Chicken Troopers — Restaurant in Norwalk

I really wanted to like this place. After all, small business owner, minority, fried chicken, good reviews. But in the end it wasn't so. Arrived there and it wasn't busy, we were the only table and ordered a good amount of food trying to support the business. The food came out very fast, too fast. Fries and cheese sticks first. Fries came out soggy and white looking, mozzarella sticks the same way. In the scale of frying, they were lightly yellow. Then chicken came out. Half chicken, not so bad, not a lot of flavor but somewhat tasty. I'd give the half chicken a one bite score of 7.1. The wings however were atrocious, like a 0.2. They smelled so bad when you bit near the bloodline. More drummettes than flats which I didn't like, but the drummettes smelled so bad I had to spit it out. These were obviously frozen and thawed, and they smelled like death, a smell like I would never like to remember. The army jiggae was not bad, not great, but not special but helped get the chicken wing smell out of my mouth. Fries soggy, asked them to refry which fixed it but tried to send them a clue by ordering another set of fries extra well done. Instead, the new set of fries came and they were again soggy and white looking. Staff never cared to check on us, didn't take our feedback, and left unsatisfied. A very poor experience with KFC and we've had a lot of KFC. Sorry, I wish I could have at least given 3 stars but I could not. If this was not a family owned place...

I want to offer some constructive criticism, because this place isn't bad, but there are a lot of small things they can do to improve.

Things that were good:

Fried dumplings were great. Crispy, good flavor.

Chicken tenders (that came with the ceasar salad) were pretty good. Good quality chicken breast fried in Korean style.

Nice restaurant vibe and very friendly staff. It's super cool that they compost.

Things that need improvement:

Chicken sandwich was not spicy or crispy. The kimchi tasted like it came from a jar.

The Ceasar salad didn't have cesear dressing. It had ranch, which is SO much ranch to eat. Also the ranch tasted like it came from a grocery store squeeze bottle, so why not just by the Ceasar dressing squeeze bottle? Also ceasar salad should have parmesan cheese, not shredded Mozzarella.

Mozzarella sticks were like grocery store frozen ones: really bready, not crispy, weirdly elastic cheese.

I think this is a small business, so I want to see them succeed, but they really have some work to do. I wish...

The food was really good and we didn't have to wait that long. Also they give a generous amount of sides even though their sides are really rather inexpensive. Chicken was absolutely delicious once we got it home. I would definitely go again for the food.

The setting is a bit odd I'm not really sure what the disco ball is for. However, coupled with "its raining men" playing in background I imagine they want people to dance there. They've set the scene for it. All in all it seems that they haven't really figured out what the theme of the interior design is considering they've got soft lighting with candles on the tables but they've got disco music and a disco ball. "Macho man" even came on while we waited.

Parking on the other hand was really not that great they only have three spots and what they call their parking lot and the side streets aren't great...