“I gets excited about my foods” – Kirk Lazarus in Tropic Thunder

I once went out on a date with a guy who called me the “anti Black” because I can’t stand the taste or smell of watermelon and I can do without chicken. If ever there was a meat I had to give up, it would be that bird. I’d walk away from it just like I did that date.

 

Oddly enough, on a scale of the things I love, Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles might just rank right under my mother, but I don’t even touch the chicken there unless it’s covered with cheese in an omelette. There are very few other chicken spots that make me go ape shit (the old school LA spot, Golden Bird, is one of them) but I recently discovered an eatery in the heart of Los Angeles’ Byzantine-Latino Quarter that made me lose my mind. Dino’s $5 chicken and fries plate is so good I’ll risk the played out Black people and chicken jokes us colored folk know so well. 

 

A few weeks ago my mother called me from her Beverly Hills office sounding like she was a few days away from 51/50. She was whispering something about how her coworkers had driven from 90210 to the mid-Wilshire district – easily a 45 minute drive in LA traffic – and bought her a plate of food she couldn’t stop eating, despite the fact that her pants were unbuckled and she could feel her insides begging her to stop. My mother loves chicken so I thought she was exaggerating but after she insisted we stop at this chicken spot the next day, this time driving from Long Beach (my mother HATES driving from LBC to LA), I knew that Dino’s had to be the holy grail of chicken spots. 

 

When we arrived at Dino’s I thought my mother’s coworkers had played a sick joke on her. First off, the sign read Dino’s Burgers, nothing about chicken.  It was one of the worst looking hamburger stands I’ve ever seen. An elderly woman hastily cleaned off the tables in hopes of a small donation, but there was people everywhere and no matter how much that old woman tried to clean the tables the filth that comes with hundreds of customers wasn’t coming off. To top if off, as clear as day was the green B letter grade posted in the window. Los Angeles restaurants get B grades for disgusting things like having vermin droppings under stoves, but I’ve ate in worse conditions so I was prepared to throw down and resist all bourgeoisie tendencies.   

 

Dino’s menu is that of your typical hood hamburger stand, but while I was standing in line I noticed that nobody was ordering anything but the half chicken plate – it comes with tortillas, coleslaw and fries (did I mention it’s only 5 dollars!). By the time I got my plate I understood why it was the item of choice. If Dino’s had an F grade for something gross like stacking decapitated chickens on their tables, I’d still eat there. The chicken is that good. 

 

No explanation will ever do justice the Greek-Mexican fusion that is the sauce Dino’s pours all over their chicken and fries. All I know is that it is some type of orange magic because it got better with each bite. It was orgasmic, spicy, everything I wanted it to be and nothing like I’ve had before. The fries are soggy, which I typically hate, but I found myself wishing they were drenched in even more sauce. What I’m telling you is nothing that hasn’t been said about Dino’s before. I Googled the place when I got home because I couldn’t imagine why I had never heard of it before and I saw that the Yelp rating was 4 1/2 stars. I imagine the people that don’t give Dino’s a 5 are the same people  who wish the chicken spot was located anywhere else but on  Pico Boulevard, West of Vermont. You know the kind of folk that don’t venture into that part of LA after dark.

 

The only downside to Dino’s chicken is that your fingers will be stained orange for days and no matter how much you lick them, they won’t taste as good as the food.  

 

I was surprised to find out that Dino’s is owned by an old Greek man (the menu is full of Mexican dishes and the cooks are predominately brown); I guess our favorite Internets Celebrity was right, everybody likes chicken.

 

Tags: Dino's Burgers, Dino's Chicken and Burgers