I’m not gonna be much help on the chicken front…

When people ask me for good tofu I can point them to places as varied as Mizuna in Spokane to Kingdom of Vegetarians in Philly. I really will be no help on the chicken front for quite some time. When I dove into meat two months ago, a year after I lost my meat-virginity, I concluded that good steak is awesome, while I blissfully avoided other types of meats.

Then, for whatever reason, I woke up one morning to find myself wanting to cut to the search for perfect chicken.

Kusina Filipina, an East Francis establishment, might just have put an end to the search, at least as far as flavor goes. When my chicken arrived, I discovered I had to eat around the bones, and, sadly, there was no one to help me figure out how to exactly do that. I guess my dining companion was more fixated on his poker winnings than on my new found gold mine of chicken. Can I really blame him though? He was with me a year ago when I lost my meat-virginity.

The texture was… strange, but good. It perfectly absorbed the flavors of the marinade, not unlike tofu, yet completely different at the same time. I liked the flavor. Maybe not as much as I like steak, but at least there are other alternatives out there.

It isn’t simple, eating chicken. Those bones get in the way of a delicious flavor, and I was not prepared to fully take on this chicken-encounter quite yet. I am, however, ready to move past the steak.