It’s been 10 months now since I moved to Santa Clarita and i’ve been enjoying exploring the city through food. Santa Clarita has a small town, suburban feel to me compared to surrounding cities so I was pleasantly surprised that a Big name restaurant was expanding to Valencia.
Big Chicken was founded by legendary basketball Hall of Famer, Shaquille O’ Neal. He wanted to honor his family heritage which is why chicken is personal to Shaq. There are no preservatives, no MSG, and you can expect BIG food, BIG flavour, and BIG fun with each item on the menu. He also hired some of the best in the food industry to craft each recipe to perfection. It took six months just to get the breading right and more than 50 gallons of milkshake mix before finding the right southern vanilla blend!
One of the ways he delivers on this promise of BIG is by using 5oz chicken breasts for their sandwiches. I loved the creativity and the personal touches around the restaurant. Most of the menu items have a personal meaning or are named after someone important to him.
Here are some of the best selling items I tried:
If you prefer to watch a video instead, check out my short reel here.
Shaq Attack – pepper jack cheese, jalapeno slaw, spicy bbq sauce
Big & Sloppy – mac & cheese, crispy fried onions, and roasted garlic bbq aioli. Can you guess who this was named after?
Big Aristotle – cheese, crispy fried onions, and sweet & smoky memphis bbq sauce
Uncle Jerome – nashville hot chicken, lettuce, mayo, pickles
Chicken Tenders – make sure you try them with different sauces. They have a self service sauce bar so you can try them all! The Shaq sauce was unsurprisingly my favorite.
Dirty Fries – cheese sauce, bacon, banana peppers, and chipotle bbq
Lucille’s Mac & Cheese – named after his mother and uses his mom’s famous M&C recipe with a Cheez-It crust. This was soooo good!
Diesel Shake – oreo cookies, southern vanilla ice cream
The Big Conductor – salted caramel, southern vanilla ice cream
Giant Cookie – this has the circumference of an NBA basketball!
Next time, i’d like to try Shaq’s personal favorite…
MDE – a simple sandwich with Shaq sauce and pickles. This is the most basic because he wanted the chicken to be the Most Dominant Ever and not what was on it.
Lastly, look for his footprints at the drink station and try Shaq’s favorite drink, Pineapple Cream Soda, before you go.
Have you tried Big Chicken?
Snacks and Slow Jams 
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