Thai Fried Chicken Wings

If I had a dollar for every time I said I love fried chicken wings...

I finally made Pim's Thai Fried Chicken recipe using chicken wings. I had a family sized package in the freezer and have not fried anything in over a month (unheard of!). I like cooking with wings since I seem to have a better handle on cooking it just right. Besides, how can you resist those cute little and delicious drummettes.

I didn't do anything too different from Pim's original recipe. I do, however, like my fried chicken (wings and other parts) very crunchy. So instead of putting straight into the oil after dredging, I let the wings sit a bit to help crust formation. I then dredged it one more time and then shaking off excess flour before putting them into the oil. While one batch was cooking, which took about 7 minutes to cook through and to get a nice golden brown, I would dredge the next batch and let them rest. Then while the oil was getting back up to temperature (350 degrees), I'd dredge them again and then into the oil. If you like the thinner crust, just follow Pim's original directions. Either way, I think you'll love these.

Here's what I modified for the chicken wings.

Ingredients:
3-4 lbs of chicken wings, separated, discard tips
6-8 cloves of garlic, peeled
1 Tbsp coarsely chopped cilantro stalks
1 Tbsp ground black pepper
1 tsp kosher salt (or other course salt)
6 Tbsp oyster sauce
1/3 cup fish sauce
2 cups of rice flour, you might need more if double dredging
Canola oil for frying

In a small food processor, ground cilantro stalks, garlic and salt until you get a rough paste. You can also do this in a mortar/pestle or using the flat side of a wide knife to grind into paste.

In a large container or food storage bag, combine paste with oyster sauce, fish sauce and ground pepper. Add chicken wings and mix until all wings have been coated. Marinate in the refrigerator for at least 3 hours. About half way through the marinating time, retoss to make sure all the wings get equal marination.

In a Dutch oven, add about 1 - 1 1/2" of oil. Heat oil to 350 - 360 degrees Fahrenheit. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit; put a cooling rack on top of a baking sheet into the oven. This will keep the cooked wings warm and crispy as you finish frying all the wings.

Put rice flour in a medium to large bowl for dredging. Dredge the wings and let rest for a few minutes. I did this while the oil was just reaching 350 degrees F. Dredge the wings again and shake off excess flour and gently put it into the hot oil. I was able to get about 9-10 wing sections into my DO and adjusted the heat to keep the temperature around 315 degrees F. The wings were done around 7-8 minutes.

Drain the wings on paper towel for a minute or two before putting it into the oven. I did this to remove any excess oil that might have been on the wings. Let the oil temperature come back to 350 degrees before putting in the next batch. Continue frying up remaining wings in the same way.

The wings were not greasy at all and were wonderfully crunchy and mouth-smacking good! We had them with some macaroni salad and steamed white rice. Delicious! The Mister said these were the most crunchiest chicken to date and called them "money." What more can I want? Okay, maybe a vacation to Hawaii but I'll take what I can get!

Hope y'all are having a wonderful week. Now go and eat well.

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Pim's Thai Fried Chicken

What can I say, I love fried foods. And the latest new recipe I tried was Chez Pim's Thai-Marinated Fried Chicken. Pim's secret is using rice flour. I tried rice flour once with the Korean Fried Chicken Wings to see what kind of crust it produced. Rather than mixing in the rice flour with the sauce, I marinated the wings in the sauce alone and then dredged in rice flour. The resulting crunch was nice but the color of the crust had a whitish/grey color. This is what happened with my Thai fried chicken, too.

If you look at Pim's pictures, hers are nice and golden brown.

And you see here mine, it's got some golden brown but didn't turn out as pretty as Pim's. The slight white/grey coloring, almost powderish looking crust was on all of the drumsticks. But it sure tasted good and the crunch was very nice! Maybe I coated mine a little too much with rice flour and should have been more of a dusting, now that I compare my picture to Pim's. In Pim's, you can see some of the chicken and meat, where mine is completely coated. The oil temperature may have been a little too low too since it was taking almost 15 minutes on the first side and another 8 minutes on the second side. I'll have to play around with the heat a bit more. (I figured out why this happened! See my postscript at the end of the post.)

