Tony Johor Kaki Travels for Food · Heritage · Culture · History

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Chicken Up Johor Bahru Holiday Villa JB JK1558

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Visited Chicken Up Johor Bahru, the hugely popular Korean themed food joint from Singapore (where it has 7 outlets). The first Chicken Up outlet in JB was very well received, where it saw long queues since it opened a couple of months ago. 

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We can feel the hip and youthful vibes, the moment we step into Chicken Up Johor Bahru's huge sprawling space.

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Bright cheerful, welcoming decor, K pop playing in the background, happy families and youthful crowd, the buzz already made us feel hungry with anticipation.

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Our first time at Chicken Up and noobs at Korean food, so we referred to their Best Top 10 list - and picked #1 and #2 😆 So easy.

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#1 Ganjang Soya Chicken Wings (RM13.90). 

It's 4 chicken wings deep fried till crisp outside which is coated with a Korean style soya sauce blend.

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The golden brown wings were crispy outside, the meat inside is a little firm and dry. Not much flavour in the meat. Most of the flavour came from the savoury soya sauce blend on the skin. It's tasty and reminds me of good local soya sauce marinated fried chicken wings.

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#2 Spicy Yangyum Chicken (RM28.90+).

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Same crisp fried chicken which is a little dry and not much flavour in the meat. The half a bird cut into chunks was enveloped in a thick sticky glaze sprinkled with sesame seeds. The glazy sauce was an interesting balance of robust sweet, savoury, and mild spicy flavours. The fried battered skin retained some crispiness despite the sticky coat of tasty sauce.

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For carbs, we had #8 Toppoki with Cheese and Seafood (RM28.90+).

Spongy rice sticks, fish cake slices, mussel, squid ring, prawn and vegetable in a thick soupy Gochujang red chili paste sauce and melted gooey cheese. The Gochujang sauce has robust savoury, sweet and spicy flavours.

The ingredients have not much taste though the Gochujang sauce is heavy with strong flavours.

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Come to a Korean food joint must of course treat ourselves to a bingsu, right? 😋

We picked this rock melon bingsu because we saw many people around us having this 😆

Interesting variation of textures from the melon balls, vanilla ice cream and shaved ice. We enjoyed the layers of sweetness of the rock melon bingsu.

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We appreciate the service at Chicken Up. The staff were cheerful, friendly and attentive. They were also very helpful. Here, Ms Marylen helped us cut up the rock melon after we had finished the ice cream and melon balls.

👍 We enjoyed our experience at Chicken Up JB - good service, nice ambiance and vibes which make the fad food enjoyable for us. We especially like the melon bingsu. There are many other dishes at Chicken Up JB like their Yangpa Bomb (onion), watermelon soju etc which I would love to come back for.

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Chicken Up is located inside Holiday Villa hotel which is just beside KSL City Mall.

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Restaurant name: Chicken Up Johor Bahru
AddressShop 14 and 15 First Floor, Holiday Villa, 260 Jalan Dato Sulaiman, Taman Abad, Johor Bahru
Taman Mount Austin, Jalan Austin 8/7
GPS1.487442, 103.761242 / 1°29'14.8"N 103°45'40.5"E
Hours: 12:00 noon to 12:00 midnight
Tel: +607 266 0902 | +6019 710 1449

No pork, no lard, no Halal cert (alcohol served)

Date visited: 25 Jul 2016


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6 comments:

  1. why aren't you putting whether the food is halal or not in your recent reviews?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My sincere apologies for the over sight. I have just checked with the restaurant. They do not serve pork or lard. But, they are not certified Halal as they do serve beer and soju (Korean vodka). Thank you.

      Delete
    2. Isn't it obvious when there's alcohol?

      Delete
    3. yes, i just wanted to be sure that there is no pork.

      Delete
  2. The outlet in Holiday Villa had closed down last month.
    It will reopen antoher outlet in Mt Austin.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Pls advise address of outlet in Mt.Austin

    ReplyDelete

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