Fried chicken

mmmmmmm.. Fried Chicken, the ultimate after services dinner, late at night in china town. who's got a recipe

for Fried Chicken thats rivals the great fried chicken shops around. this can be a Chefsteps community recipe development!

Lets make the Ultimate Fried Chicken!!

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Matthew_Snyder_68770

This will be interesting to follow! I don't think I've ever made fried chicken the same way twice, just not able to find the right combination of flavors and textures.

I'm partial to a mix of cornstarch and rice flour, but I'm open to improvements!

My biggest issue is getting the skin to stay with the chicken while you eat. Usually take one bite and I've got 5 square inches of chicken skin in my mouth.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I like to do my breading in two stages. The first is just a seasoned flour mix (usually caryenne, ground dried thyme, salt, pepper) that the chicken is tossed in lightly to create a base, then I have a second bag with the same seasonings but then toss in about 1/4 cup buttermilk and some tabasco, and knead it to create a crumbly texture. The chicken goes from bag one to a quick dip in buttermilk and then right into bag two so you get a nice even base from bag one and then those great little nubs from bag two. I love the texture difference and I like it a lot better than doing a standard double breading which I find falls apart like you say @matthew.

My go to these days has been to sous vide the chicken first so when I'm frying it's really just to set the crust rather than worrying about cooking times.

quasius

I brined the chicken pieces with rosemary and lemon for the best fried chicken I have ever made. Air-dried, then seasoned flour-buttermilk-seasoned flour, and then into a fryer.

deanslist

@brendan would you say that gives a result close to Popeye's? I hold their chicken in high regard.

Jack_Mayer_85396

@Brendan, I had the same thought about cooking a Chicken Fried Steak sous vide to get it done to temp and then just doing the breading and frying to crisp it up. Shallow pan fry with one flip or dry fry? Do you brine the chicken pieces first or soak in buttermilk?

Brendan_Lee_56950

the crust i'd say is pretty similar, it has those small crunchy bits for texture while still having a thin crisp coating underneath. I don't really like the super thick crust you usually get on the KFC extra crispy variety.

I should add that I always do a 24 hour soak in a mix of buttermilk, tabasco, bay, thyme, peppercorns, cayenne, salt, and a touch of worcestershire. I haven't really weighed out the ingredients but if I can remember to the next time I will put up a recipe for the process.

Matt_67991

I kind of follow Michael Ruhlman's recipe, and coat with flour, buttermilk and then seasoned flour. I equilibrium brine at about 1%, and just kind of season the flour until it tastes right and fry at about 375F until it looks right. I do the dark meat first and hold in a warm oven.

It's not perfect, but I'm definitely down to change my approach and I think it would be interesting to see what everyone else does.

A problem I sometimes have is that the chicken is too juicy. Has anyone tried something like a methylcellulose prebatter?

Matthew_Snyder_68770

I've not tried that method yet, @BrendanLee. Well.... I sorta did. The chicken wings I made for the Big Game on Sunday were cooked improvised SV and bagged with extra virgin olive oil, sweatted onions, bay leaf and a lot of thyme, and then cooked for about two hours at 60°C. Quickly breaded in some seasoned cornstarch and then into 190°C peanut oil for about 2-3 minutes to brown and crisp up.

Brandon_34695

I've had good luck breading with Cup4Cup plus seasonings, which isn't terribly dissimilar from bespoke "Korean fried chicken" flour blends.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I really don't like battered fried chicken, I always feel like i'm eating chicken nuggets that way. My grandma used to do a nice rice flour batter similar to a fish and chips batter but fluffier for sweet and sour chicken but I don't think that would really resemble fried chicken as it is made in the US at least.

One thing I haven't tried but have thought about experimenting with would be to brine with baking soda and seasonings, frying the chicken bare to crisp the skin and then cooling and breading and frying again at a higher temp to just crisp the coating.

Jack_Mayer_85396

@B_Lee, that soak above sounds like something I'd like to take a bath in! Your latest thought on bare frying the chicken sounds interesting too.

Patrick_25681

Technique wise think that the sous vide to cook and then bread and fry to crisp up is the winner.

davidattala

I've tried traditional and sous-vide methods, but never the pressure cooker. I'm wondering if the CS recipe for wings can also be used for a fried chicken application. I used it for my Super Bowl party and enjoyed the fall-off-the-bone texture the wings had, not to mention a pretty crispy coating - though I think that aspect of it could have been better. Has anybody ever gone the pressure cooker route?

ipreferale

We have a 8 quart from this site http://www.pro-selections.com/category.cfm/199/ and have used their batter/fry mix with great success.

Samuel_68313

I am leaning towards making some fried chicken this week. I think I am going to try a 12 hour soak in buttermilk then cooked sous vide then finished in the normal style.

hughallen

Sounds good samuel, ill try the same thing but I'm going to make a 6% buttermilk brine and not going to sous-vid it first, fry it in plan flour, please post your results so we can compare them. go from there.

