Bon Chon: Double the fry, double the fantastic.

Koreans know their meat. Our humble brigade has profited from this knowledge once before, having thoroughly enjoyed pork belly and beef at Honey Pig Gooldaegee Grill in Annandale back in September. This time around, we sampled the deliciousness that is Bon Chon, also in Annandale, which is where the Koreans seem to keep all their best restaurants.

This was a special outing, not only because the food was some of the best we've had, but also because it was one of our biggest outings to date. Due to the vast popularity of the brigade members and this blog, our ranks were up to six this time around. Not only did Mr. Philip Lopez, local motivational speaker to the stars, join in again for this trip--we also had the distinct pleasure of the company of the illustrious Monsieur Jean-Paul Grenouille, the renowned aesthetic consultant. Incidentally, our people are currently in negotiations with his people and, with any luck, he'll be signing on shortly as the Brigade's official stylist. There will definitely be matching scarves involved. (Adam is thrilled about this development.)

All the female Brigade members wore dresses for this outing, which reflected the classiness of the occasion.

Not only did these esteemed guests lend a certain gravitas to the evening, but the outing was delicious in a way that almost defies words. Having been the only member of the Brigade who had not experienced the deliciousness of Bon Chon before, I was probably the most impressed of the group. (There may even have been some appreciative cursing coming from my side of the table at some point.) The repeat visits of the other Brigade members testify, though, to just how much this chicken is worth driving out to Annandale for.

The deliciousness of Korean fried chicken has a mysterious quality about it, in that it is at once both cripsy and saucy, as well as being twice-fried and yet, somehow, not at all greasy. These apparent contradictions befuddled all the Brigade members. (If you're reading this, Anthony Bourdain, please do a special on Korean fried chicken so we can finally solve this culinary mystery.)

Alex and M. Grenouille are quite excited to dig into the mysterious deliciousness that is KFC

Adam, who has been to Bon Chon several times before, knew to order our chicken ahead of time, which saved us the trouble of waiting 45 minutes for our food. He also knew to make our order half ginger soy chicken and half spicy chicken.

Marta, getting serious about her fried chicken.

The spicy chicken, while delicious, definitely lives up to its billing--being able to alternate spicy with ginger soy was a great way to soothe burning lips. (Another good way to soothe the spice was by eating the pickled radishes or taking a swig or two of beer.) All in all, the six of us devoured three large plates of chicken in record time and without a whole lot of conversation. We were, quite rightly, focused on the food.

Such culinary success inspired us to see if our luck could hold long enough to find delicious dessert somewhere. Adam, who regularly flouts our no use of smart phones rule, proved once again that this rule is stupid by searching yelp to find Shilla Bakery, which is just down the road from Bon Chon.

Rebel, rebel.

When we arrived at Shilla, at around 7:30pm on Sunday night, the place was packed. We knew straight away that our culinary luck was going to hold.

The men stake their claim.

The particular Korean dessert specialty available at Shilla is an ice-cream dessert called bing soo, which consists, generally, of some combination of ice cream, red bean, condensed milk, pieces of what seemed to us like mochi, and a generous heaping of shaved ice. We ordered one green tea bing soo and one chocolate bing soo. Both were delicious, though we found the shaved ice to be a strange topping for ice cream.

There was no small size option. Bing soo would be popular in Texas.

After consuming vast amounts of chicken and large quantities of ice cream, all Brigade members (and guests) were quite pleased with the outing. It was, I think it's fair to say, one of our best so far.

The location of our next outing has not yet been determined--does the vast blogosphere have any brilliant suggestions for us?