1948 North Tustin St.
Orange, CA 92865
I feel that since the pandemic started I've written about 38 chicken sandwiches. It's of course not that many, but it's not that far off. My theory is that people want to feel comforted with all that's going on in the world. Just like the bacon craze that swept the land back in the early part of this century, fried chicken is here now to help make people feel good.
When I let my parents know where we were going to be meeting for an early dinner on a recent Saturday, I had to repeat the name many times before they got it. Holdaak, which means madly in love in Korean, is the feeling that the people behind this restaurant have when they are preparing their fried chicken, whether it be in sandwiches, as strips, wings, or even a salad, as you'll see with my dad's meal.
The madly in love feel about their chicken must be spreading quickly, because they now have four, soon to be five locations in operation. Fullerton opened first four years ago, and next came this one in Orange, then Highland Park and Northridge followed, and next up will be one in the City of Commerce. A pretty quick expansion is in the works, which will be interesting to see how it all works out for them.
As I mentioned earlier, their simple and to-the-point menu is made up of strips, sandwiches, a salad, wings, and sides. Sandwiches come either original or spicy, strips come with either 3 or five pieces, and they have three flavors of wings; regular, spicy, and caramel soy. Almost everything on their menu is under the $10 mark, with the exception being the 12, 18, and 24 piece wings.
Ordering is done at the counter, and your number is called out to pick up your order. The wait time between ordering and when our food was ready was not more than five minutes. We took a seat at one of their tables in their sparsely decorated dining area. Let's see if we fall madly in love with all things Holdaak.
I'm not sure what got into my dad this evening, but he selected the Fried Chicken Salad ($9.50) as his meal. Not that there's anything wrong with it, but it was definitely out of character for him. This deceptively large salad came with fresh greens, cut-up fried chicken, corn, hard-boiled egg, pickled onion, and baby tomatoes. It was dressed with ranch dressing, but he got an extra one. He was pretty excited about this salad. It was a good value and he liked the contrast between crunchy fried chicken and the fresh greens. His only complaint was that they did not have blue cheese dressing, but a solid meal in his book.
Here's a look at both the 3 Piece Chicken Strips ($7.50) and the Spicy ($8.50) version. I really enjoyed these. The crunch from the breading with each bite was pleasing and the chicken underneath was moist and tender. Not a dry bite to be had. The spice level at Holdaak is not as intense as other chicken spots we have been to. It was very tolerable, even to my mom. Sauces are pretty important at chicken restaurants, and here they only have two, ranch, and their signature sauce, which is called comeback sauce. The ranch was pretty standard, while the orange-hued comeback sauce is a spicy mayo with just a mild amount of heat. I liked the consistency of it. Not too thin, but not as thick as Chick Fila sauce. Be aware that each sauce costs you fifty cents, but they are pretty good-sized, so one of each will be enough for most of us. The fries were fine, fried well, and went nicely with both of the sauces. You can't see it from the picture, and I almost didn't see it at all, but there's also some Texas toast underneath everything. I know I'm in the minority here, but I'm not a fan of Texas toast, so I optioned that off to my dad. Thanks for taking it off my hands pop.
Even though I had the three chicken strips, I definitely had to give their Spicy Chicken Sandwich ($7.95) a try while I was here. This was made up of two chicken strips, which made this a bit harder to eat, as one of them tried to escape as I had my first bite. Just like the spicy chicken strips, the heat on this was very manageable, in fact, it was definitely seasoned less than the strips that I had to start my meal. The sandwich was dressed with comeback sauce and Asian slaw made up of pickled veggies, which was a nice change of pace. Even though the toasted bun looked like it was stomped on, it held up to the insides of the sandwich the whole time.
Last but not least were the Caramel Soy Wings ($9.95). I promise there were six here, but I was a little late snapping my picture and I guess my sister was hungry. These wings were nicely fried and came coated in the sweet caramel glaze, which was not over the top sweet. It was a nice contrast to the savory chicken underneath. The wings were pretty good-sized and the chicken was tender.
I have to say that I was pretty impressed with the chicken I experienced at Holdaak. It had a different tint to it, which made it unique and stand out. The prices were very fair for the most part, but even though I was a fan of the wings, they should not be $1,65 per wing. Yes, they go down in price a bit the more that you order, but paying anywhere close to a dollar and a half per wing is a little too expensive, especially with as many wings as I can put down. I'd definitely make return visits to Holdaak, and I'm sure their expansion will provide many of you the opportunity to do the same.
Out of five bottles of laundry detergent, (because in Korea when someone moves into a new house it's common for people to gift the new homeowners with extra household supplies), five being best to zero being worst, Holdaak gets 3.5 bottles of laundry detergent.
For more information about all things Holdaak, head to their website here: https://holdaak.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment