A Lawsuit Was Sparked By This (Alleged) Unsettling Chick-Fil-A Bun Find

While we don't want to tell you what to do, you may not want to read this article while eating lunch. Why? In 2017, Ellen Manfalouti, a woman in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, sued Chick-fil-A when she allegedly found a mouse baked into the bun of her chicken sandwich, according to CBS News. Unfortunately, Manfalouti said she didn't realize the situation until she'd actually taken a bite of the sandwich.

Manfalouti's coworker had picked up lunch from a Chick-fil-A located at 2424 E. Lincoln Highway in Langhorne. As Manfalouti told The Philadelphia Inquirer at the time, "I felt something funny on the bottom of the bun. I turned it over. I said to [my coworker], 'They burned my roll really bad.'" According to the paper, her coworker said as soon as Manfalouti threw the sandwich on the table, she noticed it was a small rodent. "I could see the whiskers and the tail," she said. Manfalouti's lawyer filed a lawsuit after the franchise owner didn't respond to her complaints.

You may be wondering why we're revisiting such an unpleasant story so many years later, but we wondered what happened with the lawsuit. According to the Bucks County Courts website, the case appears to have settled in 2019.

Chick-fil-A has faced down other scandals, as have most national fast-food chains. While there was no lawsuit (as far as we know), a Redditor claimed to have once found a fried feather in their Chick-fil-A sandwich. The Redditor seemed to take it in stride, bringing it up when they photographed (and joked about) a random — and live — chicken walking past that same location's drive-thru. Then in 2023, another Redditor posted about a suspicious-looking dark spot in her Chick-fil-A chicken nugget, although the majority of the replies believed it was just normal discoloration.

In a non-food-related controversy, Chick-fil-A's then-president, Dan Cathy, was open about his opposition to same-sex marriage back in 2012. His opinion caused an uproar that included both protests from LGBTQ+ supporters and support from conservatives.

However, if you're still craving a chicken sandwich, check out our ordering tips for the best Chick-fil-A sandwich, and take heart that at least some of the most disturbing fast-food controversies turned out to be hoaxes, rumors, or as a result of honest confusion. But just to be safe, maybe check out your bun thoroughly before you take a bite.