Saturday, September 3, 2011

Recipe: Are You (Fried) Chicken?

It’s my party and I’ll fry if I want to.

No time like the weekend to get your fried on! Today we take an extreme detour from the sugar highway to the Land of the Fry: America, baby! It’s funny how the brain works. This week I subjected mine to the happy combination of reading Heston Blumenthal’s In Search of Perfection with the television on in the background. About twenty KFC advertisements later, I had a powerful craving for some fried chicken.

Perfectly crispy. And preferably shaped like a dessert. Or a seashell or something.

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Signature range notwithstanding, the red, white and finger-lickin’ all over clearly wasn’t going to cut it. Lacking the hefty Heston funding, I embarked on a journey appropriate for the theme – the kind with Google as your tour guide and requiring no more movement than the range of your mouse.

Refusing to chicken out, I’m now sitting (quite heavily!) on the other side of four fried chicken meals in a row, and my apartment is littered with recipes mostly sporting the prefix ‘Southern’, ‘Mom’s Best’, or ‘X-TRA CRISPY’ but by gorge, I think I’ve got it!

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It’s important to note that this isn’t so much a recipe as it is a method. Fats on, fats off, Mr Miyagi!

Wet Ingredients

One chicken (in pieces) (or 4 legs/breast/thighs – whichever turns your head!)

Two/three beaten eggs or buttermilk

Oil (A neutral oil is best, like peanut)

Basic Dry Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour

Salt and pepper to your taste

Optional Variation on Dry Ingredients

Use your imagination!

For increased crisp: substitute some of the flour with tempura flour.

For seasoning: If you want an Asian-style fried chicken that’s more brown, add paprika and use white pepper. Other great seasonings include garlic powder, onion powder, chilli powder, or curry powder.

In these attempts, I used a 1:2 ratio of tempura flour to regular flour, paprika, white pepper, and garlic powder.

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Instructions

1. Mix the dry ingredients together by shaking them in a big freezer bag.

2. Soak the chicken pieces in buttermilk for 20 minutes, or simply dredge them thoroughly in the beaten egg/buttermilk.

3. Put the wet chicken pieces into the bag, twist or seal it shut, and toss the bag until each piece is thoroughly coated with the flour mixture.

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4. Put the chicken on a plate, cover with a clean cloth or sheet of plastic, and leave it in the fridge until the coating has reached a paste-like consistency.

It will be sticky. This will take over half an hour. For ease I suggest you complete these steps early in the day or the night before.

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5. Fill your skillet (or pot) with oil (1/3 full). You don’t need the chicken to be fully submerged in oil.

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Test oil with a wooden chopstick or the handle of a wooden spoon to make sure it's hot enough.

6. Heat the oil until it begins to smoke. Put the chicken in and flash-fry on one side, and then turn over. Chicken should be lightly golden all over.

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Flash-frying on the first side.

7. Cover the skillet, turn the heat down low and leave to cook for 25-30 minutes.

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Not yet crispy.

8. Uncover. The chicken should be cooked, golden, but soggy. Turn the heat up high again to finish frying to a crisp. This will take a few minutes.

9. Drain and serve!

The Result

Fool-proof fried chicken that is crunchy crispy but moist, juicy and (importantly!) cooked inside!

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Mine gets pretty brown from an excess of paprika and the zealous heat of my stove, but the meat is always as tender as a tot.

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It may not look like a cookie, but this chooky is pretty perfect! And I can always let the fried slide.

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P.S. This post marks the inaugural occasion of my new Nikon SLR being used! I still have a heap of backlogged photos from my canny old Canon though.

18 comments:

  1. i live in an tiny apartment so this would not do!

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  2. Michelle: I live in a tiny apartment too! I do have to yank the sliding doors wide open for a time during and after though! ;)

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  3. Oooomg this chicken.... I need some right now! Those have got to be the most mouth-watering photos I've ever seen of fried chicken! On that note, awesome shots! Are you in love with your new camera already? I remember when I got my DSLR I couldn't stop taking photos of anything and everything :P
    Thanks for a great post!

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  4. Bianca: I am totally in love yes haha it's like seeing everything through a new (flash) light ;)

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  5. OMG.... I love fried chicken but don't really do it because of the smoke and smell. yum yum yum!

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  6. Penny: Yes I prefer buying it usually, but I was a woman on a mission this time around ;)

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  7. oh man... reading this post is making me feel SO conflicted abt whether or not i should make fried chicken again... im always so turned off by the amount of oil splattered in my apt kitchen and especially how the steel pot gets so stained after the frying that its so hard to clean/scrape off after!!

    BUT, i can tell this was very rewarding for your despite all the hard work... so, the verdict is: I SHALL! thanks for making me desperate for fried chicken again =)

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  8. love to have them for dinner right now but where are the chips :)

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  9. Winston: You should totally do a blog post if you do, I'm still open to fried chicken tips! Also, I live in a tiny apartment as well - I find covering the pot (I use a pot) helps prevent a lot of oil splatter! :)

    AT: Haha I served it with rice - I figured fried chips AND fried chicken for four consecutive meals might be taking it a bit far ;)

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  10. Haha okay no probs... I hear ya abt the apt situation lol. You won't believe this, but one time I actually used my deep fryer in the balcony while holding a fan to make sure to blow the wind out of the apartment HAHA!!! but i still prefer using pot in apt...

    hey forgot ur nikon photos r really nice! esp the cooking process ones... very natural colour and sharp... mine always come out very "warm" from the light... enjoy the rest of ur weekend! =)

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  11. Winston: That's hilarious! I'll keep that in mind if I should ever get a deep fryer :) And you're too kind - I am the most amateurish of photographers really!

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  12. Mmmm, fried chicken!! It's calling out my name! It looks delicious!

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  13. Your photos and recipe have made me hungry despite the early hour here. I am new to your blog, so I took some time to browse through your earlier posts. I'm so glad I did that. I really like the food and recipes you feature here. I'll definitely be back. I hope you have a great day. Blessings...Mary

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  14. April: Yes, it's amazing the kind of pull fried chicken can have! :)

    Mary: Thanks, that's really terribly nice of you considering the calibre of your recipes to mine - and of course I'd only be too happy for you to visit again! :)

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  15. Seriously some good lookin fried goodness right here Vee!

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  16. Adrian: Haha I knew you of all people would definitely appreciate this one! ;)

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  17. Congrats on the new camera!!! A whole new world awaits.. BUT OMG>> Can I self invite to your place to taste test this out.. I love fried chicken.. heck anything fried really... PLEASE??? PRETTY PLEASE???

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  18. OM NOM NOM NOM. You're bringing out the African American from a Southern United State in me.

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