Food » fried

Fried chicken with broccoli, mushrooms, and chili sauce

mike — Sun, 30 May 2010 17:02:06 +0000

This is a simple stir-fry — or at least it’s simple once you’ve made the chicken. The mixture of the garlic and chili bean sauce is pretty good, but it didn’t really form a sauce for the dish, more a light coating with tasty chunks of garlic. If I did this again, I might add a little soy combined with other flavors and cornstarch at the end for a sauce. Though you want to be careful not to get the chicken too soggy; the thing to do would be probably create the sauce before adding the chicken and then add the chicken, toss it, and serve immediately so that the chicken picks up some flavor but stays mostly dry and a little crispy.

Ingredients

3/4 lb fried chicken bites
1 head broccoli, cut into bite-size pieces
8-10 small crimini mushrooms, stems trimmed and quartered
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tbsp toban djan (Korean chili bean sauce)
2 tsp Korean red pepper flakes
Soy sauce
Vegetable or other oil

Directions

Heat the oil in a skillet on medium heat. Add the garlic and saute until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the toban djan and a generous sprinkling of red pepper flakes. Saute for another minute or so, then add the broccoli and mushrooms. Toss to cover with the chili-garlic mixture and stir-fry for a few minutes. Add the chicken and a dash of soy sauce, cook for another minute or so, and then serve, probably over rice.

Fried Chicken Bites

mike — Sun, 30 May 2010 17:00:27 +0000

I decided to try my new fried chicken technique on boneless breast. Since it has no skin, I figured I’d try a coating of corn starch, and I thought it made more sense to fry the chicken in bite-size chunks than to just try frying a big slab of breast meat. I followed the same brine-steam-fry approach (though this time all in one day), and they came out very good, a little crispy outside and tender inside, with a good fried flavor. They worked well added to stir-fried vegetables just at the end, long enough to pick up a little sauce. The increased the salt and sugar in the brine since I was doing it for just 2 hours instead of overnight. Obviously, the flavors mixed into the cornstarch can be varied for different effects. Cayenne pepper is good for extra heat, and turmeric can give the chicken a nice color. Powdered ginger, five-spice powder, or curry powder can all work well too.

Ingredients

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (around 3/4 to 1 lb)
Peanut or other good frying oil

Brine
4 c warm water
1/2 c kosher salt
1/2 c sugar

Coating
Cornstarch
1-2 tbsp ground white pepper
1-2 tbsp Korean red pepper flakes

Directions

Mix the brine ingredients in a sealable container until the salt and sugar dissolve in the water. Add the chicken and refrigerate for 2 hours. For a longer brine, halve the salt and sugar and brine overnight. Remove the chicken from the brine. Steam the chicken in a steamer for 45 minutes over medium heat. Remove and chop into bite-size chunks. Refrigerate for at least two hours. Take the chicken out of the refrigerator half an hour before frying. Put enough cornstarch in a bowl to toss the chicken pieces in. Add white pepper and red pepper flakes to taste and mix. Add the chicken pieces in batches to the cornstarch mixture and toss to cover. Remove to a colander and shake off excess cornstarch. Add enough peanut oil to a pan to submerge the chicken pieces and heat it to 375. I use a medium saucepan on medium to medium-high and give it 10 minutes to heat up, then fry the chicken a few pieces at a time. Fry each batch for about two minutes, until they start to form a slight crispy crust, then remove them to a paper-towel-covered plate, sprinkle with a little salt, and pat dry. Eat them as finger food, with a dipping sauce, or add them to stir-fried vegetables for a minute or two right at the end.

Fried Chicken with BBQ Sauce

mike — Thu, 27 May 2010 15:47:10 +0000

This recipe was inspired by the Momofuku fried chicken recipe. David Chang uses a three-step process: brine, steam, fry. The brine (as usual) makes sure the chicken stays juicy; the steam actually cooks the chicken, so the fry can be only as long as necessary to crisp the skin. It worked perfectly and was pretty easy, though it takes time to do all the steps. It doesn’t actually have to be three days — you could do the whole thing over the course of 4-6 hours — but I did the brine overnight (my brine is not as strong as Chang’s), then steamed the chicken the next night and put it back in the fridge, then actually fried it on the third night. I decided to use chicken thighs, since they tend to be juicier than breasts and have a good ratio of meat to bone to skin.

Along with the chicken, I experimented with some sides and garnishes that were less successful. I thought it would be tasty and picturesque to fry whole stalks of thai ginger. They looked pretty good, but didn’t taste so great, acquiring a slightly bitter flavor during the frying. I also fried garlic slices and scallion pieces to accompany the chicken. The garlic was still too garlicky, but the scallions were not bad. I also put a little chili paste in the brine but it didn’t seem to have any effect. Finally, I made a BBQ sauce for dipping, which came out pretty good and went well with the chicken.

Ingredients

4 chicken thighs, bone-in and skin-on
Peanut or other good frying oil

Brine
4 c warm water
1/4 c kosher salt
1/4 c sugar

BBQ Sauce
1 tbsp hoisin sauce
1 tbsp mae ploy (sweet chili sauce)
1 tsp sambal olek (or other hot chili sauce)
a few drops liquid smoke

Directions

Mix the brine ingredients in a sealable container until the salt and sugar dissolve in the water. Add the chicken and refrigerate overnight. For a shorter brine, double the salt and sugar and brine for 1-6 hours. Remove the chicken from the brine. Steam the chicken in a steamer for 45 minutes over medium heat. Remove and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight. Take the chicken out of the refrigerator half an hour before frying. Add enough peanut oil to a pan to submerge the chicken pieces and heat it to 375. I use a medium saucepan on medium to medium-high and give it 10 minutes to heat up, then fry the chicken one piece at a time. Add the chicken to the oil skin side down and fry for 2 minutes. Flip the chicken and fry until golden brown, about 2 more minutes. Remove from the oil to a paper-towel-covered plate and sprinkle with a little kosher salt. Mix the sauce ingredients and serve the chicken with the sauce in a bowl for dipping.