It’s hard to believe, but we actually know a handful of people who are somehow so enraptured by the smoky allure of Southside 815’s bar scene that they’ve never once bothered to sample anything beyond its libation. While we’re normally all about compelling such folks to chase their pints of Dogfish with Southside’s excellent “drunken” pot roast or vinegary housemade “state fair” pickles, we’d just as soon they remain sequestered at the bar on Thursday nights. That’s because we don’t need the extra competition for Southside’s Thursday night fried chicken special (of course, we’re always happy to share with you).

We’ve enjoyed a battered and fried bird at all manner of country food shacks and soul food diners throughout the D.C. area, as well as in the greater South, and Southside has some of the best fried chicken we’ve ever had. And the restaurant is apparently sufficiently confident of its deep frying prowess that this is the only special we’ve ever seen listed on their menu with the warning that it’s available from 5 p.m. until its gone.

Now we realize that Southern regional purists will likely sneer at Southside’s sprawling pan-Southern menu that draws its influences from the Low Country to Creole Country. Nevertheless, Southside is one of those rare restaurants that can successfully pull off such broad ambitions.