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That fried chicken at Posh Restaurant and Supper Club that everyone was crazy about? It turns out not to be a Posh original, which is actually a happy turn of events for those wanting to taste the Korean fried chicken again now that the restaurant has closed.
Derek Newton, a consultant for Posh’s parent RLJ Companies in Bethesda, says he owns the local franchise rights for Mad for Chicken, a small New York chain that itself is an offshoot of the famous BonChon Chicken.
Newton met Mad for Chicken founder Sean Cho (a former BonChon muckity muck whose story I can not independently confirm yet) in New York, and Cho agreed to show him the secrets of his fried chicken, which is allegedly healthier than the BonChon version since the former includes only trace amounts of MSG. (An aside: I find the whole MSG as health concern grossly overinflated; the stuff occurs naturally in lots of food items, including tomatoes.)
Former Posh executive chef Christopher Willis was taught how to prepare the chicken, too, and the item quickly became a hit at the former downtown restaurant/club, arguably the main reason (other than the crab cake) to visit the place. When I first contacted Willis about Posh’s sudden demise, he directed me to Newton, whom the chef said controls the rights for Mad for Chicken.
Sure enough, Newton does, and he plans to open a genuine Mad for Chicken outlet in the next six to eight months. That’s the good news. The bad? Newton will likely open it in Columbia, Md., where he lives.
Newton is open to the idea of selling the take-out birds in D.C. again, too, but the economics don’t work as well in the District. You have to sell a ton of Korean fried chicken to make your rent and overhead.
“I’d have to get a very good deal,” he says.