Mexicana Gochu Hwasak Review 24,000 won [Korean Food]

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Today’s new release from Mexicana Chicken, a Korean fried-chicken franchise after a fairly long pause, is the Gochu Hwasak. The name spells out the concept: crispy (“hwasak”) batter meets a fiery, chili-forward sauce. On paper it looks like a shot across the bow at Goobne’s Gochu Basasak, but Mexicana fries its chicken while Goobne oven-bakes, so the result has more of its own identity than you might expect. Value-for-money holds up too. Let’s take a closer look at what’s in the box.

Table of Contents

📋 At a Glance

Product: Mexicana Gochu Hwasak (whole-chicken serving)
Brand: Mexicana Chicken
Price: 24,000 won on delivery apps (boneless +2,000 won; drumstick, wing/drumette, combo +3,000 won)
Signature sauce: in-house spicy blended sauce
Topping: “gochu crunch” of gochu-bugak (crispy chili leaves) and granola
Included: a cola and pickled radish (chicken-mu)
Add-on: garlic dipping sauce +1,000 won
Verdict: ★4.5 — a yangnyeom (sweet-spicy glazed) chicken that genuinely stays crispy after delivery, with a balanced sweet-salty-spicy profile.

Gochu Hwasak: Price and Highlights

Two words really sum this menu up: fiery and crispy. The fire comes from an in-house spicy blended sauce, and the crispness gets dialed up not just through the batter but also through a “gochu crunch” topping that combines gochu-bugak and granola for a clearly differentiated texture. On price, the standard delivery-app rate is 24,000 won. Going boneless tacks on 2,000 won, while drumsticks, wings and drumettes, or the combo option add 3,000 won.

Yangnyeom chicken emphasizing the crispy bite

I ordered the standard bone-in version first. From what I remember, Mexicana’s boneless typically mixes breast and thigh meat, and since I tend to prefer thigh, the bone-in felt like the safer pick. It’s been a while since I ordered Mexicana boneless, so my memory may be a touch fuzzy. The standard order ships with a cola and chicken-mu (pickled radish).

A special method that keeps the crunch intact

Gochu Hwasak: What’s in the Box

Let’s get straight to the contents. Opening the box, a wave of spicy-sweet aroma hits immediately. The first thing you see is the distinctive granola-and-gochu-bugak crunch piled on top, which makes the chicken look genuinely crispy. The sauce reads deep red, signaling real heat. It might look like a direct shot at Goobne’s lineup, but the overall direction here feels noticeably different.

Fried chicken with a gochu-bugak topping

The sauce coats the chicken pretty generously. A noticeable pool collects at the bottom and that area doesn’t really carry the crunch, so it looks like the crunch is layered on right before packaging. The chili aroma comes through with a slightly hotter pitch than typical yangnyeom chicken, though I’m hoping it doesn’t tip into full burn.

Gochu crunch driving the textural differentiation

According to the press materials, this release leans on Mexicana’s heritage as a pioneering yangnyeom chicken brand while flipping the soft, soggy texture that has long been the format’s weak point. They mention a special recipe technique that keeps the crispness alive over time. That part is worth testing during the tasting.

A balance of sweet, savory, tangy, and spicy

Why crispness matters in yangnyeom chicken

For context, BHC recently dropped its “King Chicken” lineup around the same “stays crispy to the last bite” idea, so it’s hard to ignore that Mexicana might be riding the same wave. That said, the chicken itself doesn’t look soggy at all even after delivery, which is already a noticeable win.

A yangnyeom chicken with a strong spicy edge

The playful combo of gochu-bugak and granola

For what it’s worth, I like spicy food but my tolerance is honestly not great, so I added a garlic dipping sauce for 1,000 won to soften any heat spikes. You can stack on various dipping sauces at order time, so playing with mix-ins to push the dish hotter or milder is genuinely worth trying.

