I think the real reason is that I was recently reading a blog about a fast food pop up in Kentish Town called Lucky Chip's Fried Chicken. It sounded like it kicked Colonel Sanders arse and I was planning on dragging Rhid up there a few weekends back to try it out. Through a catalogue of failures we missed the lunch service by 15 minutes and I only found out later that it was the last day! This lit a bit of a fried chicken fire inside me and I began to ask Google, 'Where is the best fried chicken in London?'.
Do you know where the best friend chicken in London is? Do you? According to every food blog I can find. Only Lucky-sodding-Chip in Kentish-bastard-Town!
So, if I can't get my hands on that version then I'm going to bloody make my own. I've started reading lots of accounts on how you can get the combination of soft and tender meat, crispy coating and of course that 'special' blend of spices which we've all been told about since birth.
One of the things that I've found out which I think is really interesting is that you don't get the soft flesh by slow cooking the chicken. This is normally what I'd do with joints of chicken as I love the flavour and the moist flesh but I'm not really a fan of chewy meat and gnawing at bones. No, in fact you get that soft meat by soaking the meat overnight in buttermilk. The culture in the buttermilk is supposed to breakdown the meat proteins Apparently it's similar to brineing meat but with the added bonus that it adds a really nice flavour as well as tenderising.
The other myth apparently is that the chicken is battered. No, it seems that the crunchy coating is only flour. I can't see how this in going to work but I'm prepared to give it a go. Here's how it went...
The process is actually remarkably simple. Soak the chicken in butter milk, coat it in seasoned flour and fry on each side for six minutes. I was quite intimidated before I started, but next time I'd be much more relaxed about it. The main reason for nerves were because I'm not that used to deep frying. Hot oil scares me and I don't think it's something that people of my generation do very much. I remember my mum always having a deep fat fryer and making home made chips. However the health junkies have beaten us into a grilling and steaming submission. Bastards.
They came out looking remarkably authentic and I was dead chuffed. I put them in the oven to keep warm, desperate to try them. Then our guests got stuck in traffic and where half an hour late. Argh! But when they got here and we finally tucked in. I was so chuffed. The chicken was meltingly tender and the seasoned coating was crispy and tasty. A definite result and I'll definitely do this again, but maybe not for a while.
I served this with maple and mustard pulled pork, which was amazing! Coated in marinate and done in the slow cooker for 8 hours then finished in the oven. I'd add a photo but it looked like cat food. We also traditional American cornbread, which was essentially just a slightly savoury cake with sweetcorn in it. Weird!
Anyway, here is the recipe for the chicken. The only thing I would change would be to add more salt, but then I'm a bit of a salt demon. I also added some onion powder to the recipe I found so you could leave that out if you wanted. I also soaked the chicken in butter milk for about 20 hours. I've read that you can do it for anything up to two days. Although there does seem to be a risk of the meat going soggy:
Southern Fried Chicken
300ml buttermilk
1 tsp salt
6 pieces of chicken (I use a mixture of legs and thighs)
150g plain flour
½ tsp salt
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper
½ tsp smoked paprika
Vegetable oil, for frying
Combine the buttermilk and salt in a bowl large enough to hold the chicken, and add the meat, spooning the buttermilk over it to coat. Cover and refrigerate for about 8 hours, allowing it to return to room temperature before cooking.
Put the flour, salt and spices in a large, flat dish and whisk briefly to combine. Put 1.5cm of vegetable oil into a wide, straight-sided pan with a lid and heat until very hot: a cube of bread should brown almost immediately (about 170C). Wipe as much buttermilk off the chicken pieces as possible then roll them in the seasoned flour until thoroughly coated.
Put the chicken in one layer in the pan (you may need to do this in batches, depending on the size of the pan) and cover. Turn the heat right down and simmer for 6 minutes, then turn the chicken pieces over, cover again and cook for another 6 minutes. Prepare a rack to drain the chicken.
Turn the heat up and fry the chicken until it's a deep golden colour on all sides. Transfer to the rack and blot with kitchen paper. Allow to cool slightly before serving.
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