Filed under: Food and Drink
Now let’s talk about cultural fusion food/settings. Not the fancy schmancy, artfully arranged thimble sized entree with drizzle of lychee infused balsamic stuff.
I mean, the good grub of the common man.
Won’t you take me to….Chicken Town?! (Break into Funky town song now…)
Following every triathalon, I develop severe fried chicken cravings. All those lost calories, all that sodium secreted away..who needs Accelerade or Gatorade when some good Southern Fried Chicken will do the trick so nicely?
Today, my sweetheart and I sat at the kitchen table handcrafting her beautiful one of a kind wedding invitations. I lamented that Louisiana Fried Chicken was closed today. They suggested "Korean fried Chicken."
Her fiance said "Ooh! That sounds good."
That did sound good.
"Where do you go for Korean Fried Chicken?" I asked,
"On Telegraph. OB Chicken Palace"
"Chicken Palace?! Palace. Are you serious?"
He looks it up on line, "actually it’s Oriental BBQ Chicken Town."
Dude, that name is so bad on so many levels it sounds made up…
Who even uses the word Oriental anymore?
What in hell is a chicken town?
Is it a BBQ or a fried establishment?
I wanna go see for myself. When mom used to work in a Chinese restaurant, I remember the owner would always fry up little drummettes when my bro and I visited. SO good.
Sweetheart recalls her folks frying up Chinese Georgia wings, "the best."
We arrive in the parking lot behind a car full of fashionable young Korean guys who come in and holler at the Laker’s game. A staff person is in the parking lot practicing his gold swing as we walk in.
This is fusion for the casual weekend evening when you wanna have a flashback to college days filled with Hite beer and Korean pop music. Iced beer steins come out with a liter plus sized plastic jug of Hite that sends me into peals of laughter. It’s like a Korean 40 on steroids. A little bowl comes out, at first I think it’s white rice…then…marshmallows? Upon inspection, they are little cubes of pickled daikon, the daikon healthy-bitter subdued with a crapload of sugar and vinegar.
The young waiter also brings shredded cabbage with thousand island dressing. Then, a small dish of tortilla chips.
I don’t think anyone’s ever served me tortillas in a Korean joint before. And these, my friends, are pretty much the extent of the vegetation portion of tonight’s meal.
I admit that I actually like chicken gizzards. Kev and sweetheart say they like ‘em too. We order stir fried gizzards but alas, they are sold out! We go with Fried Chicken regular #1, and Soy Garlic fried chicken, and a skillet combo featuring grilled onions, chicken and thick, tubular dok Poki rice noodles all drowned in both cheese and a spicy ’til your lips hurt paste. (This is the mild version we asked for.)
Chicken is perfecto. Crispy, yet moist. Cooked through, evenly breaded, delish. One of them comes with honey mustard sauce as well. We chow down happily while watching basketball, drinking Hite, giggling about the oft-corny Korean pop music while holed up in a dark Corona-bar looking booth. It’s all odd, yet it works.
We go through reams of napkins, not from fried chicken grease-but from the sinus challenging, tongue scorching sauce.
Four well fed, perhaps, OVERfed peeps con cervezas ran under 45 bucks.
I hate the name. Decor is garish. Neighborhood is not very neighborly. Menu lacks a single unpickled vegetable. To say the least of any coherent theme or reason. Our white rice never showed up. Probably totally unhealthy overall.
But I Love it!
Fried chicken, icy beer steins, speedy service, daikon/cabbage refills, and open ’til 1:00 a.m. all the time- what a great place to eat and drink as if we were back in college again…
New York Times on Korean Fried Chicken
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