Telegraph Road, in Wayne County at least, is a lot like 8 Mile Road, only Telegraph runs north and south, is less funky, has fewer strip clubs and hasn’t been featured in a movie starring Eminem.
But, like 8 Mile, Telegraph is busy, wide, has a great number of auto-related businesses, sketchy motels, bars, party stores and fast food. Lots of fast food.
So how do you attract attention if you are a new fast food restaurant on Telegraph?
You give yourself an unusual name, serve only four items, keep it cheap and make sure your food is as natural as all get-out. And play techno music.
That’s the plan at Moo Cluck Moo.
Yes, Moo Cluck Moo. That’s the name of a recently opened fast-food carry-out joint sandwiched between a tattoo parlor and a transmission shop on Telegraph in Dearborn Heights, just south of Joy Road.
Even the typography on the restaurant’s sign is different. Simple. Eye-catching. And the name is in parentheses.
The menu can be summed up in one paragraph: hamburgers, a fried-chicken sandwich, twice-fried French fries, hand-dipped milkshakes and healthy pop.
The owners insist the meat and dairy at Moo Cluck Moo is hormone-free and never frozen. The chicken is free-range. The buns, baked in-house, are fortified with protein, minerals and vitamins.
You don’t have to be a food scientist to know the burger and chicken are delicious. I haven’t had a fast-food burger in 27 years. The last one, from an Oakland County Burger King, is memorable because I felt like I was pregnant after I ate it and it gave me a three-day stomach ache.
But the one I ate at Moo Cluck Moo was juicy, tender and good-looking. The intriguing bun alone was worth the $3. And at this writing, four hours after eating, my stomach feels great.
I also had a chicken sandwich at an earlier visit. The chicken was almost startling in its softness. It made me question all the other allegedly free-range chicken I have been eating. And the buttermilk-dipped glaze and spicy slaw was so good that, like the hamburger bun, it was worth having without the chicken.
I liked the garlic fries, with sea salt, so much that I put aside half the container to share with my work colleagues, who are fond of fast food. But I started dipping into them as I entered the Jeffries Freeway at Telegraph on my way downtown. By I-94, they were gone.
You know America is changing its eating habits when a place like Moo Cluck Moo opens on Telegraph Road. You can even buy Moo-Cluck-Moo hats and T-shirts, and, who knows? Someday they could might become iconic if Moo Cluck Moo becomes the McDonald’s of the 21st Century. I’m rooting for them.
Moo-Cluck-Moo-wear is not the only innovation. MCM also will donate to your favorite charity until May 31.
The guy in front of me in line left a dollar for the woman at the counter.
“We don’t accept tips,” she said.
“Why?” he asked.
“We’re taken care of. Just keep coming back so we can keep our jobs.’
Noted.
Moo Cluck Moo, 8609 N. Telegraph, Dearborn Heights, south of Joy. 313-562-9999. Moocluckmoo.com. Hours: “11ish-8ish.” Carry-out only, though there are three small, round tables.
