just a flavor of the filling of pot pie soup, we love this as a choice, and with an extra puff pastry, it might just get even better. Admittedly, wed love to take this soup and pour it on top of a Plain Jane baked potato for the ultimate comfort food pile.
This one hurts a bit, but P.J. Clarkes is a great example of the sheer fact that you dont have to be great at everything. P.J. Clarkes has all the old-time vibes, a heavy dash of history, and great drinks. The chicken pot pie, though, isnt so great.
On the menu, its listed as the Country Chicken Pot Pie with a cheddar cheese crust. Sounds promising, right? In a subreddit dedicated to New York City, users shared their distaste for P.J. Clarkes chicken pot pie. One reviewer, responding to a question for the best pot pie in the city wrote, “NOT PJ Clarkes, I had it 4ish years ago and it sucked. Decided to give it another try this year, and it was still just as bland and unseasoned as I remembered, plus it was cold.” Another user seconded this review, “Can confirm. PJ Clarkes pot pie is awful.”
Granted, some will say otherwise. We saw several other reviews of diners praising the pot pie, but what ultimately pushes this one over the edge is the crust cap. By now, you know how we feel about a crust hat.
We love restaurants that pay homage to tradition, and Lazy Dog does just that. Using the collected knowledge of its founding family, Lazy Dog brings meals through items full of ingredients sourced from familiar sources. Just looking at the chicken pot pie, its easy to see why diners love this one.
Lazy Dog, like most restaurants, offers take-away choices or in-diner seating, but it also has frozen TV dinners. Instead of relying on frozen chicken pot pie brands from your local grocery store, you could opt for Lazy Dogs very own frozen pot pie.
This chicken pot pie is so beloved that when the chain posts a video or photo of it on social media platforms, the comment section is a mixture of “yummy” type responses and requests to have the chain bring a location closer to home. Beverly Benton Collard seems to summarize the general consensus, writing, “This is absolutely the BEST! Each time I order it, my mouth is so grateful! (And, my tummy is comforted, full & happy. Yummy!!)” she goes on to make a second comment to drive the point home: “(Oh…..this is the chicken pot pie! Get it!! Get two! One to eat @ dinner & one to take home for dinner tomorrow!!).”
Its painful to watch once-enjoyable restaurants fall. Boston Market is certainly one of those places. For many years, it was a go-to pie pickup spot, but then, these restaurants started disappearing, and the restaurant seemed to fall apart. Take, for instance, a post Boston Market made to social media with a couple of photos of pot pies and a caption celebrating “that first bite feeling.” Curiously, however, these are not the pot pies served in restaurants, which Amber Marie Regan points out, “Thats not how the pot pies look. No bottom crust, only top. Ive made hundreds when I worked for them in Michigan.” Shes right. The other photos of Boston Markets in-store pot pies have only a topper.
While the not-whole-crust situation automatically hurts Boston Markets overall chances of being a quality pot pie, customer photos show just how bad these can get. Jennifer Small shared a photo on Facebook where the chains pot pie looks nothing like it should. The chunks of chicken are huge, there are minimal pieces of veggies, and the filling isnt really there. To top it all off, the crust top is peeled off like a giant cracker. Hopefully, this isnt common, but it sure doesnt do much for the public opinion of Boston Markets pot pie.
When you do a search for Potbellys Chicken Pot Pie, as we did, you discover that several recipes are floating about for copycat versions of Potbellys Chicken Pot Pie Soup. Imitation may very well be the best compliment, but copycats all but promise a homerun, and in the case of Potbelly, that seems to be the case.
Over on X, the love for Potbellys Chicken Pot Pie Soup is real, with @swiftlydelicat writing “I forgot how much I love Potbelly Chicken Pot Pie Soup. Literally the best” and @LoriAHiggins celebrated with “Potbelly chicken pot pie soup is back for the cold weather season and Im a very happy person.” Really, were just excited that, like Jasons Deli, this is a soup that knows its a soup, so the brand calls it a soup. People love this one, and Potbelly is totally buying into its own deliciousness, proudly proclaiming, “#ICYMI: We literally hand-crumble warm fresh-baked pie crust into our chicken pot pie soup. Serious business.”
Its a tale as old as time: A neighborhood cafe sells chicken pot pies and brings all the flavors of home. Mimis Cafe follows this same course across 12 states and 42 locations, with a menu that is nothing short of expansive. As weve seen, however, this often results in less-than-stellar individual items, and the chicken pot pie at Mimis leaves a lot to be desired.
It seems Mimis Cafe falls victim to the same pastry-over-filling issue weve seen time and time again. As a comment to a Facebook post sharing a chicken pot pie from Mimis Cafe, Linda Lindley commented, “If it really looked like that, it would be great, but I was in there three days ago and had a piece of plain dough lying on the top that had been stuck under a broiler and had a few brown spots in it.” Her review definitely isnt going to inspire anyone to order this supposed comfort food that is actually a bowl of filling with a pastry beret.
What Most People Get Wrong About Chicken Pot Pie
FAQ
What fast food restaurants have chicken pot pie?
While traditional chicken pot pies are not a staple of fast food, you can find versions at some fast-casual and restaurant chains like KFC and Mimi’s Cafe, or opt for a frozen option from brands such as Marie Callender’s and Stouffer’s, or a chicken pot pie-flavored soup from places like Jason’s Deli.
Does Cracker Barrel serve chicken pot pie every day?
Cracker Barrel Old Country Store® today announced it will welcome fall with new menu additions and limited-time seasonal items, including offering a classic comfort-food staple – Chicken Pot Pie – everyday.
Does KFC make chicken pot pie?
Yes, KFC offers chicken pot pies that feature KFC’s fried chicken with diced potatoes, peas, and carrots in a savory sauce, all encased in a flaky crust. The pot pie has been on their menu for many years and is available year-round at participating locations and through www.kfc.com and the KFC mobile app.