Photos by Sarah Mayo

Enter Champy’s World Famous Fried Chicken, the large restaurant on Broad Street right at the corner of Clark Boulevard, where the sweet sounds of the blues hit your ears as the aroma of fried chicken reaches your nose.

Mississippi Delta culture is the theme at Champy’s, where photos and album covers of legendary blues artists line the walls while patrons dine on tamales and more.

Evidently, many cooks—at restaurants and at homes—in Mississippi take great pride in their tamales. If you didn’t know this was a thing, or if you have not yet dined upon the fabulous tamale, give them a try. A plate of three can be obtained at Champy’s for $5.99. Each of these tamales contains ground beef wrapped in corn meal, seasoned with peppers and wrapped in a corn husk and tied with string to cook. The diner unwraps each one to discover a nice little gift inside—a spicy, beefy, doughy, delicious, flavorful and filling tamale. Try a bite with a little slaw and cracker for the full experience.

While the tamales are popular and delicious selections at Champy’s, the sign proclaims “World Famous Fried Chicken.”

Champy’s has chicken and does it right—chicken breasts, chicken wings, chicken tenders, chicken livers, chicken hunks, chicken legs, grilled chicken salad and more.

The Champy’s team cooks this chicken beautifully. The chicken pieces have a very crispy, thin and salty breading and are just greasy enough.

“This the best fried chicken in Murfreesboro!” Kelly Jackson Farley said after a meal at Champy’s. “They have a great sausage/cheese/pickle plate as well. One thing I can say about Champy’s, that I can’t say about every restaurant in Murfreesboro, is that the food always comes to your table hot.”

Many diners rave about the catfish, and Champy’s also offers shrimp, gumbo, a handful of (primarily deep-fried) appetizer selections and a dessert menu including key lime pie, banana pudding, strawberry cake and Mississippi mud pie.

Jeff Jansen said he recently ate at Champy’s two nights in a row.

“The two-piece white meat plate was awesome. Mashed potatoes to die for with extra brown gravy,” he said. The second visit he went with tamales and smoked wings in buffalo sauce. “Amazing tamales,” Jansen said.

Champy’s is a small chain, currently with eight locations in Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia, and the Murfreesboro location is independently owned by two husband-and-wife teams, who opened the location in 2017.

The parent company does allow for a little menu flexibility at each location, according to Rachael Goonan, one of the owners, along with her husband, T.J., his sister, Samantha, and Samantha’s husband, Jonathan Newson.

“The gumbo is my husband’s recipe,” Rachael said. “The banana pudding is mine.”

She points out that all of the chicken is cooked to order (so keep that in mind if you order a chicken breast, as they take a little while to cook), and all ingredients are freshly prepared. In fact the establishment doesn’t even have a freezer.

“The chicken tender basket is popular with kids and adults,” Goonan continues, and adds that a big key to both the peppery, tender, tasty green beans and the sweet and salty baked beans is to let ’em rest a day or so after first cooking them to properly unleash all of the flavors.

Happy hour specials are available from 3–6 p.m. on weekdays, and Champy’s offers $3.50 mimosas and $5 bloody marys on Saturdays and Sundays. Champy’s features crawfish when in season (which just ended in early June), and many in Murfreesboro seem to enjoy a good crawfish boil, although the chicken is the year-round star at Champy’s.

“Best chicken strips ever,” said Naida Pearson Owczarzak, who also enjoyed the catfish.

“Chicken was awesome. Check out the hot sauce selection,” Chris Blake advises. “We will be back, fed a family of six for under $50.”

The Champy’s value is what Michael Lewis calls a good “bang for your cluck!” as he posted in an online review.

One of the complaints heard about Champy’s is the use of polystyrene plates and plastic cutlery. Foam dishware can melt and it’s not always easy to cut food with plastic knives and forks, but go sit on the patio or by the large open doors and it feels like a picnic.

Almost all restaurants can have some issues with training new servers, and some report that sometimes there can be service issues at Champy’s, but most all comments on the service are very positive.

Others say the menu is a little limited, and really if you don’t want chicken or tamales, you may want to find somewhere else to go, but the adventurous at Champy’s can try fried green tomatoes or chicken livers or perhaps some gumbo.

Or, explore the hot sauce selection.

Grady Allen Rutledge called the tamales and fried chicken “top notch.”

“The gumbo is as good as or better than anybody’s,” Rutledge reported, stating that he will return and send others.

Do you want to try some tamales? Did you grow up on fried chicken? For a good outdoor dining experience on the patio, and for the fast and fresh lunch menu, 40-ounce beers ($7 apiece, “forties and fowl,” as they say), or 50-cent chicken hunks on Tuesdays and Thursdays, visit the Murfreesboro location of Champy’s.

Champy’s World Famous Fried Chicken
1290 NW Broad St.
10:30 a.m.–10 p.m. every day
6 Mississippi Delta Hot Tamales: $10.99; Single catfish or chicken tender: $2.75; Half-chicken plate (4-piece fried chicken with baked beans and slaw): $11.95; Chicken finger basket: $9.95; Bowl of chicken, sausage and shrimp gumbo: $6; Fried green tomatoes: $9.50
615-225-8040
champyschicken.com