But even if my drumsticks aren't as pretty, they sure were tasty! As a matter of fact, The Mister said he'd rather have these over the Korean Fried Chicken Wings! I don't know if I'd go so far to compare the two since they are 2 different birds (ahem, sorry for the bad pun). They both deserve their own spotlights I think. The Thai fried chicken is salty, savory, and you can just make out the garlic and cilantro taste. The Korean fried chicken is all about the spicy-sweet balance. Different tastes, different crusts. Both really good.

So if you like Asian-style fried chicken, this is one you're got to try!

Postscript: SO! I figured out why my drumsticks were getting the gray color after frying. Thinking about it now, I feel kind of silly that I overlooked such a simple thing. I was at 99 Ranch last week and decided to pick up a new package (different brand) of rice flour. As I was looking over the brands, it dawned on me that the rice flour I had at home which I used for these drumsticks were probably glutinous (mochi) rice flour. I decided to buy a Thai brand of rice flour and when I came home, compared the two and sure enough, that was it! That was my problem, wrong kind of rice flour. Sheesh.

I made a batch with the correct rice flour and it turned out golden brown just like Pim's and tasted even better than with the glutinous rice flour. It was so crunchy and it didn't really matter how much rice flour I had on the drumsticks. I have to agree with The Mister now that I think I like these over the Chicken Alice-style fried wings.

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Braised Chicken with Mushrooms and Almonds

Braising is a technique that I've really become quite fond. I've used it on short ribs and whole chicken. Since The Mister and I are dark meat fans, I thought I'd try a braised chicken dish with just dark meat. Anne Burrell's recipe for Braised Chicken with Mushrooms and Almonds sounded perfect since we love mushrooms (you can find the recipe here). When I first read the recipe, it was a little confusing to me as to how long it would take to make since I wasn't sure if the total prep time (40 min) included the "inactive" prep time (35 min). I don't really know what is meant by inactive prep time. I thought maybe it was watching the chicken cook while sipping on some white wine, or not. In the end, it took about 2.5 hours, which includes all prep time and cooking time (with a few sips of wine thrown in!).

I only had 6 chicken thighs for the recipe and used the following assortment of mushrooms (starting from upper right): Shiitake, Oyster, Button, Portabella, and Cremini also known as brown mushrooms (center).


Here's what the thighs looked like after searing (searing took about 6 minutes on each side). The skin is very crispy with most of the fat rendered out.

I used about 2 lbs of mushrooms like the recipe calls for but it was a bit more than what the dish needs. That is unless you like a little chicken with your mushroom dish. I'd say you can get away with 1 - 1 1/2 lbs of mushrooms.

After cooking down the onions, mushrooms, and garlic, it was time for the wine. I used the whole 2 cups of wine but think I'll reduce that to 1 1/2 cups of wine the next time since I like a little more milder wine flavor. Once the liquid has been reduced by half, I added about 3 cups of broth to just cover the thighs. Here's what it looks like right before simmering for 30-35 minutes.

I decided to make more garlic mashed potatoes since my Yukon Golds were getting a bit old. And I thought the sauce from the chicken would go really well with mashed potatoes.

Here's another shot of the final dish plated. A large scoop of garlic mashed potatoes, layered with 2 braised chicken thighs, some sauce and lots of mushrooms.

It was a very tasty and hearty dish. The almond puree added a lot of flavor and pop to the sauce although I had an "ah-ha" moment when I added it. Wonder if I could substitute it with almond paste or almond butter? Might try that next time to save time on blanching the almonds (I had to blanched my own almonds because I couldn't find any when I went to the store, a bit time consuming). Definitely a dish I'll make again and with some minor adjustments on wine and salt, it could be outstanding.

Hope everyone is having a great week. Now go and eat well.

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French Chicken in a Pot with Garlic Mashed Potatoes

The weather has been cold and wet and what better way to stave off dreary weather blues than a hearty chicken dinner. I saw this recipe either on Cook's Country or America's Test Kitchen (I can't remember which one) and knew immediately that The Mister would love it. A very straightforward slow cook recipe that results in a very tender and juicy chicken.

