BonChon Chicken
 |  |
While looking for somewhere different to try in New York I asked for tips for Korean places and one of many suggestions was BonChon chicken. This won out over more traditional places because the chance to try fried chicken was too good to pass up and because I was hoping to get wings of a similar standard to those in Cheers Bar in Seoul.
BonChon Chicken was originally established in Bosan, South Korea in 2002. It sells itself as a fried chicken specialist and now has restaurants in 6 states in the US through franchising as well as The Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia. The US headquarters is in New York City with 5 separate locations in the area. Our chosen destination was on the corner of 51st Street and 2nd Avenue where the narrow fronted tenement had been taken over by two large inflatable American footballers and inside was dominated by large TV screens showing college football or NFL highlights depending on which way you were facing. It was difficult for us to avoid Missouri’s shock win over Georgia in Athens.
The décor is simple with white painted brick walls down each side except where the massive TV screens were in place. The back wall is dominated by wine racks and a long bar takes up half the right hand wall when looking in from the front of the room. There are four seating options in the restaurant. Low tables on the side walk outside mean you can eat and watch the 2nd Avenue world go by. The open window had higher tables with tall chairs so you still get some daylight. It’s also possible to sit at the steel-topped bar, an option I’ve taken advantage of when drinking cocktails during other visits. There is more formal seating down each side of the restaurant with red bench seats set against the wall and simple dark wooden chairs on the other side of the plain wood tables. The soundtrack during lunch was interesting in the way it veered from RnB to Pendulum to Pop to Nine Inch Nails to Natalie Imbruglia’s Torn.
BonChon Chicken was originally established in Bosan, South Korea in 2002. It sells itself as a fried chicken specialist and now has restaurants in 6 states in the US through franchising as well as The Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia. The US headquarters is in New York City with 5 separate locations in the area. Our chosen destination was on the corner of 51st Street and 2nd Avenue where the narrow fronted tenement had been taken over by two large inflatable American footballers and inside was dominated by large TV screens showing college football or NFL highlights depending on which way you were facing. It was difficult for us to avoid Missouri’s shock win over Georgia in Athens.
The décor is simple with white painted brick walls down each side except where the massive TV screens were in place. The back wall is dominated by wine racks and a long bar takes up half the right hand wall when looking in from the front of the room. There are four seating options in the restaurant. Low tables on the side walk outside mean you can eat and watch the 2nd Avenue world go by. The open window had higher tables with tall chairs so you still get some daylight. It’s also possible to sit at the steel-topped bar, an option I’ve taken advantage of when drinking cocktails during other visits. There is more formal seating down each side of the restaurant with red bench seats set against the wall and simple dark wooden chairs on the other side of the plain wood tables. The soundtrack during lunch was interesting in the way it veered from RnB to Pendulum to Pop to Nine Inch Nails to Natalie Imbruglia’s Torn.
We grabbed a tall table at the front of the restaurant and after ordering drinks (water for my son, a pint of Hite, the watery Korean beer, for me) we turned our attention to food. The first dish to arrive was a bowlful of shoestring truffle fries served with a spicy remoulade. The hint of truffle gave a subtle richness to the fries and the dip was spicy with a nice lingering heat so the whole thing disappeared pretty sharpish.
The hand wrapped fried pot stickers were excellent. The wonton wrappers had a nice crispness but it was the filling that excelled. A generous portion of tangy pork with spring onions in each dumpling meant that this was a really satisfying appetiser.
The first of the mains was chicken katsu don with poached egg, salad and rice. The crispy breaded chicken with a topping of the same remoulade was excellent. The salad with its subtle vinaigrette dressing was a nice fresh accompaniment and the rice was a good plain companion to the rest. This was my son’s order but I tried to steal as much as I could.
My main was totally focussed on fried chicken. This comes with two options, hot and spicy or soy and garlic. Also it’s possible to order wings, drumsticks or chicken strips. As it was two of us eating I went for the medium wings and drumstick combo (10 wings & 6 drumsticks) and split the sauces so half were hot and spicy and half came as soy and garlic. The chicken was nice and crisp with good tender meat inside. My preference were the hot and spicy where the heat lingered for a while but tastewise I got a hit of chilli in addition to the chicken but not much else. My son preferred the soy and garlic and they were nice enough but lack a certain oomph for me. The chicken was really good but I suppose I’d built up my expectations too much regarding the sauces. Certainly, they did not match my memory of Cheers. The bowl of pickled daikon was good though.
This was a very pleasant lunch and BonChon chicken became another addition to the list of places I’d recommend to others. I wouldn’t view it as a destination restaurant but it’s the type of place that you would love to have as a local resource. I hope they consider expanding to Upstate New York in the near future.
Overall rating – 3.5/5
Overall rating – 3.5/5
