Tokyo Fried Chicken

Despite winning the hearts of Jonathan Gold and Bill Addison, we aren’t the hugest fans of Tokyo Fried Chicken, which recently moved to Downtown L.A. from Monterey Park. Kouji Yamanashi’s Southern-style batter with vaguely Japanese seasoning strikes us as a premium mediocre version of KFC rather than anything truly exceptional. Tokyo Fried Chicken’s recipe involves brining in soy, ginger and garlic and frying in rice bran oil, but the end result’s taste and texture are far too similar to one of America’s most popular fried chicken chains for us to recommend the (quite pricey) tenders and buckets on their own. That being said, we loved Tokyo Fried Chicken’s newer fried chicken sandwich, which offers an oversized chicken thigh with Japanese-style kewpie mayo and pickles on a housemade milkbread bun. Each bite is enveloped in just enough creaminess to balance the craggy bite of chicken, and the sandwich comes with excellent seasoned housemade potato chips.