The recipe states a chicken between 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 lb will take about 1 hour to cook, while a 5-6 lb will take between 1.5 to almost 2 hours. I used a 5 1/2 lb chicken, which took approximately 1.5 hours.

I'm sure chicken parts can be used instead of a whole chicken but just make sure you check on the meat temperature for doneness a littler earlier since chicken parts will cook faster than a whole chicken. The recipe also recommends not using a chicken larger than 5 lb if cooking in a 5-quart pot.

The only change I made to the recipe is adding 2 carrots and increasing the celery to 2.

Ingredients:
1 whole roasting chicken (4 1/2 to 5 pounds), giblets removed and discarded
2 teaspoons kosher salt or 1 teaspoon table salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil (I used extra virgin)
1 small onion , chopped medium
2 small stalk celery , chopped medium
2 small carrots, chopped medium
6 medium garlic cloves, smashed, peeled and trimmed
1 bay leaf
1 medium sprig fresh rosemary (optional)
1/2 - 1 teaspoon juice from 1 lemon

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F and adjust the oven rack to the lowest position.

Pat the chicken dry with paper towels. Season the entire chicken with salt and pepper. I like to season the inside cavity, too.

Heat oil in a large Dutch oven (I used a 7 1/2 quart DO) at medium heat. When the oil is just smoking, add the chicken breast-side down. You should hear a good sizzle. Add the celery, carrots, garlic, bay leaf, and rosemary into the pot. Cook until the breast is lightly browned, about 4-5 minutes.

Flip the chicken over. I used a large, sturdy wooden spoon inserted into the cavity to flip it. Continue cooking with breast-side up until chicken and vegetables are well browned, ~6-8 minutes more. Here's what it looked like after flipping.


Remove DO from heat. Place a large sheet of foil over the pot and cover tightly with the lid. This will ensure all the steam stays within the pot. Transfer the DO to the oven and cook until the breast registers 160 degrees F in the thickest part and 175 degrees F in the thighs. See above regarding roasting time.

Take the chicken out of the DO and onto a carving board that has grooves to catch juices. Tent with foil and rest for 20 minutes. I just reused the foil from the pot. I was nicely surprised that the majority of the browning stayed on the breast (the show stated that the chicken would lose quite a bit of the browning).


Strain chicken juices from the pot through a strainer into fat separator. I pressed on the solids to extract some of the yummy liquid goodness. This should yield about 3/4 cups of juices. Discard solids. You should have about 3/4 cup juices. Allow liquid to settle 5 minutes, then pour into saucepan, leaving out the fat, and set over low heat.

Carve the chicken and adding any accumulated juices to saucepan. Add lemon juice 1/2 teaspoon at a time into jus to taste. I added about 1 teaspoonful. Serve chicken with jus on the side. You'll have plenty of jus leftover but don't throw it away. See note at bottom of post.

I served the chicken with a side of garlic mashed potatoes. The garlic mash potatoes are very easy to make. The following will make about 2-3 servings.

Ingredients:
2 lbs Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and quartered
4-6 cloves of garlic, smashed and peeled (add more or less to taste, we like a lot of garlic)
~1/3 cup heavy cream
Kosher salt
Fresh ground black pepper

Place potatoes and garlic into a large pot and cover with water. I usually add enough water to come up about 1" above the potatoes. Salt the water (I add about a good tablespoon). Bring everything to a boil on high heat. Reduce heat to medium and cook the potatoes until a parring knife can go through the potato fairly easily with no resistance. Be careful not to overcook the potatoes.

Drain the potatoes and put back into the pot. Don't forget to put the garlic back in, too. Use a potato masher to mash the potatoes and garlic together until no more lumps. Add heavy cream to mixture. Use the masher to incorporate the cream into the mixture. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.

If you like your mashed potatoes creamier, you can add another 1/4 cup of heavy cream.

