Fried chicken is one of those dishes, like Tollhouse cookies, scrambled eggs, meatloaf and apple pie, widely considered a staple of home cooks. One might naturally assume that this great canon of foods is easily prepared, with guaranteed delicious results; after all, every kid has baked Tollhouse cookies after school, every parent a meatloaf for a weeknight meal, an apple pie for Thanksgiving. But these dishes are fraught with minefields: crepe-thin cookies, dry pasty meatloaf, crunchy apples in a tough crust. Nonetheless, these remain prototypical favorites, emblematic of all that is good about ‘home cooking.’
As a native Midwesterner, I’d always considered fried chicken a strange beast, eaten first and foremost from KFC, and never made at home. But given fried chicken’s place in the canon of home cooking, I just assumed when I made it that the results would be unfailingly delicious: everyone makes this, all the time, off the cuff, on a weeknight, and with mind-numbingly fabulous results; failure was impossible. Alas. My coating was bland and semi-crisp, the chicken lacked seasoning, the outside was scorched dark brown while the breast meat cooked endlessly to never-done-ness. My frustration was further intensified by the great effort and resulting mess that making fried chicken requires: the brining, the breading, the resting, the frying; and then, at the end, the cooling and disposal of the cooking oil.
Over the years, I’ve tried in earnest to make improvements. Alton Brown uses solid shortening, and cooks the chicken to 170 degrees, so the breading doesn’t fall off; Cooks Illustrated doesn’t use spices in their breading, since they burn upon frying. Buttermilk brines, salt-sugar-water brines, garlic and herb brines; resting half an hour, overnight, not at all before frying. Double dipping in flour, using half cornstarch, soda water, baking soda, even beer for a light, ethereally crisp coating. I even try, despite the great travesty it apparently embodies, de-boning the breast meat before frying. All of these resulted in some changes and even some improvements, but still the perfect fried chicken eluded me. HOW ON EARTH do people make delicious, juicy, shattering, crispy, salty, flavorful fried chicken?!
You can therefore imagine my great excitement when I planned a recent meal at Jardiniere, where their Monday night prix-fixe featured fried chicken. At last, finesse comes to fried chicken! This was bound to be informative and delicious, an education in how to elevate the mundane to the sublime.
The plate arrives. There’s a small nub, a sort of butterball off the thigh or leg perhaps, and a quarter breast, both looking extremely unremarkable. And both BONELESS. The breading was just that: breading – lackluster, a bit soft, not even remotely shattering. The meat was juicy but otherwise forgettable, with no clear flavors from a brining or marinade, no astounding chicken-ness. My husband took several bites, then said to me, “Fried chicken by definition should be down-and-dirty, and this is neither. It’s completely unsatisfying.” It came on a bed of grilled corn and Padron peppers, with light, delicious, shoestring French fries and a smoky crème fraiche for dipping. Both of these additions were delightful — relatively standard fare, but done very well.
So, what’s to be learned here? This deceptively simple dish, when made too simply, results in a complex failure; expectations are high when it comes to fried chicken in general, and when you are paying top dollar for said chicken, expectations hit the ceiling. Furthermore, even the most accomplished of cooks, as I assume would work at a place such as Jardiniere (where we have otherwise had nothing but exceptionally delicious food) are capable of mediocre results.
I did take comfort in this.
Worth noting: On our recent trip to Kentucky, the alleged home of fried chicken, we had the worst version yet. This chicken was coated with what could only be Shake & Bake and then cooked to a petrified state. It was flavorless and seemed old and dismal, like something forgotten in the back of the fridge. It came with instant mashed potatoes and a dim sauce meant to be gravy. What’s more, we received this paltry plate for the hearty price of $17 at a family-owned fine dining restaurant in operation since1937. Here, in the fried chicken heartland, this was passing for not just good food but special-occasion-at a fancy restaurant food! People were happily eating it at the surrounding tables. When I travel home I make great efforts to avoid any behavior that could be construed as California snobbery, but this situation left me no choice but to cry fowl. (oh, yes, I just said that.) We paid our bill and left hungry.
ALSO: at a recent meal at Hopscotch (in Oakland), I had some really great fried chicken. The waiter had ready answers when my friend and I quizzed him about it: it’s brined in buttermilk, soy sauce, and lemon, and then coated with potato starch and flour. This coating is worth trying, since potato starch may take longer to brown, giving the breast meat ample time to cook before the coating burns. It arrived looking extremely delicious, tantalizingly textured and rippled on the outside; you could almost hear the shatter of the first bite. I have also had mind-numbingly delicious fried chicken in Port Costa, at the Bull Valley Tavern, where they served it with mashed potatoes and bacon gravy. Such is their skill with it, that this leaden sounding dish really only needed a biscuit! – more carbs, more butter! – to elevate it to sheer perfection. In my haze of satisfaction, I neglected to pick the waiter’s brain about their technique. Perhaps another trip there will be in order.
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