For roughly 20 years, the phrase “Chicken Chunk” has been taking up space in my brain for no good reason.
Back in high school, my friend Bryan used to walk around saying it.
Chicken Chunk.
Chicken Chunk.
I don’t remember the setup. I don’t remember asking him what he was talking about. It was just one of those dumb friend phrases that gets repeated enough times to become permanent. Then, two decades later, I walked into Charlie’s Chicken in Tulsa and finally had a suspect.
Charlie’s Chicken on Sheridan, at 6001 S. Sheridan Road near 61st and Sheridan, is one of those Oklahoma places that makes more sense once you understand where it came from. This is not a national chicken chain that happens to have an Oklahoma footprint. Charlie’s started in Muskogee, tied to Oklahoma native Charles “Charlie” Randolph, and the company still operates mostly in Oklahoma, with one Missouri location in Joplin.
So yes, Charlie’s Chicken is very much an Oklahoma thing.
And its big claim?
The Original Chicken Chunk.
What exactly is a Chicken Chunk?
Charlie’s describes a Chicken Chunk as boneless, skinless chicken breast that is hand-breaded and deep-fried. That sounds simple, but the name does a lot of work.
It is not quite a nugget. It is not exactly a tender. It is a chunk.
A Chicken Chunk.
I am beginning to understand why Bryan enjoyed saying this so much.
I stopped at the Sheridan location while running around Tulsa, and there was no way I was ordering around the thing. Charlie’s has a broader menu than I expected, with fried chicken, chicken-fried steak, steak fingers, livers and gizzards, rotisserie chicken, homestyle sides, cobblers, pies, and the sort of comfort-food lineup that feels built for someone who already knows what gravy is for.
But I had waited 20 years for the Chicken Chunk.
So that was the order, with mashed potatoes and gravy.
The plate did not need to reinvent anything
The Chicken Chunks were exactly the kind of straightforward fried comfort food I wanted them to be. Hot, breaded, easy to eat, and not trying to act fancier than the building. The mashed potatoes and gravy did their job too, which is a higher compliment than it sounds. Plenty of places can fry chicken. Not every place understands that the side plate matters.
That is probably the best way I can explain Charlie’s Chicken. It feels like fast food filtered through an Oklahoma meat-and-three restaurant.
You can get in and out quickly, but the menu still has that old-school cafeteria comfort to it. Chicken. Mashed potatoes. Gravy. Green beans. Rolls. Cobbler if you are making a decision with your whole heart and not your doctor’s voice in your head.
Nothing needed to be reinvented here.
The mystery is mostly solved
Can I prove that Bryan’s high school “Chicken Chunk” chant came from Charlie’s Chicken?
No.
Maybe he had another source. Maybe he was just ahead of his time. Maybe teenage boys are not reliable archivists of regional chicken terminology.
But Charlie’s has been serving Chicken Chunks around northeastern Oklahoma for decades, and after eating them in Tulsa, I feel pretty confident I found the origin story.
It only took about 20 years.
If you are around Tulsa, Muskogee, Broken Arrow, Tahlequah, Claremore, Sand Springs, Owasso, or one of the other Oklahoma towns with a Charlie’s, this is the order I’d start with: Chicken Chunks, mashed potatoes, gravy.
Then say it a few times and see if it sticks.
Chicken Chunk.
Chicken Chunk.
Chicken Chunk.
