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Is The Famed Naruto Honten Fried Chicken In Otaru Fulfill It’s Hype?
Otaru is a port city located in Hokkaido, Japan, about a 30-40 minute train ride from Sapporo, it’s a popular day trip from the biggest city in Hokkaido. Of course it has a number of outstanding restaurants to choose from. Depending on how long your stay is you may only get one or two meals here so it can certainly be a tough choice deciding on what to get!
I had seen a video on Naruto Honten and hadn’t had fried chicken up to this point on my trip so I definitely had a hankering for it. I decided to make this my meal in Otaru so I certainly had high expectations and even higher hopes (that I made the right decision lol).
Table of Contents
The Experience
I walked over to the restaurant around noon, so peak lunch time. It’s about a 10 minute walk from the famous Otaru Canal. You know the place is popular and expecting crowds when there’s a ticket machine where you pull a number with a waiting room where you can sit until your turn is called. With it being lunch time it was fairly busy, not overly so though. It took about 15 minutes or so to get my number called.
The front of Naruto Honken in Otaru There’s a lot of options to choose from on the menu. They have much more to offer than just the fried chicken they’re known for.
But I came here specifically for the fried chicken. That half-chicken combo meal was just calling my name and that’s what I went with along with a beer (1850 yen, $12.02 USD)
The Fried Chicken
The first thing you notice about the fried chicken is how crisp the skin is. Exceptionally crispy and seasoned well, it really is delicious. Digging into the meat, it’s tender and extremely juicy. With fried chicken you can sometimes run into places where the meat is a little dry, but it wasn’t the case here. The fried chicken was done perfectly and juicy throughout.
The seasoning is mild which I enjoyed. It’s not overly salty at all. For my taste preference it was perfect. The fried chicken isn’t very greasy either, another positive!
The combo meal also came with a bowl of rice, miso soup, tofu, and radish. Quite a filling meal for $12!
Is Naruto Honten worth visiting?
If you’re in the mood for fried chicken and have had your fill of sushi (which Otaru is also known for) then Naruto Honten is certainly worth the trip. It’s an iconic, well-known establishment in Otaru and the fried chicken is quite good! You get quite a bit of food for only $8.25 as well.
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Burnin’ Mouth Brings Popular Nashville Hot Chicken To Irvine Spectrum
The Background
Nashville Hot Chicken is a spicy take on fried chicken that seems to get more and more popular with new restuarants opening up every year. 10-15 years ago I can’t really recall seeing too many Nashville Hot Chicken spots in Orange County. These days there seems to be quite a few.
Burnin’ Mouth at the Irvine Spectrum is one of the more recent Nashville Hot Chicken restaurants to open up in the area.
The Experience
Once you enter the restaurant you’re greeted by a few digital menus to order off of. The touch screen itself is easy enough to navigate through and select what you want. There’s no actual human interaction. That’s fine for most people but I could see it being problematic. If people have any questions about the menu there’s only one person manning the front.
Anytime I try a Nashville Hot Chicken spot I have to go with the chicken sandwich. I feel like that’s generally the item on the menu the restuarant is going to be most known for. Burnin’ Mouth calls their chicken sandwich the Coo Coo Sando. I grabbed the combo which comes with fries, and no drink which is kind of weird ($13.90).
There’s five different spice levels to choose from ranging from the lowest (Simple) to the hottest (Insane). I love me some spicy food but places are always different with how they define “spice”. So I played it safe and went with Ugly, which is the second hottest spice level.
The food came out pretty quickly and is a fair amount of food. The sandwich is a pretty decent size. It’s packed with coleslaw, crispy onions, a few pickles, and a large piece of fried chicken coated in spices and seasonings. The entire sandwich is oozing with a thousand island type sauce. It’s a really great presentation.
The piece of chicken had a nice crunch and had some spicy kick to it. Not overbearing heat but definitely a kick that I was a little surprised by. There were parts of the chicken that were a little dry and stringy though, which did take away from the overall enjoyment.
The brioche bun was nice and fluffy, the sauce very tasty, and the different textures with the cripsy onion, coleslaw, and pickles, all adding a diffent type of crunch and flavor with each bite. Overall a pretty delicious sandwich!
