Chick-Fil-A's Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich & Caramel Crumble Milkshake Review: There's No Going Back Now

In the past few years, Chick-fil-A has quietly been experimenting in the kitchen and sharing some of its new products in select markets to see if they have any bite. One of those is the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich, which was the first ever attempt to futz with its signature item, the Chick-fil-A Chicken Sandwich and, in the words of the company, make "an original take on an original." Another was the Butterscotch Crumble Milkshake, which morphed into the Caramel Crumble Milkshake.

In 2020, select locations in North Carolina and South Carolina were the first test markets for the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich. Initial expectations were quickly exceeded, with some customers walking away with 10 to 15 in hand. Since Salt Lake City was home to the largest consumers of Chick-fil-A's milkshakes, the company sent the then Butterscotch Crumble Milkshake to Utah for testing in 2021, which saw mixed results. 

Flash-forward to 2023 — the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich + Caramel Crumble Milkshake are now ready for their national spotlight. Did Chick-fil-A do the original Chicken Sandwich proud or do it dirty? Is the newly minted shake a creamy dream or a dessert nightmare? We headed to our local Chick-fil-A on day one to give them a try, and here is our chew and review of them...

On the surface, the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich closely resembles the usual Chick-fil-A Chicken Sandwich, with a soft buttery bun holding together a lot of fun within. What stands out immediately as being different is a yellowy-orange drool of pimento cheese sneaking out from the side. The smell of the entire sandwich is delicious, a confluence of all the flavors rolled into one — a sign of great things to come.

Sweet and tasty honey is drizzled over the chicken. Since it isn't drenched all over, the filet maintains its usual luscious crispness with each nibble.

Opening the bun reveals the pimento cheese spread, which appears more like a liquidy Big Mac sauce than the accustomed thickness that stand-alone pimento cheese would normally put on display. Chick-fil-A's pimento cheese leans heavily on a peppery flavor, thanks to its green chiles, but when tasted as a whole sandwich, it's a little bit subdued. It falls into the background when mixed together with the winning honey-tinged filet and pickled jalapeños.

The Caramel Crumble Milkshake is Chick-fil-A's seventh seasonal flavor and is here to abruptly end summer, kicking the sweet Peach flavor to the curb and jumpstarting the fall. Autumn Spice, fused with cinnamon and crunchy bits of brown sugar spice cookies, was last year's entry, and this year's new model, Caramel Crumble, in its own way feels like rolling in a giant pile of leaves.

Whipped cream and a cherry are given toppings for Chick-fil-A milkshakes, but they get in the way of the flavor it's hovering above. Once you penetrate past the fluff, the milkshake, which stays pretty thick for 20+ minutes, drowns the mouth in being overly sweet. As mentioned, this flavor began life as butterscotch and is now pegged as caramel, but the former taste seems to have carried over to this concoction regardless of what it's called. The blonde crumbles have an interesting texture, in the vein of Sugar in the Raw or perhaps tiny bits of rock candy, and can even hang around in the mouth and on teeth long after finishing the shake.

The Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich has a similar make-up to the Original Chicken Sandwich, with a juicy, seasoned, boneless chicken filet between a toasted buttery bun, but in lieu of the standard pickles, there are pickled jalapeños. The extra kicks here are the honey drizzle and a loving spoonful of pimento cheese, which is made of cheddar cheese, cream cheese, mayonnaise, green chili, and pimientos. The sandwich is 570 calories, has 28 grams of total fat, 95 milligrams of cholesterol, 1660 milligrams of sodium, 50 grams of carbohydrates, and 33 grams of protein.

The Caramel Crumble Milkshake has an overly sweet composition of Chick-fil-A's whole milk-based Icedream dessert, with butterscotch caramel flavoring, blonde crumbles, whipped cream, and naturally, a cherry on top (although the cherry is kept off when the milkshake arrives via delivery). One shake contains 690 calories, 26 grams of total fat, 95 milligrams of cholesterol, 420 milligrams of sodium, 13 grams of protein, and, wait for it... 102 grams of carbohydrates!!!!!

Both the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich and the Caramel Crumble Milkshake became available at Chick-fil-A locations nationwide starting Monday, August 28, for a limited time only. The Caramel Crunch Milkshake sticks around until November 11, or while supplies last. Both the sandwich and the shake can be ordered six days a week, as Chick-fil-A is famously closed on Sundays, and will be available on Labor Day 2023.

The Caramel Crumble Milkshake starts at just under $5 and is available from open until close, but the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich, which starts at $6.75 is only available in stores when breakfast ends and lunch begins promptly at 10:30 a.m. Hours, prices, and availability may vary by location.

Like all items at Chick-fil-A, they can be ordered in-store at the counter or via a kiosk, or at the drive-thru. The Chick-fil-A app is another option that allows for advance orders, deals, and point earnings for future free food and drinks.

All foods and drinks can be customized, to suit your needs. With the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich, the standard Chick-fil-A filet can be substituted with either the Spicy Filet or the Grilled Filet, and the buttered bun can be swapped out for one that is unbuttered, or a multigrain brioche or gluten-free bun. Add-ons include pickles, tomatoes, lettuce, bacon, Colby Jack or Pepper Jack Cheese, and all the side sauces and condiments in its cache. If one is such a fan of the pimento cheese or jalapeños, the good news is they can be ordered as individual sides. There doesn't appear to be any add-ons for the Caramel Crumble Milkshake, but the blondie cookie crumbles and caramel syrup can also be ordered up and added onto some of Chick-fil-A's other desserts.

The Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich can be ordered as a combo. A combo includes one side, like fries, salad, or soup, and a drink. For an additional charge, there is an option to select the Caramel Crumble Milkshake as your combo drink of choice.

The Caramel Crumble Milkshake's pungent sweetness can push an eater to keep sucking it up, going on a deep sugar rush, or as it begins to fill up a belly, cause a case of bloated dairy nausea. How one measures their own acceptable level of sweetness will decide if you wolf this one down or run for the hills. We fell somewhere in the middle and yet had no issues emptying the cup with the help of a straw and a spoon. As a seasonal flavor, it matches its time of the year quite well, but when the leaves start to brown in November, we'll happily be ready to move on to the next, wintery mixed-up flavor. 

As for the "original take on an original," the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken has instantly become one of the best new products Chick-fil-A has introduced in a generation. While it could have used a lot more pimento cheese spread and even a few of those crunchy pickled jalapeños (which can be ordered as extras), this new sandwich is one small step for Chick-fil-A and one giant leap for sandwich-kind. Listed as a seasonal item, we will shed a tear if and when they are removed from our menus and may have to start buying them by the dozen. With the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken in town, there's not even a reason to order the plain old regular Chicken Sandwich, which now, in comparison, seems somehow rather bland and boring.