Ma'ono.....More Fried Chicken!!

12th Street is a main drag through Capitol Hill and one of the myriad of routes I wander down on my way home. It has varying degrees of restaurants and other establishments I glance at as I tried to get back to the apartment without getting completely soaked through at this time of year. Some things I see and think, hmm, I need to try that sometime and a couple of them I have like Dave’s Hot Chicken, the bagel place, the sushi place (but only for tempura) and now I can add, that bar with that fried chicken place inside.

To be more specific, Rachel’s Ginger Beer is the bar and the pop-up outpost inside is Ma’Ono Fried Chicken. Now to be honest, I kind of had no real interest in the bar part. Mostly, I’m not really a fan of ginger beer and I outside of wine, I don’t drink hard alcohol. That said, Rachel’s does have more than one location around the area and many people seem to like it so if you that is your thing, then you should go, it is a nice space inside with a GIANT television which is great to watch sports on. Me, I’m just here for the chicken, or rmore precisely, I’m intrigued about them being Hawaiian fried chicken.

For whatever reason I never really looked the place up online until after I went so I had visions of fried chicken covered in pineapple and what not running through my mind before I sauntered in and perused their compact menu. Not exactly unappealing but then again, not exactly my thing, kind of like pineapple on pizza (not a fan and don’t care what you think!). I mean I like pineapple but usually in my yogurt with cereal. Still, for whatever reason on this particular day I was game to see and try their take. Since they didn’t have a lot of choices I decided to make the most of the one visit and chose two different sandwiches, two different sides and got it to go since, you know, I wasn’t into the bar thing.

**Medium Hot Fried Chicken Sandwich $13.95**

Why not dive right in with the crispy fried chicken sandwich with daikon pickles, kewpie mayo, and iceberg lettuce on a toasted King’s Hawaiian bun. You get to pick your level of heat for the chicken and I was all set to go with hot but for some reason there is a .50 cent up charge for hot or extra hot? Don’t know what that is all about. I mean does it really cost that much more to bring the heat? The sandwich is already at the top end of my price comfort level so I passed and just went medium which didn’t cost anything.

It was a nicely crispy chicken breast with a decent crust to give it crunch. The medium heat was like a nice tingle you could taste and feel on the tongue but not so overwhelming you are gonna burn your mouth or anything. It was really nice with the daikon pickles which added more crunch and some sweetness as a contrast to the spice. So no pineapple but still some sweetness! Between the sweet and spicy you don’t necessarily get all the flavor from the Kewpie mayo you might normally get but there is the creaminess as another layer. (And in case you forgot what Kewpie mayo is—it is a Japanese brand of mayonnaise known for its umami-rich, tangy-sweet flavor profile. Compared to American mayonnaise, which uses the whole egg, Kewpie mayo is made with only egg yolks, giving it an exceptionally lush, smooth texture and a deeper yellow color.)

The Kings Hawaiian bun also adds more sweet but for me it was a bit of overkill. I think the daikon pickles were more than sufficient, plus the bun was a little to soft and didn’t hold up for the entire eating of the sandwich, surprising since this isn’t that wet of a sandwich. Personal choice for sure and I get why they use it, the whole Hawaii thing, but I don’t know, maybe cut back one or the other or a different mayo with even more tang? Still, it was a good enough and slightly different version of a fried chicken sandwich that I’m sure pairs well with some of the beverages they sling at Rachel’s.

This one seemed interesting to me as read on the menu and I felt I had to try it so good on ya’ for the description. A BBQ’d Kalua chicken bun—pulled Kalua chicken, salted cabbage coleslaw and crispy onions on a toasted and buttered Kings Hawaiian bun with a side of hibiscus bbq sauce. The above is the actual sandwich I got……

….and this was the shot on the menu. One seems a little light on the chicken and a bit less stacked than the other. Though that was not the only conundrum I experienced with this sandwich. I decided to try it without the sauce first to get a taste of the Kalua chicken which is slow cooked and smokey. (Usually you hear of Kalua pork—same concept, different meat) I took one bite and wooobooy! It was a salt bomb! between the meat (which was at least appropriately tender if not exactly juicy), the salted slaw and salty fried onions I was quickly reaching for some water. Like biting into a salt lick. I was wondering how I was gonna get through it.

The hibiscus barbecue sauce came on the side so I popped it open and spooned up a tab to taste and wooooboooy! It was an odd combination of tangy, smokey, sweet and at the end you get those small floral hibiscus notes which all together had a very odd and cloying reaction on my tastes buds. Again I’m thinking, how am I gonna get through this.

But here’s the thing, separately they seem almost inedible, but after dipping the sandwich into the sauce and taking a bite, it was almost like something magical happened as all those strong competing flavors seem to coalesce and balance (cancel?) each other out to create something that was pretty tasty? Not sure if that is the right word, but for whatever reason, they all kind of work together. Weird to say the least but now I figured I was gonna be able to eat it all. I think ultimately it could have done without the crispy onions as they got soggy when you add the sauce and added more of the cabbage since that would still hold and add more crunch. Otherwise, not sure I would get it again but it was definitely a unique eating experience. (As a side note, any sweetness from the bun was totally lost here with everything else that was going on.)

But let’s move on to the sides. Like the mac and kimcheese. I think I was expecting some mac and cheese mixed with kimchee but it was actually mac and cheese with kimchee seasoned sauce with small notes of chili garlic. What are kimchee seasonings you ask well mostly some variation of dried chiles, rice flour, salt, miso powder, garlic, cabbage extract powder, sugar, cellulose, ginger and scallions. Or some variation of that. Ultimately this was just standard mac and cheese with a little kick. Not bad, not exciting, not as salty as the sandwich at least.

Then there was the potato mac salad with (more!) Kewpie mayo, potatoes, macaroni, scallions and the menu said eggs but if there were any in there, it was subtle enough I could not even tell they were there. If actually there at all. This brought back vague remembrances of after church potlucks where the old church ladies would try to liven up their potato salad with macaroni like it was something new. Sadly, this version also lacked any kind of flavor whatsoever, much like those church versions of yore. Maybe take some of that salt from the sandwich and add it here? Pepper? Something? It was quite bland as is, surprising considering you are serving this in a bar where you want folks to drink more so some spice, salt, seasoning could have elevated this.

Ultimately what we have here is food that seems made for a bar. Well, except for that last thing. I guess that explains why the other locations of Ma’Ono are also pop-ups located inside drinking establishments. There is are greasy crunchy things, some salty things, some spicy things, some sweet things—all seeming designed to make you thirsty and drink some more. I’m sure if I had peruse Rachel’s menus they probably had some concoctions that paired with the food. I mean, I did kind of like the fried chicken sandwich but I guess I am still stuck on Bok-A-Bok as the best one I have had so far in town, but I guess if you are Rachel’s you don’t necessarily want to go out and get something so this one is perfectly serviceable. As for the other sandwich, definitely weirdly interesting and I will leave it up to you to decide whether to try it or not. Who knows, it might also go well with one of their cocktails, a combo of something else I will also leave up to you to try. Me, there are many more fried chicken stops to go before I make any return trips. This one I may skip.