LOCAL Houston | The City Guide FEBRUARY 2015 | Page 20
Local February 2015 final.qxp_002houston 1/26/15 1:57 PM Page 20
OPEN
DAK & BOP
Last year was the year for ramen. This year, it’s
clear that fried chicken is the name of the game.
And while you can get traditional fried chicken at
any number of joints around town, the only place to
get bona fide Korean fried chicken (besides the
food court at H-Mart) is Dak & Bop.
“Dak & Bop” is Korean for “chicken and rice.” The
warm, convivial, high-ceilinged warehouse space –
sandwiched between Bosta and Museum Park Cafe
in the Museum District – is casual and fun. They have a great sound system, which had Red Hot Chili Peppers and other ’90’s hits playing during
my first visit. When I went back, they were playing techno and house,
which can get a bit loud, but that’s what makes the ambiance so great.
This is a place to go with friends, order a bunch of appetizers and fried
chicken, get a beer and cocktail (I recommend the Cool Cucumber or the
Photography by Mai Pham
CUISINE: Korean
EXECUTIVE CHEF: JASON CHO
www.facebook.com/dakandbop
1801 Binz St., Ste. 120
713.528.0280
Mon–Wed 5–10pm; Thu–Sat 5–12pm; Closed Sunday
Fried Chicken
Blackberry Chili Margarita) and grub on tasty, twicefried, crispy yet deliciously moist Korean fried chicken.
The recipes for the sauces come from Mad for Chicken in NYC. The chicken is made with TLC by owner Jason Cho (yes, he’s the one in the kitchen
making it all). I prefer the wings, but you can get a combo with drumsticks
or strips, and choose from the soy garlic, hot ’n spicy or half and half (a
mix of the two sauces, which is a mild spicy). Just know that the spicy is
really spicy, and you’ll be fine. Seriously, it’s all good.
Photography by Mai Pham
SICHUAN NOODLES
CUISINE: Noodle House
9889 Bellaire Blvd., #C205
832.831.3038
Sun – Thu 11am–9:30pm; Fri – Sat 11am–10pm
If you love spice and noodles, there’s a new
Chinese noodle house, Sichuan Noodles, that you
have to visit. Tucked away in the back of the Dun
Huang Plaza on Bellaire Blvd., the place is pristine
and super-cute. (The floors are a shiny black granite
tile with inlaid gold leaf motif.) It’s a hole-in-the-wall in the literal sense – just
a long rectangular strip mall dining room with about 10 tables.
Items are extremely reasonably priced and start at just $3 for something
like their basic spicy cucumber, with their typical noodle dishes running
around $6 or $7. The staff spoke minimal English, but were as helpful and
as nice as can be. I was crying as I was eating a delicious bowl of
Szechuan hot oil wontons, so an additional order of spicy noodles was just
a little too much for me to handle. The pan fried rice noodles, which I
spied at another table, looked excellent however, as did the individual-
Spicy Tangy Noodle
Hot Oil Wontons
sized hot pots (there are nine to choose from) featuri