CM Chicken - Columbus — Restaurant in Columbus

I have been here twice.

First time: The food was amazing, but the service was very bad. I understand being tired as a server as well as a cultural difference of how customers speak to waiters and vice versa. (My friends and I who went are all Asian, and I have also worked as a waitress, so know I’m saying this with actual knowledge.) However, our waiter did not respond to “thank you” a single time. After we finished eating, we waited 15 minutes for the server to give us our check, even though we could see him standing at the front, doing absolutely nothing. This isn’t a place where you go up to the cash register, as we saw many others receive their checks when he noticed they were done. We were on our phones half of that time with napkins on our plates, so I don’t know why he didn’t approach us. When we asked for a box at the end, he seemed very annoyed. So first time, delicious food (original and curry chicken) but bad service.

Second time: This time we ordered the original chicken and the Cheese Monster chicken, which is significantly more expensive. Before ordering the latter, we asked what it was, and the waitress said it was fried chicken covered in cheese powder with a cheese dip. The chicken itself was delicious like before, but there was absolutely no cheese in the expensive Cheese Monster chicken. You could see the powder, but there was no flavor. The cheese sauce was actually very bad; MAYBE they mixed chipotle sauce with the flavorless cheese powder, but I’m not even sure because there was literally no cheese flavor. It was cold and tasted like straight up bottled chipotle sauce. Our waitress was very kind, so I don’t have any criticism for the way she treated us. However, when she asked how the food was, my friend politely told her that the cheese didn’t taste like cheese, and that we wouldn’t be using the sauce. We also told her we had ordered rice, but no worries, just please take it off the bill. We absolutely did not tell her that to make her feel bad, but to constructively give feedback to the kitchen. But her response was, “…Well I hope you enjoy the rest of the food” and left. We were confused and my friend felt bad afterward for possibly offending her, so when she came back, he told her that he was sorry if he offended her, because she was doing a wonderful job but he just wanted to give feedback for the cooks. She said it was fine and asked if we wanted it in a to-go cup. We were a bit confused since we clearly didn’t want to eat it, but said sure since we had leftover chicken anyway and our roommate may like the sauce. But when she came back, she had the rice that we had asked her to cancel 15 minutes prior in a to-go cup. I thought maybe she was giving it to us for free since we didn’t eat the cheese, but on our receipt, we were charged for everything — rice and bad cheese. Not saying we necessarily should have received a discount, but at least not have been charged for rice we did not want.

I seriously don’t want to criticize this waitress the same way I did the original waiter, because again, she was very kind. However, I think this restaurant generally needs to train and watch their employees much more thoroughly, because both employees did not seem to know what to do as servers. Overall, this restaurant’s chicken is very very good, but visiting in person has just not been a pleasant experience. I recommend for the food (other than the overpriced cheese), but definitely not for the service...

For those criticizing the busy restaurant with long wait times, that should be viewed as a good thing - it means they are popular, aka GOOD FOOD. If you show up at peak hours, it isn't unreasonable that you have to wait 30+ minutes to receive your fresh, made to order meal. This was our first time trying this place out, and we intentionally came around 4:30pm to beat the dinner crowd, based on the entitled reviews from people slamming the wait time. While there wasnt a line to be seated, almost every table was full with only 2 servers. I will say that they are a bit inconsistent in customer service and attentiveness, but it didn't seem to be ethnically driven, rather just a general lack of awareness in managing a fully seated dining hall. We stood by the entrance waiting to be seated for at least 8min before even being noticed, and waited another 5 minutes to receive a menu, and additional 10min to receive a water, while people who arrived after us received Waters and menus right away. This could be due to we were waiting on 1 more in our party. Our waitress disappeared, so we did have to flag down the other guy to take our order. Once order was placed, we only waited about 20min for it to be brought to our table. The portion sizes are generous! You can probably get away with just the regular size order of tenders/drums, or the half-whole order of bone in chicken per 2 people, but being our first time, we ordered a different style for each of us (3 types). The breading is super crispy and savory! The tenders are made from thick, juicy cuts of breast, and the regular bone-in style are really tender. I recommend the snow onion half chicken, which is bursting with flavor. I do wish that they offered more banchan options to compliment the meal, because when going out for a Korean meal, french fries just don't appeal to my palate. Overall, this place is worth a regular visit, and while one of the waiters was smiley-friendly and joked around with us, a lot of Asians are misunderstood because they don't typically give that warm, welcoming vibe that westerners are accustomed to. I don't usually go to non-Japanese Asian restaurants for the typical western style of friendly service, I go for the food, which CM chicken is...

If you're trying to go here during lunch or dinner hours, expect a long wait!

Korean fried chicken is unique, delicious, and addicting. CM Chicken did a really great job for being a chain and we were pretty excited that it came here. We got the garlic soy and curry flavors, both were absolutely delicious! The chicken was juicy, decently sized, and sauced well. The garlic soy was sweet, savory, and just the right amount of both with a touch of garlic. The curry flavor was very unique, we were pleasantly surprised and enjoyed it. It was on the sweet side, tasted like honey and curry, which was very good. Just a note, the curry chicken has a bit of a kick and can be spicy, but not it's not overly spicy. Both flavors were bold and the wings had a great crisp. We would absolutely order both again and try all the other flavors! We also got a complimentary dish of pickled daikon and it helps balance the flavors and refresh your palate, which was really nice. We got wings, but there are options for drumsticks, tenders, half or whole chickens. There was also a platter that has onions and it looked delicious from what we saw. They did cover up a park of their menu, which I assume is no longer available. We also tried ordering calamari but they ran out for that day. Overall, it was a good meal and experience.

If you're coming with a large group, you might want to call in and check on wait time be sure it was a 1-1.5 hour wait on a Sat night. It's a great place for casual dates, small groups, family dinner, and tasty wings! They have a lot of parking space, but they do share it with other businesses and there's a decent amount of seating inside. If you're looking for a unique wing experience, definitely...