The fries were crispy with cajun seasoning sprinkled over the top. Definitely quality fries.
The Verdict
Burnin’ Mouth is a solid Nashville Chicken spot if you’re craving a spicy chicken sandwich. However, I can’t say it’s a place I’d go out of my way to go and get. While it’s pretty tasty, the dry, stringy parts of the chicken stood out to me. But if you find yourself out shopping at the Irvine Spectrum, it’s a solid place to stop by for a bite.
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KOREAN FRIED CHICKEN @ Gorilla Brewing Co in Busan, South Korea
I wanted to check out some local brewed beers in Busan and found Gorilla Brewing which sounded like it had a great of variety of beers on tap, which it did. I sampled a couple of the IPA’s, which were great and also put me in the mood for some fried chicken. Fortunately, fried chicken was on the menu with a couple of seasoning choices.
Gorilla Brewing Co Menu I went with the original since I just wanted plain fried chicken without any kind of sauce.
I have to say the orginal was the perfect choice. It was fried to perfection. Not oily at all. Every bite brought a very satisfying crunch. Lightly salted but very tasty. The meat was unbelievably moist.
I’m so used to fried chicken that is dripping oil and parts of the chicken being overly tough. That definitely wasn’t the case here. Probably the most moist fried chicken I’ve ever had. Served with a dipping sauce that is slightly sweet but not overly so, with a good spicy kick to it. It complemented the chicken well. The portions were amazing as well. This was a lot of chicken to work through.
If visiting Busan and craving some local brewed beers and tasty fried chicken, Gorilla Brewing is certainly worthy of a stop!
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Savoring Las Vegas: A Foodie’s Guide to The Crack Shack
Crack Shack
The popular Southern California fried chicken sandwich staple made its way to the Las Vegas Strip back in 2019. Located in the MGM Park area, the Crack Shack provides all the familiar food items from it’s popular SoCal restaurants.
The Experience
So I have to admit, I’d never had Crack Shack and being both a Southern California native and a fried chicken lover, I really am at a loss of how I never ate here before. It took a recent trip to Vegas and a late night stroll down the strip for me to stop by and give the famous SoCal restuarant a try.
There’s a solid selection of chicken sandwiches of which to choose from at Crack Shack. I’m gonna be honest, I have no idea what kind of sando this is. Looked at the menu online since I forgot to take a picture of the menu (oops) while I was in the actual restaurant, and this ain’t on it. We’ll just call this the Generic Gary.
What matters MOST is this had a massive piece of juicy fried chicken. There’s a solid selection of sauces of which to choose from as well. I was focused on a couple of them – Baja Hot Sauce and Cracksup – to go along with my sandwich and Schmaltz Fries.
The Food
The outside coating of the fried chicken has a satisfying crunch to it that only comes with a good piece of fried chicken. Each bite of the fried chicken was moist, flavorful, and extremely tasty overall. It really is a LARGE piece of chicken. The bun was fluffy and soft and definitely had a nice fresh quality to it. I also liked the fact that it wasn’t overly “bready”. Since this was only chicken and bread essentially, a quality bun is quite important to pair with the tasty piece of fried chicken and Crack Shack delivers.
Something else that was enjoyable was the different types of sauces you can choose from. I went with the Baja Hot Sauce specifically for my chicken sandwich. Drizzling the Baja Hot Sauce onto each bite added some spice and went extremely well with the chicken. It wasn’t overly spicy, but still brought some heat, which was enjoyable. I didn’t try the other sauces with the chicken since I’m a pure spice lover and was absolutely digging the Baja Hot Sauce, so didn’t go with any other option this go around. I’ll have to try them next time…probably.
The fries were nice and crisp and tasty as well. No soggy fries here, which was quite a relief. There’s nothing worse than soggy fries, let’s be honest. Can’t really go wrong with a side of fries to accompany a nice chicken sando and these certainly hit the spot.
Is Crack Shack Worth A Visit?
Everything was freshly made here and despite the sandwich I got not having any trimmings – this was literally just chicken, bread, and sauce – was immensely satisfying for something so simple.
If you’re hungry on the Strip and craving a delicious fried chicken sandwich, Crack Shack certainly warrants a stop!
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