Side note on leftover jus: The jus contains a lot of flavor (from all those broken down connective tissues!) which can be used to flavor many things (soup stock, sauteed mushrooms or onions, etc.). It will congeal when cold, which makes defatting so much easier, and can be stored up to a week in the refrigerator. You can also freeze it, too. I used some leftover jus to heat up some leftover chicken for sandwiches the next day (post to come).

Hope everyone has a wonderful week. Now go and eat well.

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Garlic Korean Fried Chicken Wings

Before I ever tried Chicken Alice's Korean Fried Chicken (KFC) wings (original recipe here, mmm-yoso's version here, and my version here), I made a batch of "garlic" KFC. We love garlic and this recipe really sounded good. Love garlic or not, I was a bit hesitant because garlic burns quickly and deep frying a whole lot of minced garlic could be...a bitter catastrophe. But being a wing-aholic, and encouragement from the Mister, I gave it a shot.


The results were a bit mixed at first. As you might see in the picture, the little darker spots were the pieces of garlic and some of them did seem a little overcooked, giving a taste that was slightly bitter and sweet. On first bite, I wasn't quite sure how to react but there was a subtlety to the fried garlic and by the second bite, I was hooked. The Mister said they were really good, different and addictive. There definitely was a garlic aftertaste, not bad and again sweet. And certainly no fear of vampires visiting me in bed that night.

And sitting here now, thinking about the taste of these little delectable wings makes me want to whip up a batch for this weekend. Perhaps for tomorrow's Sabres game. Not quite Buffalo wings but wings, nonetheless.

Ingredients:

5 lb chicken wings
1/2 onion, grated or minced finely
2 Tablespoons salt
2 Tablespoons ground pepper
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/4-1/3 cup minced garlic cloves (as much as you can take!)
1/2 teaspoon ginger powder or 1 teaspoons fresh grated ginger
1 egg yolk

Directions:

In a large mixing bowl, add all the ingredients except chicken wings. Mix thoroughly, the batter should be thick and paste-like. If you're willing, taste the batter to adjust for taste (too sweet, too salty, not enough, etc.).

Add wings to the batter and mix well. Let marinade in the refrigerator for 2-3 hours. The longer the better. You can also let it marinate overnight.

Take the wings out 1 hour prior to frying.

Preheat oil to 350 degrees F. I used my Dutch oven to provide the depth needed for deep frying (a Lodge cast iron skillet won't cut it here). Use a candy/deep fry thermometer to monitor oil temperature. You don't want your oil to get too hot on this one. Depending on the type of oil you use, type of frying vessel, how large the wings are, it will take anywhere from 6-10 minutes for the wings to cook.

Don't crowd your pot. Cook in batches. You might also need to adjust the temperature to make sure the wings cook all the way through without burning the outside. I've learned that I need to have the actual cooking temperature (once the food has been added) to be around 325 degrees F when I'm using the Dutch oven.

Think I might just whip up a batch this weekend. Aloha Friday everyone. Have a fantastic weekend. Now go and eat well.

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Chicken Fingers - Revisited

Every now and then, I go back and reread some of the recipes I posted. I made chicken fingers again this past weekend and realized that somewhere along the line, I've started to lean towards deep frying the chicken fingers rather than pan frying. I'm still pan frying but I'm adding more oil that barely covers the fingers, almost deep frying. I found that this cooks the chicken wings quicker and more evenly.

I also discovered something interesting due to a brain fart and lack of timing. The chicken fingers were done before the fries were done, by 12 minutes! I was in a dilemma because I did not want soggy chicken fingers and since the fries were being baked, I couldn't tent foil the fingers in the oven. So I resorted to "refrying" (egad!) the fingers once the fries were done at the risk of them being too oily.

The oil temperature kept well in the Staub Dutch oven so it didn't take long to get the oil temperature back up to 350 degrees. But something in the back of my head (where all the useless information resides) told me to heat the oil a little higher for the second fry. Some Korean chicken wings place do this to get an extra crisp on the wings. So I let the temperature rise to around 365 degrees before test frying my first strip (better a soggy finger than a burnt finger, I guess). It only took about 30 seconds in the oil until the outside crisped up. So I proceeded to refry the rest of the chicken fingers. All in all, took only a few minutes to refry the whole batch.

