Wendy's Chili Still "Finger Licking Good"

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The line stretched out the door. The parking lot was full. And no one seemed to be avoiding the chili.

"It's still finger-licking good," said San Jose resident Jonathan Riga, 52, unable to resist the obvious in describing the most famous item on the menu at Wendy's.

It was a good day for a change at the fast-food establishment's beleaguered San Jose location, known until quite recently as Finger Central after a woman claimed to have found a finger in her bowl of chili.

Wendy's restaurants throughout the Bay Area saw a sizable jump in business Saturday following the arrest of Anna Ayala, who set off a firestorm of controversy with her now apparently dubious discovery March 22 at the Monterey Road Wendy's.

Ayala, 39, was arrested Thursday night at her home in Las Vegas and has been charged with attempted grand theft in connection with the chili incident. Police said they found no evidence to support Ayala's claim that she had found the finger in the chili. There is still no word as to where the mystery digit originated.

As the specter of food contamination began to recede, the hungry diners returned in force Saturday. Some were drawn by a sense of guilt for avoiding the place for the last month, others by the bizarre publicity surrounding the case. Still others just wanted a free Junior Frosty -- a little frozen incentive dangled by Wendy's to bring customers back.

"I didn't buy chili for a week after the incident, but as the story unfolded, I realized this woman is just trying to take Wendy's for bundles of money," said San Jose resident Sam Arlotta, 77, advancing the most popular, if unproven, theory as he ate his lunch. "I'm just glad they caught her, and I can't believe she would try to ruin these people's lives like that."

Arlotta had lots of company as customers packed the small restaurant. Many people insisted they had known all along the finger find was a hoax. But many of the same people admitted they weren't so sure, avoiding Wendy's along with everyone else at the height of the scare.

"I knew it was a scam, but then I thought, 'Why play around with fate?' " said Ray Labonte, 64, of Santa Clara. "It was almost like breaking a strike line. Why would I go in if no one else does?"

Some people turned out Saturday to catch a taste of the hype surrounding the case. Nicole Hawkins of San Jose, a fan of the forensic crime show "CSI," said the case had all the makings of a good episode. She made it a point to eat the chili just to satisfy her curiosity.

"The whole story is hysterical," said Hawkins, 35, who has been following the case closely. "When it came out, I thought it was possible, but as they investigated, it just got weirder and weirder."

The Monterey Road restaurant was just one of many throughout the Bay Area that appeared to be doing quite well. In Walnut Creek, for instance, workers ran out of vanilla Junior Frostys by 11 a.m., after which they pushed the chocolate.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/04/24/BAG02CEA211.DTL

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