Jack_Mayer_85396

@SamuelG & @Hugh - really looking forward to seeing and reading about your results, thanks!

Samuel_68313

So I went for a 12 hour soak in plain buttermilk, then I cooked it sous vide at 65 for eight hours, then coated it in a spice rub of thyme, pepper, chilli powder, onion powder and salt. I then rubbed on some of the chicken jus and very lightly breadcrumbed it (as opposed to flour, did this on a hunch), and fried at 190 for about a minute.

It was okay, but I would definitely make some huge changes.

Pros

- Texture of the chicken was awesome

- I was very happy with the seasoning rub I made, tasted great

- Intense chicken flavour

Cons

- Breadcrumbs didn't stick too well, using jus and breadcrumbs was a big mistake, wish I had just used flour like normal

- It got too dark, it just didn't resemble what I would class as fried chicken (though the taste definitely did)

- Flesh needed a little extra seasoning, I would definitely lean towards a light brine, maybe with some of the seasoning rub I mentioned earlier

Brendan_Lee_56950

i've never done chicken that long before, i think the longest i've ever gone was like 4 hours and that was more of an accident. How was the texture of the flesh?

Samuel_68313

It's pretty much how I always do the legs tbh. It's obviously how I prefer it.

DiggingDogFarm_65362

I'm going to give this a try.

I made chicken leg confit a few nights ago....78 C for 8 hours...the texture was great but it wasn't as moist as expected....I think i'll give 65 C a try for that also.

Jack_Mayer_85396

@SamuelG - thanks for sharing your process with us! Looks pretty tasty to me! Next version will be a post-SV dip in buttermilk and seasoned flour before the fry step?

Samuel_68313

Basically yes. I think I will soak for 12 hours in buttermilk still, but with something else added. I am reluctant to go as far as 6% salt because I like a really salty skin and I think it'd be too much. Also in my experience brining chicken before sous vide cooking doesn't always yield as enjoyable a texture.

But to finish I will definitely dip in buttermilk, into seasoned flour and then fry.

I won't get a chance to try this for a couple of weeks though.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I'm going to document my process this week, I bought a chicken and some buttermilk yesterday so tonight I will portion it and do one batch brined and one batch in a buttermilk "brine" like I traditionally do. I'm really curious about the long cook times you use @SamuelG I may have to experiment with that on the legs.

merridith

I have tried many different methods including Thomas Keller's and Michael Ruhlman's. I always go back to the original…my original, that is. If I try something new, my family and friends complain. I have been making the original since I was 12 years old (and that is nearly 50 years). I season the AP flour well with salt, a fair bit of sweet paprika, a tiny little bit of garlic powder and some finely ground black pepper. The chicken pieces (boneless is best, except for wings) are dredged in the seasoned flour, then dipped in egg, and then back to the flour. I cook it a few pieces at a time, white with white and dark with dark, on a very high flame, in a deep pot with lots of vegetable oil. The fried pieces are kept warm on a rack in a cookie sheet in the 200F oven. It is really simple, really crispy and it is hard to stop eating! I don't eat fast food so I have no idea what Popeye's tastes like but people say mine is "the best." I will leave that up to you!

hughallen

Thanks for sharing SamuelG, I also haven't cooked chicken that long. I'm interested to see the texture of the flesh. The brine was more for the for the texture benefits, helps prevent it from drying out, and also enhancing its natural chicken flavour, ill let you know if its still overly salty with the skin also getting seasoned as well when i do tests.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I put a half chicken in a 1.5% brine and the other half in a buttermilk tabasco mix. Both will be down for 24h and then I'm going to cook them 65C for 4 hours before frying.

Brendan_Lee_56950

As promised here is the fried chicken recipe I came up with this week. I did a side by side with a traditional buttermilk soak vs. a 1.5% salt brine and both were cooked sous vide for 4 hours at 65C and then breaded and fried. As you can see the texture (and flavor) of the brined chicken was much much better, it was pretty amazing how you could see it visually in appearance.

Here's the written recipe. Let me know how it goes and what changes you would make. I still think there is a little fine tuning in the breading to go but this is a great base recipe IMO. http://www.chefsteps.com/activities/sous-vide-fried-chicken

Pepijn_31744

Wow what a difference, didn't expect the brine to have such an effect. The endresult looks great. I'll try your recipe later and will report back if I would change anything. Thanks for sharing!

Samuel_68313

Really magnificent work there, very very well cataloged and it looks great.

I personally find the amount of ingredients in the rub to be a little low, and would like some dried thyme in there as well.

How did the breast compare to the leg? I find four hours at 65 to be a little too much for breast but the brine might help with that.