[VIDEO] Behind Korea's love for crispy, flavorful fried chicken

Fried chicken and Korea are like a couple that can’t stay apart from each other. Koreans eat fried chicken when they are enjoying a picnic by the Han River with their friends, when they are watching a sports game or as the perfect compliment to go with a glass of beer.

In fact, chicken franchises are currently the third largest type of franchise business by category in Korea, after convenience stores and Korean restaurants.

But if you think about it, fried chicken is not a traditional part of Korean cuisine – if anything, it’s pretty far from what you would expect a traditional Korean dish to look like. So how did fried chicken restaurants start to boom in Korea?

BY LEE JUNG-JOO, JEON TAE-GYU [jeon.taegyu@joongang.co.kr]]