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Our city has cluckloads of excellent charcoal chicken shops all over the place (you could say Sydneysiders are obsessed with them) so it’s hard to stand out in a cramped market – but Hariri Chickens in Kogarah does. I’d have to say it’s the best chicken shop in all of Sydney. I’ve eaten my way across a lot of them because my son does love a barbecue chook.
I am particularly clucky for Lebanese style-charcoal chicken – not only because of the toum, tabouli and pickles served alongside it, but because the chicken meat is always so flavour-packed and juicy. Hariri takes it up another notch – they finish the cooking of their whole barbecue chicken (after the skin is golden and crisp) by wrapping it in a village-style Lebanese bread (you know like those really thin Mountain Bread wraps you get from the supermarket?). As well as keeping the chicken insulated so it stays nice and succulent, the bread soaks up all the tasty chickeny goodness – the flavours from the skin and the juices from the chicken, so it’s this partly-crisp, partly-oozy thing that you rip into alongside the chicken. It’s an absolute masterstroke. Even just thinking about it right now, my tastebuds are keen.
As well as that, Hariri serves up all the other chicken-shop staples (chicken burgers, wraps, fried chicken), but the other thing that sets this place apart is that you'll also find delicious side dishes like molokhiya with chicken (a type of Lebanese stew), Lebanese pepper rice with chicken, and eggplant and cheese melt (drool). It's all extremely good.
Note: the actual restaurant isn't anything special – it's primarily a takeaway restaurant. So if you feel like takeaway chicken tonight, spread your wings from your usual go-to and flock to Hariri. Trust me, it’s worth crossing the road for.
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