To my surprise, the chicken fingers were not any oilier than the first fry and the crust stayed crunchy much longer. My guess is that the fingers had cooled down before going in the second time and were not in the oil long enough to soak up excess oil. Although I wouldn't go out of my way to do a second frying but it's nice to know that they can withstand a second "crisping."

Have a good hump day. Now go and eat well.

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Chicken Adobo

The chicken adobo recipe that I use includes a step to brown the chicken. Being lazy, I have skipped this part and the dish still comes out pretty good. A couple of friends who make this dish a lot told me they sometimes skip browning step too. I particularly like this recipe because the chicken adobo doesn't come out as vinegary as some that I've had. I like the taste of vinegar but not to where it overwhelms the dish. I also like the addition of onions since I think it adds a nice flavor to the overall gravy.

Ingredients:
3 lbs chicken, cut to serving pieces*
5-6 cloves of garlic, minced
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/3 cup vinegar
2 cups of water
1 teaspoon paprika
5 bay leaves
4 Tablespoons of cooking oil or olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Slurry Ingredients:
2 Tablespoons water
2 Tablespoons cornstarch

* Note: I like to remove the majority of the skin.

Instructions:
In a big sauce pan, heat 2 tablespoons of oil on medium heat and sauté the onions until soft (about 6 minutes). Add garlic and sauté for another 2 minutes. Be careful not to burn the garlic.

Add the chicken to the pan. Add water, soy sauce, vinegar, paprika and the bay leaves. Bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes or until the chicken is tender.

Heat 2 tablespoon cooking oil in another pan. Add the chicken from the sauce pan and brown the chicken for a few minutes on all sides. Transfer the browned chicken back to the sauce pan.

Make the slurry by dissolving the cornstarch in water. Add the slurry to the sauce pan, stir thoroughly. Add salt and pepper to taste (I like to add fresh ground pepper but find no need for additional salt). Bring to a boil then simmer for an additional 5 minutes.

Remove the bay leaves before serving. Serve hot on plain rice.

As you can see in the picture, the chicken is very light in color, lighter than most adobo dishes I've gotten from take out restaurants. A few sprinkles of parsley or cilantro would have improved the presentation but it still tasted great. One of the variations of this recipe is to add half pork and half chicken. I have not tried it but it's simple to adjust. Just substitute half the chicken with pork and follow the recipe. I would think browning the pork would really add a whole new dimension in taste.

BTW, I've added pictures to the Dr. Pepper Pineapple Spare Ribs post. Instead of over rice, I served it over macaroni this last time. I enjoyed it even more with mac.

Have a good week. Now go and eat well.

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Korean Style Wings

Sorry for the delay on this post. All I can say is thank goodness it's Aloha Friday. And doubly thankful the temperature has finally cooled down a bit. Okay, now to the food...

Should be no surprise that I love fried foods but then I don't really know anyone who doesn't like fried foods. I don't eat it all that often (but the Mister would argue that point) but I certainly get cravings for it. The latest fried food item have been Korean style chicken wings. The first try was using a very garlicky not-so-spicy recipe I found--somewhere. It was pretty good overall in taste and crunchiness but it didn't have the spiciness I liked in wings. Also, the recipe called for a lot of garlic chunks in the batter which some ended up burning during the frying process. This created a slight bitterness to the flavor which got to be a bit overwhelming after eating a few.

What I really wanted to use was Chicken Alice's recipe with Kirk's (mmm-yoso) modifications. You can read about Chicken Alice and her famous wings in Honolulu Star-Bulletin's article here. Kirk's adjustments are here. But I have 2 problems to overcome. I can't find the special ingredient that makes the wings, Park's Brand Kim Chee Sauce. It's a product from Hawaii and needs to be refrigerated, I'm guess that's why we can't find it here. The second problem and biggest challenge is that I've never tasted Chicken Alice's wings so I don't even have that to go on. My family had moved from Hawaii before Chicken Alice was even around and by the time I learned about it, her restaurant had closed. But I did hear a rumor that she is now serving up her wings at another place (name escapes me right now).

