Zehnder's

The larger and slightly more old-fashioned of the two great Frankenmuth chicken houses, Zehnder's has been in business in some form since 1856. The colonial-style building seats 1,500 diners across multiple rooms; service is fast even when the place is full to capacity, which is most weekends.

The chicken dinner runs the same as at the Bavarian Inn — three pieces, sides refilled, around $25. The two restaurants together feed more than a million people a year. Zehnder's also runs a year-round bakery and gift shop.

eating out restaurant
A story
Zehnder's and the Bavarian Inn are owned by different branches of the same Zehnder family, which split in 1928 over which of two brothers should run the original hotel. The rivalry is over a century old, and the two restaurants — sitting 500 metres apart on the same street — together pull in more diners on a typical day than the entire population of the city.