Fry Them Feet!

Kimchi, bulgogi, barbecue, bibimbap. Korea's most famous foods. I would like to add one more: fried chicken. Fried chicken is damn good in this country. I can't really explain why. It could be the batter. Probably the batter. Could also be the chickens as well. Whatever it is, it rules. However, it could also be the ubiquitous draft beer that is served with your plate of deep fried bird. It's one of those things where you think, "why doesn't America get their shit together and open up chicken and beer restaurants." How hard can it possibly be? It's two great things made even better by being together. An ice cold frosty mug of draft beer and golden deep fried chicken.

As mentioned before, I live in Suwon, South Korea. It's home to about a million folks just south of Seoul, and a shit ton of restaurants. It can be daunting in Korea because of the sky rise apartments and the flashing neon lights. I still discover things in my neighborhood that I never saw before because things look very different at night than during the day. So, I constantly rely on word of mouth to discover the jewels of Korean cooking.

A recent discovery comes from an ex co-worker and friend named Pil Young. Pil Young has already turned me onto one great restaurant which I will probably post on here at some point, and recently I met up with him to try a famous fried chicken restaurant right here in Suwon.

I met up with my man on a cold ass night at Paldalmun (팔달문) or the South Gate of Hwaseong Fortress. At the time it was the coldest night of the year until this past week when it hit a low of 9 goddamn degrees (fahrenheit). The bus ride was a bit longer than I thought, so it took me almost an hour to get to the stop where Pil Young was anxiously waiting. Luckily, the chicken joint was only a street up and a turn into a narrow crusty old street. On both corners were chicken hofs. Chicken smoke was billowing up from both sides. As we approached, I noticed that the middle aged ladies there were frying the chicken right there on the street, and then bringing the plates inside for the hungry customers. Pil Young told me that both chicken hofs were famous.

Inside was warmer, but not warm enough to take off my coat. Like many Korean restaurants, there's too many goddamn lights on, but I'm used to it by this point. The only seating was floor seating which is okay by me cuz I like to keep my ass warm on a cold day. Pil Young orders the chicken and the 500cc of beer mugs.

AHHHH. The beer tastes great. Usually Korean beer is not impressive EXCEPT in chicken hofs where you can get the draft beers. Not long after, out comes the fried chicken. Impressive. A nicely stacked plate of chicken with all the necessary parts PLUS an extra mini plate with gizzards and deep fried chicken feet. That is a first for me. I never knew they deep fried the feet in Korea, but there it was! I rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn't dreaming, but this was no dream! It was reality! A beautiful reality.

Usually the chicken feet you get in Korea is drowned in super spicy red sauce, and is quite tender. However these were much tougher, and chewier, but good. The chicken was, of course, crispy on the outside, but also nice and tender on the inside. Gobbeldy good. We ate the whole damn plate of bird, and there was a lot of bird, and we downed 2 mugs of beer.

Success! Pil Young is not wrong in his food choices. I look forward to the next time he takes me on a food hunt. God bless the man, and the tongue that the Lord built for him. And God bless fried chicken and beer!