Fried chicken: almost everyone loves it, but it’s a tricky bird to master. The perfect balance of flavor, texture and juiciness is rarely achieved. This classic dish is so difficult to perfect because it requires a finessing of technique, heat, seasoning and moisture. Oil temperature, coating formulations and cooking time dramatically influence the result, potentially leading to either undercooked or overly greasy chicken when one element is out of whack. Enter unlicked fingers.
But where did this bonne bouche originate? Like many traditional dishes, fried chicken doesn’t have a single origin story. The earliest references to fried chicken are found in ancient Roman cookbooks, and across the North Sea in the land of haggis, the Scots were adept at frying chicken in fat.
However, fried chicken truly achieved legendary status in the American South, where African and Scottish influences converged to spark culinary greatness. Africans brought their mastery of seasonings, while Scottish immigrants brought their tradition of deep-frying this domesticated fowl. The result is what we now know as Southern fried chicken.
It is strange, then, that Collin County seems to lack this prized culinary exploit of the South. But that is only if you don’t count Korean influences. While fried chicken has emerged as a beloved dish worldwide, it is a culinary celebration in South Korea, where it is double-fried to boost its crispness, served with sweet and spicy sauces and enjoyed with beer. What can go wrong? We set out to answer that vexing question.
Babe's Chicken Dinner House
6475 Page St., Frisco
babeschicken.com
Babe’s Chicken Dinner House is a grub coop steeped in Frisco history. Planted out front are a 1920s-era Hart Parr Tractor and a 1940 Simms Ford Fire Truck. Babe’s clucks near the Museum of the American Railroad and the Frisco Heritage Depot. It’s also not far from the National Videogame Museum — home to the world’s largest Pong console, an ode to one of the most iconic and addictive video games ever created. But Babe’s embraces its own kitsch, with lots of chicken taxidermy, steer skulls, deer antlers and signs like “Beauty is in the Eye of the Beerholder,” even though Babe’s doesn’t do tipple. But they do serve fried chicken, bronzed parts that are crunchy, moist and flavor-forward without a preponderance of oil bleed. They supplement this with family-style sides that include a deliciously brisk yet simple iceberg lettuce-based salad, tasty green beans, creamed corn, and mashed potatoes and gravy. But other than the salad, skip the sides (which you can’t doggy bag because they’re all-you-can-eat). Save all your belly real estate for the fried chicken and keep those chicken taxidermists gainfully employed.
bb.q Chicken
8240 Preston Road, Suite 130, Plano
bbqchicken.com
At bb.q chicken, which stands for “best of the best quality,” a chalkboard displays the process by which chicken achieves “bb.q” status. The chicken is trimmed, marinated in bb.q’s secret powder for at least 12 hours, breaded and fried in olive oil in a specific order: drumsticks, followed by thighs, breasts and wings. The result is a Korean-style symphony of crunch and juices that opens with subtlety at the front of the mouth but kicks in with a hearty spice finish. It also comes with a plastic ramekin of pickled radish, an effective palate cleanser that clears the decks for the next bite. This table-service joint has a counter-service vibe with a long counter aft, wooden tables and chairs, and a faux brick wall that descends into a long banquette. Two screens in front broadcast Korean music videos, mostly young Korean women dancing, twirling and taking selfies — not with smartphones but with small digital cameras, a dash of retro-tech. Maybe they can add the beak-opening movement of the Chicken Dance to the music video rotation to enhance the vibe.
Chicken Barn Korean Style Cuisine
9292 Warren Parkway, Suite 350, Frisco
chickenbarnfrisco.com
Chicken Barn maximizes the barn motif with rough-hewn wood wall paneling, barn-rustic tables and benches, and lighting elements that are long, bored-out wooden beams with rectangular pockets for light bulbs. You can almost hear the pecking order maneuvers above the musical din. This Korean fried chicken troupe includes wings, drumsticks and tenders with a choice of flavors: Korean sweet and spicy, hot soy garlic, soy garlic, lemon pepper or buffalo. We ordered six lemon pepper wings stretched across a long platter. They’re sheathed in a light, pungently spicy coating that unleashes moist, pleasingly chewy wing meat. Prepared in small batches, Chicken Barn serves limited quantities of chicken parts daily. Once it’s sold out, it’s gone. So, watch your six and get a dozen.