So literally in the dark, I decided to just do some wings using the recipe and adding *most* of the ingredients that are in Park's Brand KC sauce (chili pepper, garlic, fish sauce, sugar, paprika, salt, ginger). The sauce also includes MSG (which I don't use) and water. The results were pretty good and it looked a bit like Kirk's picture of his wings but it lacked the slight stickiness characteristics. Well, I realized after the fact that I forgot to add the fish sauce but that still wouldn't account for the lack of stickiness. My thought, more sugar! It also lacked any discernible heat. More chili! I remedied the need for more spiciness by mixing up some hot sauce and tossing it like Buffalo style wings. Not too bad. Kirk recommended adding more garlic and sugar and that the fish sauce was a key part of the wings. (Note to self, don't forget the fish sauce!).

So last weekend and despite the heatwave, I decided to go ahead with my plan to make the chicken wings again with adjustments. Since the recipe called for 1/3 cup of Park's Brand KC sauce, I used the ingredients list to create about a 1/3 cup of my own sauce using Korean chili pepper powder, Asian chili paste, Korean chili paste (kochujang - I love this stuff), grated garlic (about 8 toes), about a tablespoon of fish sauce, 2 tablespoon of sugar, 2 teaspoon of salt, minced ginger. I really didn't measure and eyeballed everything (out of habit) and I regret not doing so now because I really still need to make some more adjustments on the sauce. But more later on that.

From this point on, I followed Kirk's recipe and here's what the batter looked like. Sorry the lighting in the kitchen is just horrible and having it in a red bowl doesn't help with photo either. The batter wasn't *pink* like the article described but I didn't expect it to be with all the chili stuff I put in.


I marinated the wings overnight and the next day, I was ready to fry! I used my Dutch oven and peanut oil for the frying part. For some reason, and it could have been the heatwave or something in the batter, but the first few batches of wings were coming out really really dark, close to burnt. I know the recipe calls for deep brown but I don't think they meant burnt. The candy thermometer was reading 350 degrees F but the wings were starting to turn dark around the 6 minute mark but they needed to cook at least 8 minutes to be done. I had to make several adjustments on the temp with the next couple of batches and finally ended at 325 degrees F to get the wings to cook all the way through and without completely burning the crust. Here's what the final batch looked like. You can still seem some burnt edges.


Results:
Taste was pretty good, definitely more spicy this time although it could have been hotter for me. Good crunch and just a hint of stickiness. But I think the batter could have used more salt, even more garlic and more sugar. I will be curious to see if I have the same problems with temperature control the next go around.

A side story since I'm on the subject of frying. I bought an electric deep fryer about 2 weeks ago since I though it would be easier than trying to control the heat on my crappy, old ceramic electric stove. I bought one that could hold 1 gallon of oil and had the immersion heating element. Well, I decided to take it back because 1) the timer was nothing but a really cheap egg timer that would ding at the 2-minute mark (the sales lady assured me that's how it comes from the manufacturer - like that's suppose to make me go, "oh, well then, I'll keep the defective product since the manufacturer intended it to be that way!"). And 2) I checked the oil temperature with my digital thermometer and the oil never got hotter than 365 degrees F. It's suppose to get at least 375 degrees F. But I knew this was one of the biggest consumer complaints in many of the electric deep fryers brands. So back it went. I also mentioned to the sales lady that I think there's something wrong with the heating element and the oil is not getting hot enough as advertised. And I think I overheard her tell the store manager that the only thing was the timer so she's going to put it back on the shelf. WHAT????? Whatever. Just made a mental note not to buy small kitchen appliances there anymore.

So I'm back to my Dutch oven for small fry jobs and as a compromise, I bought a new 14" carbon steel wok (from The Wok Shop) which I use for larger fry jobs. I've been meaning to buy a new wok anyway so this will kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

Have a wonderful weekend! Now go and eat well.

