Joy G.

As a chick from Philly, it really grinds my gears when businesses claim to have authentic Philly style cheesesteaks. It's seriously one of my pet peeves that drives me apeshit. I can tell you with authority that there isn't a single place in Anchorage that can claim to offer an authentic cheesesteak because they don't have access to the right ingredients. That may sound like a crazy assertion regarding such a basic sandwich, and I'm not going to go into details, but trust me when I say it's a thing. And don't me started in the finer points of the technique involved in preparation. .. that's a thing too. Tirade aside, Charley's is a worldwide chain that does actually make a tasty sandwich. So I ordered and turned a blind eye to the Philly claim... and ordered a teriyaki chicken (omg... I cringe as I write that, STG I'm dying a little inside cause in Philly there is no such thing) I also ordered a lemonade and asked the dude at the register which was his favorite. He was a doll and said he'd give me a combination of the two best flavors, strawberry and peach. I also got the ultimate fries as did my other half. He also ordered some kinda bizarre steak sandwich with bacon and stuff on it that made me want to scream. ( I really have to go to my happy zen place when I talk about steak sammiches. I think I need therapy.) The weird thing is once your order comes up, they customize your sandwich the same way as Subway. You point at what you want: Banana peppers, jalapeños, mayo, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, etc... (which by the way, means your sandwich is now called a Grinder, if you want cred in Philly when ordering.) Our order came and the food was really surprisingly kinda outstanding. We should have just gotten one order of ultimate fries to split cause they're very heavy laden with artery clogging cheese, bacon and ranch. Actually, I think an order of these would have satisfied my appetite alone. However, the teriyaki chicken was so so so SO good. Generally I don't like a toasted roll, but it really helped the roll hold up to the wetness of the delicious chicken. The flavor really reminded me of the awesome teriyaki burgers I used to adore at the old Dimond Mall Burger Express. By golly I haven't been able to stop thinking about tasty that sandwich. Like, I can't wait to go back. The service was great. Good management at play here for sure. Staffed by nothing but kids, but they knew what was up, and the ship was tight. Great customer service. Food was great by fast food standards. I also liked that the sandwiches have numerous portion size options. I took 1 star away for 2 reasons. One is I just hate the Dimond food court. It's a shitty, unappealing atmosphere. 2nd and more importantly, the price of the food ran us what a nice dinner out would cost. 30 bucks for 2 people at a fast food joint is excessive. Granted we did get two crazy orders of fries and the fancy lemonades. But I winced at the total. Next time I'll just get the 5.99 sammich and drink water. But I WILL be back.