Two Brits try Best Fried Chicken in America!

Hi, I'm Josh. I'm Oli. And today we are going to try the best fried chicken in America. Like, the America. Yeah. What do you mean? It's a big place. There's a lot of fried chicken. Willie Mays, established in New Orleans in 1957, have been awarded multiple times as the best fried chicken in all of America. It's a big claim. Let's go see what it's about. Let's do it. Love fried chicken. Cannot wait. The thing is, there's a lot of fried chicken around the world, right? It's not a niche thing. It's a saturated market. It's not like fried pigeon, you know? If you set up a restaurant and said, we're going to have the best fried pigeon in the world, I'd probably believe you. But fried chicken, it's the main thing they do, fry. Well, they don't fly. They don't fly, but they do fry. Oh, that is a big tray of food. Oh my gosh. Wow, that looks really good. It looks very different from fried chicken I've had before. It almost looks like fish and chips. Look at the size of that breast. That's a busty chicken. Look at the belly. OK. Cheers, mate. Here we go. This is ridiculous. Holy moly. That is so well seasoned. I think that's the crispiest chicken I've ever bitten into. The batter's just perfect. And yeah, the meat inside, that's white meat. It's so juicy still. So juicy. Look how juicy that meat is. That chicken was well hydrated. I think genuinely that's the juiciest chicken I've ever had. It's so juicy. One thing I should say, though, you've got to embrace the grease. I could probably change the oil in a car. With just by wringing your fingers into it. Should we try some of the sides? Yeah. OK, first off, we both have a little bit of cornbread, which I love. This is such a Southern thing. Oh, this is the cornbread. This is cornbread. I thought this was a muffin. It looks like a little muffin. Yeah. Cheers. That's so good. I'm not a huge fan of cornbread. It tastes like a muffin that you missed an ingredient. A slightly savoury muffin. Slightly? I mean, that's very savoury. Look at this mash with gravy. This is like a Southern fried chicken classic. Get stuck in. Mm. That gravy is strong. Yeah, there's a lot of flavour in that. That's like, as a Brit, not used to that many spices in my gravy. Wow. That packs a punch. Look at that gumbo. There's literally, like, seafood tails. Oh, wow. Beautiful. Well, that's really seafood-y. I really like that. That's strong. Very salty. Makes me want a bit more chicken. You've got a leg. I've got this giant thigh. Thunder thigh. Is it a thigh? It is. It's a thunder thigh. This is like a track cyclist's thigh. It's amazing and kind of disgusting if you look at them for too long, you know? Doesn't look human. No. All right. Let's do it. Get in. Mm. I think, as I bit into that, a bit of chicken juice, like, squirted out and it hit the table. It's like biting into a flipping orange. Holy crap. Oh, my gosh. It's so good. You flipping polished that leg off. In the UK, fried chicken is kind of trashy food. It's like the idea of doing it well or even winning an award for your fried chicken. It's kind of like, it doesn't make sense. Fried chicken is the epitome of cheap fast food in the UK. It's dirt cheap. They use low quality, maximum quantity. But here, it's like elevated to a level of prestige that we just wouldn't apply to in the UK, you know? It's like finding out that Dwayne the Rock Johnson was a distant relative of King Charles, you know? You're like, you just suddenly start seeing him differently. But what I love about this, though, it's like, really, this is like a family-run place named after Willie May, the founder. It's a family recipe. This has become an institution in New Orleans. And this chicken's just made the same way now as it has been for generations, and it's just absolutely incredible. The thing is, it must be hard to do it this well, right? And yet, you don't think of fried chicken as something that would require, like, exquisite technique. It's not a freaking souffle, is it? But the sheer amount of kind of bad fried chicken shows how hard it must be. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. Three years ago, I secretly ghost-wrote my best friend's autobiography and published it without his knowledge. I did not know what I was getting myself into when I became your friend. It went on to become a global bestseller. So this year, with the help of a team of comedy writers, I did it again. There's no way. Another book. It's a space opera. What does that mean? Seriously, guys, this book took me a year to write, and it's really good. It's available on Amazon if you want to buy it. I'm going to try this mac and cheese. The ratio of cheese to mac is high. Yeah, it's high. Very high. I kind of wish it had a crispy top. Yeah. But, let's see. Who are we to criticise? Holy moly. That is so cheesy. That is like, whoa. Do you want a bit of mac with your cheese? Because that is extremely cheesy. It's more like cheese and mac. Yeah, exactly. While mac's been relegated to second place. Massively. Is this just cabbage? Oh my gosh. I don't know what's going on there, but that is unlike any cabbage I've ever had. I guess it's just flavour. That's actually cabbage with flavour. We don't really have that. That's amazing. I thought cabbage was supposed to be flavourless. That is so much flavour. You could have that between two pieces of bread, and it'd be a lovely sandwich. Okay. You know? It's a bit overwhelming for me. I know. Like, cool it, cabbage. Calm down, cabbage. Calm down. I want a candied yam. Oh my gosh. Have you just got a whiff of that? Oh my gosh. Smells like flipping pancakes. That's yam, that's yam. Oh my gosh. Everything here is so overwhelming. That is just so much flavour in everything. I love that. Gosh. I love the texture of that. I do like that. But like the cabbage, I mean, I couldn't come even close to finishing that. And that's not a large portion. Red beans and rice. Now this, in Asia, you have it like as sweet. That's not sweet. It's like vaguely reminiscent of like refried beans. The star of the show though is the chicken. Wow, like such a long wait. I flipping love this. The most important question, where does this fit in the pantheon of fried chicken that we've had over the years? That's tough. It is very, very different. And here are the beautiful tenders. Oh wow. You can see how big they are. Oh, amazing. And you hold them right here. Not what I had in mind when I thought of tenders. Cheers, mate. Holy moly. Wow, again, it's unbelievably juicy. It's almost overwhelming. What the heck? You know what I want to do? I want to dip it in the mash. Mash up. Mash gravy. Get in. Let's go. Oh baby. Oh yeah. That's like a warm hug on my tongue. That's not how your cardiovascular system describes it. Okay. More like a choke hold. Yeah, yeah. You thought it was a hug, but then you start kind of feeling a bit dizzy. And it's funny because there's so much flavor going on, Josh. If you add on top, it's like there's not enough room in my mouth for the flavor. I feel like my fragile British taste buds are like overwhelmed. Overwhelmed. This has been supposedly the best fried chicken in America. De facto best fried chicken in the world. I still resist awarding a singular medal. I don't think there can be a single best chicken in the world. Obviously, you can't rate it against everything in the world. You haven't tried that much. How does this compare to chickens you've tried? Well, it's probably the best I've tried. So then it could be the best in the world. Of course, but we knew that before we walked in. I actually do think this is the best fried chicken I've ever tried. Wow, that's a big steak. Wow, that's big. It's incredibly good. Willie May just absolutely freaking smashed it. Come and try it. It lived up to its extraordinary reputation. In the meantime, we'll see you jolly soon. See you later, guys.