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Chicken Fingers with Honey Mustard Dipping Sauce and Sweet Potato Fries

Last night's dinner was chicken fingers with honey mustard dipping sauce with a side of sweet potato fries. All 3 items were first timers and according to the Mister, this meal was out of the ballpark! Oh yeah, I noticed something yesterday while I was making dinner. Apparently I can't operate a camera while I'm cooking. Is that like walking and chewing bubble gum at the same time? So you guessed it, no pictures again, sorry.

I made the fingers similar to that of my fried chicken recipe, except I did a double dip. I wanted to see if double dipping (actually, double dipping and dredging) would create a nicer crust. It turned out really good. I might add more spices next time since I think an extra kick would go really well with the honey mustard sauce.

Since I had the electric wok all set up for frying, I decided to finally use the sweet potatoes I had lying around. Gave me a chance to use my Bron-Coucke mandoline. The fries turned out thinner than I had wanted but it still fried up nice on a test fry. The fries were really good, even cold. They didn't crisp up as much as I would have liked but maybe an extra minute or two would have done the trick. Tasty nonetheless (the Mister was going to town on them).

The following recipe for the chicken fingers estimates 1 chicken breast per person. If you're feeding big appetites, make about 1.5 chicken breasts per person. The prep areas were similar to other fry foods. The "raw" area consists of 1 bowl of flour and 1 bowl of buttermilk (for the second dipping). I didn't use a raw resting area since I added the strips directly after the second dredging. The "cooked" area was a resting area (draining rack over a baking sheet) for the cooked fingers.

Ingredients:
3 boneless chicken breasts, each breast cut into 4 equal strips
4 cups (1 quart) buttermilk
4 cups all purpose flour
Vegetable shortening for frying (you can use Canola oil)

Chicken Seasoning ingredients:
2 tablespoons kosher salt
2 tablespoons Hungarian paprika
2 teaspoons garlic powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Place chicken strips into a plastic container and cover with 2 cups of buttermilk. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

Preheat oil to 350 degrees. Use enough oil to come up at least half way up on the chicken strips.

Drain chicken strips in a colander. Combine Chicken Seasoning ingredients. Liberally cover the chicken strips with seasoning. Dredge strips in flour and shake off excess. Dip strips into buttermilk and then back into flour. Shake off excess flour.

Carefully place a few strips into heated oil. Don't overcrowd the pan or fryer. Fry chicken strips for about 3 minutes on each side, until golden brown. Serve with honey mustard for dipping (see below).

CAB's Honey Mustard Sauce ingredients:
2 Tbsp mayonnaise (I recommend Best Foods)
4 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp yellow prepared mustard
2 Tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp Horseradish
Pinch of salt and pepper

Whisk ingredients together. Let stand for at least 15 minutes. Can be refrigerated but let it come to room temperature before serving.

Sweet Potato Fries:
I par-fried the sweet potato fries first, then fried them again after the chicken fingers were done.

Cut the sweet potatoes into about long 1/4" strips. Cover the SP strips with water until all the SP are cut. Drain and then rinse the SP strips under cold running water until water runs clean (this is to remove excess starch). Thoroughly pat dry the strips.

Heat up oil to 325 degrees F. Add fries, about handful at a time, to the hot oil. Fry and stir occasionally until potatoes are soft and limp. It will turn a blond color, about 3 to 6 minutes, depending on the thickness. Use a spider to carefully remove fries from the oil and set aside to a drain area (mine is a draining rack over a baking sheet). Rest for 10 minutes or up to 2 hours.

At this point, I made the chicken fingers since I wanted the fries to be hot.

When ready to serve the sweet potato fries, reheat the oil to 350 degrees F. Transfer the par-fried sweet potatoes into the hot oil a handful at a time. Fry again, stirring frequently, until golden brown, about 1 to 2 minutes. Transfer back to drain area. Sprinkle salt or other seasoning at this time. Serve immediately.

Yes, it was a lot of fried foods but dang, this was good. I certainly wouldn't make this all the time (moderation is the key, right?) but I'll definitely have to make this again soon.

Postscript: I recently did a double fry on the chicken fingers when my timing was off. You can read about it here.

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