THE
ORIGINAL 11 SPICES SECRET RECIPE?
Prep: 30 minutes
Soak: 20-30 minutes
Cook: 15-18 minutes
Makes: 4 servings
2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 tablespoon salt
1/2 tablespoon dried thyme leaves
1/2 tablespoon dried basil leaves
1/3 tablespoon dried oregano leaves
1 tablespoon celery salt
1 tablespoon ground black pepper
1 tablespoon dried mustard
4 tablespoons paprika
2 tablespoons garlic salt
1 tablespoon ground ginger
3 tablespoons ground white pepper
1 cup buttermilk
1 egg, beaten
1 chicken, cut up, the breast pieces cut in half for more even frying
Expeller-pressed canola oil
1 Mix the flour in a bowl with all the herbs and spices; set aside.
2 Mix the buttermilk and egg together in a separate bowl until
combined. Soak the chicken in the buttermilk mixture at room
temperature, 20-30 minutes.
3 Remove chicken from the buttermilk, allowing excess to drip off. Dip
the chicken pieces in the herb-spice-flour mixture to coat all sides,
shaking off excess. Allow to sit on a rack over a baking sheet, 20
minutes.
4 Meanwhile, heat about 3 inches of the oil in a large Dutch oven (or
similar heavy pot with high sides) over medium-high heat to 350
degrees. (Use a deep-frying thermometer to check the temperature.) When
temperature is reached, lower the heat to medium to maintain it at 350.
Fry 3 or 4 pieces at a time, being careful not to crowd the pot. Fry
until medium golden brown, turning once, 15-18 minutes. Transfer
chicken pieces to a baking sheet covered with paper towels. Allow the
oil to return to temperature before adding more chicken. Repeat with
remaining chicken.
- The Chicago Tribune
First off, KFC Original Recipe chicken isn't pan-fried or deep-fried, it's pressure-fried. So, without a pressure cooker, you're never going to replicate it.
ReplyDeleteAnd in the late '30s, when the Colonel started making his famous chicken, I don't think anybody'd ever heard of canola oil; that's a relatively new addition to supermarket shelves.
So the spice ingredients may be accurate (and anyone with a sufficiently sensitive and experienced palate can probably get it close) but the rest of the "recipe" strikes me as bogus.
Stu: Agreed.
ReplyDeleteI worked for the Colonel (not Pepsico or whomever) when I was in high school. IIRC, it was a bag of seasoning mixed into a standard amount of flour. Chix was dredged thru the mix, and the dropped into the pressure cooker.
Used oil was strained, and the 'debris' dried in a pint salad container the lived on the vent hood. When deemed 'ready', it was mixed w/ water and a bag or 'gravy' mix. Which was as close as the gravy ever got to a chicken.
I worked at a KFC while in high school in the late 80's. We fried the chicken in lard. It came in a cardboard box, as if they took a box with a blue plastic bag and filled it with liquid lard and left if solidify. After we cleaned a pressurized deep fryer, we'd cut the block into chunks, toss em in the fryer and melt them. IIRC, extra crispy was marinated before-hand, original was not. Original was dipped in buttermilk and breaded in flour that had a spice mix bag added to it. Extra crispy was just dipped in buttermilk, breaded (in flour only), dipped again, and breaded again. French fries and nugget-like stuff was fried in some kind of oil, don't remember how we did the gizzards. Clean up involved a lot of hot water, and your shoes were half breaded by the time you left.
ReplyDeleteI worked for KFC back in the 70's as a manager and trainer. The chicken was never cooked in lard-that was hydrogenated vegetable shortening. The flour came in 25 lb. bags and was mixed with a large quantity of flour salt (very finely ground salt) and the bag of seasonings. Then it was dipped in a milk and egg mixture and breaded. We cooked it in a 103-C automated pressure fryer that handled the pressure, temperature, and time. The cracklings should NEVER have been left out to sit. They were drained in the cooler and made a fantastic gravy when properly handled. The Colonel used to say "pitch the chicken and eat the gravy"!.
ReplyDeleteI say Rajah. You've taken on this subject of pressure cooking chicken before. Do you have a link to that effort. My recollection is that broasting chicken requires peanut oil.
ReplyDeleteCasca