Zip Dak Korean Fried Chicken — Restaurant in Kirkland

We were driving by, and I am just amazed at the chicken we had! When I think of Korean Fried Chicken, I think of the sauce, the moist and juicy insides, and the crispy skin of the fried chicken. My partner had the yangnyum chicken (mixed), and I ordered the chi-bap. The yangnyum spiciness was the restaurant's 2 out of 4 rating, but I felt it was the right amount of sweet and spicy. Next time, I personally would try something spicier! Sauce was finger-licking good! My partner wasn't too impressed with the crunchiness of the fried chicken wings and drumsticks, but I thought their tenders actually had captured that crispiness! But we understand that the balance of the crisp and sauce coating can be hard to master. But this was still delicious!

The chi-bap was quite good too. We choose the grilled chicken option and the staff was polite to let us know that it was going to take longer to cook. The grilled chicken was juicy and the sauce ratio felt decent. The grilled kimchi was so good! Not burnt at all but had the right balance of what I expected a delicious grilled kimchi to be. There was so little, it was so delicious I could eat more! The radish were not too vinegary. Can't wait to come by around here again to try out more. (Also, it's nice that there's a market literally next to it. We didn't try the drinks from the restaurant but you could easily buy a drink or even some small ice cream on the way out through...

Fantastic food. We ordered the mild soy garlic, spicy soy garlic, extra crispy, and kimchi fried rice. The fried rice was not too spicy or kimchi forward but was the best Kim chi fried rice we've ever had. It had a depth of flavor and it seemed that they might have cooked it in seafood broth as it had some essence of seafood like shrimp or seaweed flavors (no pieces so not sure how the flavor was infused). It did use a good amount of oil though. It came with shredded cabbage a couple of cherry tomatoes and a sesame dressing. It was fine but was literally shaved cabbage with dressing.

The spicy soy garlic was not too saucy so maintained it's crispiness. The chicken was very juicy and didn't have a thick coating. The extra crispy was bland after having the soy garlic but would have been good with a dipping sauce. Extra chicken, a few fries, and celery and ranch was added which was a nice touch. You can choose 2 flavors with a full order or one flavor for the other sizes. They have a lot of flavor options. I also like that you can choose if you want tenders or boneless or wings or drumsticks or mixed.

It's not the healthiest options but very tasty and we'd be happy to return as it's one of the best korean fried...

The chicken needed to be good since it’s a chicken place, but it was just average. We ordered a half-and-half combo with Krunchy, which was supposed to be extra crispy, and Yangnyeom, the classic Korean sweet and spicy flavor.

However, the krunchy fried wasn’t really crunchy—the breading was underwhelming and tasted like something fried at home. Given that the restaurant’s name, Zip Dak, literally translates to “homemade chicken,” the flavor unfortunately lived up to that name—nothing more, nothing less.

To make things worse, the yangnyeom sauce was cold, almost like it had just come out of the fridge. After frying, the sauce should at least be room temperature or slightly warmed. Since it was so cold, it quickly brought down the temperature of the chicken, making it lose its heat much faster. After a few minutes, it felt like I was eating refrigerated chicken.

On the bright side, the place was clean, and the atmosphere was nice, but the chicken itself was mediocre at best. I won’t be coming back.

Revisit intention: No Vibe: Pass Cleanliness: Pass Food:...