Don Chicken
3320 K Ave., Plano
972.881.0300
Located inside the K-Town Food Court adjacent to H Mart, Don Chicken is a Korean counter-order outpost where you place your order and then shuffle off a few stalls to your left to pay. Once the transaction is consummated, you’re given a receipt with a number. A militantly commanding female voice announces your number over the food court PA system and orders you to pick up your food. We ordered the “crispy” soy garlic chicken wings, which were expertly fried with a layer of soy sweetness nuzzled next to a welded mass of crinkle-cut fries. You can nosh on your chicken in the food court, a mishmash of table-and-chair ensembles, or take it with you and experience the eye-popping culinary extravagance of H Mart. Here, you’ll discover tanks of live geoduck and abalone that seem to smile at you as you stare them down, imagining their prized textures and flavors unfolding in a garlic and ginger saute.
Roots Chicken Shak
7800 Windrose Ave., Plano
469.546.5961
rootschickenshak.com
Launched by celebrity chef Tiffany Derry, who cut her teeth in the much-lauded, but defunct, Dallas haunt Private Social, Roots Chicken Shak is billed as a home for “duck fat fried everything.” That includes wings, strips, chicken sandwich stuffings and fries. We ordered wings that came with a choice of sauces, which included ranch dressing, West Indies hot sauce, honey mustard and sweet ’n’ spicy BBQ. We settled on the latter. But really, sauces seem superfluous to this strain of chicken mastery. These wings are crispy, with golden skin that crackles with every bite and flesh that is spectacularly juicy and delicate. The duck fat brings a deep, luxurious flavor, elevating this to haute status. Roots Chicken Shak is a stall in Legacy Hall, a food mall with 20 locally curated culinary and craft brew vendors and events like karaoke and speed dating. Strap on your duck fat wings and add velocity to these amusements.
Jollibee
1016 Preston Road, Plano
jollibeefoods.com
Among the world’s fastest-growing restaurant chains, Manila-based Jollibee is billed as the home of Chicken Joy, a crispy fried chicken meal that can be ordered with a variety of sides. These include rice and gravy, fries, buttered corn and … spaghetti. Spaghetti? Yep, a special species of this pasta dish with a subtly sweet — rather than tangy — sauce laced with slices of hot dog: ballpark Italian. The thinking is that fried chicken’s savory crunch is a satisfying foil to the understated sweetness of the pasta, which is topped with a mesh of melted cheese shreds. They call this the perfect pairing, creating a harmonious interplay of flavors. We’re still not sure if it works, but the spicy drumstick and thigh we ordered sure were crisp and tasty, though the spice was subdued, perhaps so as not to eclipse the hot dog. Still, this distinctly Filipino culinary clash is worth a bucket-list entry.
Sal’s Nashville Hot Chicken
6205 Coit Road, Suite 352, Plano
972.212.4403
Inspired by Nashville’s hot chicken culture, Sal’s Nashville Hot Chicken serves up drumsticks and thighs with a satisfying crunch on the exterior and a lush, tender interior. They’re served with a variety of spice levels, including no heat, mild, medium, hot and extra hot, and sauces that include spicy, “Come Back” (Nashville), jalapeno ranch, honey mustard and garlic. We got ours fresh out of the fryer, calibrated to the mild level with a ramekin of “Come Back.” The chicken had a pleasingly crispy crust with a spice kick that throttled down to a slightly sweet finish. Yet, this hole-in-the-wall haunt could use a little spit polish to keep pace with the caliber of its flavors.
Seager & Sons
5864 State Highway 121, Suite 106, Plano
214.296.9300
seagerandsons.com
With dark woods and rich leather, this family restaurant has a Dallas steakhouse vibe drenched in ’70s sonic wallpaper. Think of it as disco ball comfort food. Decor includes a reel-to-reel tape deck, old radios, guitars, Fender amplifiers, a Technics receiver, a stereo components ensemble (remember those?) and stacks of vinyl records by the likes of Juice Newton, Donna Summer, Leif Garrett and Michael Jackson. Above the open kitchen are song lyric snippets from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Grateful Dead, Manfred Mann’s Earth Band and Rush: “Attention all planets of the Solar Federation, we have assumed control.” It all goes groovy with potato skins, beer nuts, fried cheese, sammies, hand-stretched pizza and … fried chicken — perhaps the best fried chicken in the County of Collin. There’s an intoxicating crunch inaugurating a seeping succulence with a briny lilt on the finish. It comes with two sauces: chipotle hot honey and “green stuff,” a parsley, cilantro, olive oil, garlic and parmesan puree. The hot honey sauce adds a bit of stinging sweet richness, but the chicken really comes alive when dragged through the green stuff. Even Leif Garrett sounds outta sight when paired with this “Seager family secret recipe.”
This article originally appeared in Local Profile magazine. Check out the issue here.
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