Galactic Fried Chicken

The Story

You just may drive past it. It sits on the main drag of a small Kentucky town southeast of Cincinnati, a brick corner storefront with blue clapboard upstairs, a red barrel awning, and flower boxes somebody actually waters. Your phone will try to put you in the alley behind the building (we've asked Google to fix). Know that there is a public parking lot less than a hundred feet away. Patio out back, but raining day we swung by.

Know what you are walking into. This is a dive. Dayton is an old river town, the building has been standing a long time, and nothing about the place is trying to be fine dining. If that is a problem for you, it is going to be a problem the whole time.

Inside is a pressed copper tin ceiling over green vinyl stools and a counter face buried in stickers. There is a Rebel Alliance flag, a NASA flag, a United Federation of Planets banner, Han Solo frozen in carbonite on the door to the back, and a flatscreen mounted inside an old wooden console TV cabinet playing a loop of animated space. None of it matches the room. All of it belongs. In its own way, it's perfect.

Locals know about it, as there was a steady stream of people known by name when they came in to grab some takeout.

The Food

The limited, yet ample, menu puts Galactic's vibe on full display, starting with deviled eggs, which I never would have expected. The eggs were a tad looser than I normally eat them, and carrying smoke. But it worked well enough that I bought six more to take home. The Galactic sauce carries the same smoke, and they make it in house. That is not a coincidence, and once you catch it you catch it everywhere. Gary, who took my order and who makes a point of learning every guest's name, told me to mix the Galactic sauce with the Texas Pete sitting on the table if I wanted to pull the smoke all the way forward. He was right.

The chicken is excellent and it is different. The breading is rice flour and potato starch and it means nearly the whole menu is gluten free. It also means the crust behaves differently. It comes out pale and craggy instead of dark, and it does not reach the shattering crunch a wheat flour dredge gives you. What it does instead is hold together, stay crisp, and keep the brined meat hot and juicy underneath. Show up expecting the other thing and you will notice what is missing. Everyone enjoy and celiacs rejoice.

The slaw is right. Creamy without drowning, enough tang to land. The loaded fries are, well, loaded. Ranch comes on them already, and another splash on top does not hurt. The bacon is big crisp pieces off real bacon, not the dried bits some kitchens hope you will not look at. They are not going to blow you out of the water, but you are not going to stop eating them either.

Then there is the boozy shake. Dairy free, gluten free, served in a mason jar, and they will put Old Barstow bourbon in it. I took the caramel first (and vanilla second). Sweet, cold, and the right call on a hot afternoon. You can get it alcohol-free too, if bourbon isn't your thing. I have been in a lot of restaurants. I had never had a bourbon milkshake while They Might Be Giants' Birdhouse in Your Soul played over the speakers, sandwiched between the Cranberries, Johnny Cash, Social Distortion, and Beastie Boys. I chatted with the Galactic team about the music and they said they try to play things that people will enjoy to keep their patrons entertained. It works too.

The Point

There is a laminated sign by the paper towels and the bucket of wrapped plastic forks. It asks you to leave everything on the table when you are finished. It thanks you for wanting to help and tells you they are happy to clear it themselves.

That sign is the whole place. Paper towels on a stand, sauce dialed into paper cups, a bathroom that is tiny and about forty years behind. Nothing spent on presentation and all of it spent on you. They built me a combination that is not on the board because it came out cheaper. They walked me through which items have gluten and which do not before I had to ask twice. The check was reasonable enough and I took two bags full home to the fam. Daughter tried as soon as I got there and said the fingers were very good (although chastised me for not bringing some ranch with them).

Best of Cincinnati plaques hang by the door, one for every year since 2022. They are earned.

I am calling this Worth a Short Detour, and I want to be clear about why. The food is good. It is not the thing that will reorder your week. What you are going for is the whole hour: the room, the records, the sauces, the guy who learns your name before you have finished ordering.

It was a debate on Worth the Drive, but that's a pretty exclusive list. We will certainly be back and encourage people on a certain mission to give Galactic your attention. If a funky little dive with good chicken is the specific thing you are hunting, drive for it and do not think twice. And if you eat gluten free, drive for it. A fried chicken joint where nearly the whole menu is open to you is not something you find in the next town over, and this one is run by people who will walk you through every item without making it a production.