A recommendation for crispy yangnyeom chicken

Gochu Hwasak: Taste Test

First bite and how spicy it actually is

Time to actually taste it. Grabbed a drumstick and went straight in. The flavor is more universally appealing than I expected, and the things that matter most for this category come through clearly. The balance between heat, sweetness and crispness is genuinely well-judged.

Versus a standard yangnyeom chicken, the chili aroma here lands clearly on top. It’s not as hot as I feared. The first bite hits with a quick punch of heat that then eases off as you keep eating, which makes it surprisingly easy to power through. If the heat had been the slow-building, cumulative kind, this would have been a much tougher meal.

A consumer recommendation for the yangnyeom-chicken update

Crispness and the sweet-spicy-salty balance

The batter ditches the thick wet-dough style of older yangnyeom chicken and goes noticeably thinner. Pair that with a relatively dense sauce and the crispy bite still holds up nicely. The signature crumble does a lot of work to support that texture, and the sweet-spicy-salty equation is well-mapped.

Expectations and reactions to the Gochu Hwasak flavor

Expressing expectations for the new yangnyeom menu

Balance aside, the overall profile is pretty hot, pretty sweet, and pretty salty, so the soda kept disappearing. Worried it would push too hot, I dipped lightly into the garlic dipping sauce I’d ordered, and the heat softened nicely. Picking up one dipping sauce to match your taste is a smart move. Not exactly a health pick, sure, but the experience improves.

Expectations and reactions to the Gochu Hwasak heat level

Overall take and who it’s for

Compared to the modern yangnyeom chickens that just keep getting sweeter and spicier, this one actually evokes the older-style yangnyeom with that distinctive chili-flake aroma. As you eat, it pairs especially well with chicken-mu (pickled radish), and I suspect many readers will reach the same conclusion.

Enjoying yangnyeom chicken with proper crispness

Plenty of new chicken menus have hit Korea this year, and by my measure this one earns a top-tier spot among the ones I’ve tried. It doesn’t lean overly weird; instead it reads as a fresh reinterpretation of classic yangnyeom sauce. If you can handle bold flavor, the spread of taste preferences here should be unusually wide.

Gochu crunch as the textural differentiator

Final Verdict — A New Menu I’d Easily Recommend

All things considered, this is a new menu that’s easy to recommend. I’ll admit I might be getting a bit past the age where I should be loading up on this much heat, but even with that caveat, this is worth trying. Even if you usually can’t handle intensely hot, mouth-numbing food, the sweet-spicy-salty balance keeps it accessible. Just set up your own light “defense” — a soda nearby, a dipping sauce to soften the heat — and dive in. For visitors to Korea, you can order Mexicana through major delivery apps in English (Baemin and Yogiyo support English interfaces) and pickup is available across the country.

An attempt at reinterpreting yangnyeom-chicken texture

Describing the features of the new Gochu Hwasak menu

For more on the launch background, the in-house blended sauce, and the gochu crunch topping (along with the new brand model announcement), see (Korean source) the The Fact launch report.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. How much does Mexicana Gochu Hwasak cost and what options are there?

The standard delivery-app price is 24,000 won. Boneless adds 2,000 won, while choosing drumsticks, wings/drumettes, or the combo option each add 3,000 won. The base order ships with a cola and chicken-mu (pickled radish), and you can add dipping sauces like garlic for 1,000 won at checkout.

Q. How spicy is it, and is it OK for spice-sensitive eaters?

The heat hits hard on the first bite then eases off as you keep eating, rather than building up over the meal. Even so, the overall profile is on the hotter side. If you’re sensitive to heat, the 1,000-won garlic dipping sauce is the right add-on; lightly dipping each piece tames the burn to a manageable level.

Q. How does it compare to Goobne’s Gochu Basasak?

Goobne’s Gochu Basasak is oven-baked with a thicker dough-style crust, while Mexicana’s Gochu Hwasak uses a thinner fried batter on a deep-fried chicken base, glazed with a spicy sauce. The gochu crunch topping made of gochu-bugak and granola is the key differentiator. If you grew up on traditional yangnyeom chicken, the Mexicana version is likely to feel more familiar.

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