In Korean fried chicken terminology, dak is the Korean word for the domesticated fowl.
The distinction matters because Korean uses several related food terms that can sound interchangeable in English. Chikin, borrowed from the English word “chicken,” refers specifically to fried chicken as a dish, while dak means chicken as the bird or meat. Twigim means a fried food or frying style, not chicken itself, and maekju means beer.
Korean fried chicken became especially prominent in the 1970s, when cooking oil became more widely available. The first modern Korean fried-chicken franchise, Lims Chicken, opened in Seoul in 1977. The dish later developed into many styles, including plain huraideu-chikin, spicy yangnyeom-chikin and soy-based ganjang-chikin.
A related term is tongdak, meaning whole chicken, often used for older-style whole fried chicken. The famous chicken-and-beer pairing is called chimaek: a blend of chikin and maekju. Thus, dak is the bird, while chikin names the fried-chicken dish.