Fried Chicken…Again
Apologies for the redundancy but frying chicken deserves more than a recipe card. I would like to make certain difficult culinary endeavors easier for you, the reader and hopefully you, the cook.
Some people have an innate ability to cook and others are completely hopeless in the kitchen. If you fall into the latter category, I would recommend you refrain from frying chicken. But if you can follow a recipe, I’m confident I can help you with this task.
I have found patience is the key characteristic when it comes to cooking and it is imperative you have patience here.
My recipe for fried chicken begins by combining 2 cups of buttermilk, ¼ cup of Crystal Hot Sauce and 1 tablespoon of kosher salt. You can use your favorite hot sauce here but I have conducted many hot sauce taste tests and this is my winner for my fried chicken brine. I don’t think any greater detail is required here but do it and then add in your chicken.
Now the chicken. A whole chicken, broken into pieces, has 2 wings, 2 legs, 2 thighs and 2 breasts. 8 pieces. I highly recommend halving your chicken breast so you’re left with 2 wings, 2 legs, 2 thighs and 4 pieces of breast. This way all your pieces are relatively the same size. I prefer to fry skin on, bone in pieces but this recipe can be applied to any piece of chicken, including boneless, skinless chicken breast.
And now we’re patient. Ideally refrigerate your chicken in the brine overnight but 4 hours will suffice. Then we dredge. Combine 1 ½ cups flour, 1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt, 1 teaspoon black pepper and ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper. Then take your chicken pieces directly from the buttermilk mixture and coat in flour. Do not pat your chicken dry. Do not try to get the excess buttermilk off. Let the flour clump with the buttermilk on the chicken.
A cast iron skillet is one of my favorite pieces of cookware and I highly recommend owning one. So pull out your cast iron skillet but if that’s not an option, a dutch oven works just as well. I don’t recommend any other type of pot or pan. Fill your cast iron skillet or dutch oven with 2 inches of canola oil, peanut oil, avocado oil - any oil with a high smoke point. Do NOT fry in olive oil.
Oil temperature is the key to crispy skin and juicy meat. If your oil isn’t hot enough, you’ll get greasy fried chicken and if it’s too hot, you’ll have burnt skin and undercooked meat. To avoid this, invest in a candy/oil thermometer. Heat your oil to 350 degrees over medium-high heat and try to maintain your oil temperature between 325 and 350 degrees through the cooking process. Be sure your chicken is room temperature before frying, otherwise your oil temperature will drop rapidly when the chicken is added in.
This is when patience is really required. Wait for your oil to hit 350 degrees before adding in your chicken. Seriously, wait. Then once your chicken is added, don’t panic as the temperature drops. The oil temperature will rise again once the chicken begins to cook. If it does drop below 325 degrees, crank the heat a little but be sure to watch and turn down if it exceeds 350 degrees.
Fry each piece for about 4-5 minutes per side and then remove from the oil. Place on a rack over a paper towel-lined baking sheet. The internal temperature of each piece should read 165 degrees. The chicken skin will also darken slightly after removed from the oil so don’t freak out if your chicken isn’t golden brown!
If you’ve made it this far in this lengthy post about frying chicken, then I think you’re ready to fry some chicken!!! And if it doesn’t work out, there’s always takeout.