blinky193
I would love the recipe to Kentucky Fried Chicken, both the original and extra crunchy.
The KFC recipe is not that hard to figure out there are only 11 spices but you can duplicate it with 7.
The trick with both the extra crispy and the regular recipe is in the cooking and you can do both at home very easily.
Gloria Pitzer became a friend of mine many years ago and has written many copy cat recipes in just as many cook books.
She wrote over 5000 recipes that she named with a name that was close enough to the company (the original owner of the recipe) that you would recognize the original source.
I have over the years lost touch with her but at one point introduced her to my mother and as they talked fried chicken Gloria started laughing and said you have been using the Kentucky Fried Chicken recipe before we even knew there was a KFC. I’m not sure Gloria is still with us but you can find her books at used book stores or garage sales. They were always very inexpensive and I’m sure the same is true today.
Here is her web site:
http://www.therecipedetective.com/Recipes.html
Back to KFC Chicken
For both you should use a black iron skillet, with a tight fitting lid and it MUST HAVE the tiny tits on the underside of the lid. Those little bumps will collect and drip the moister back onto the chicken as you fry it.
Most people don’t understand the basic heat vs amount of meat you put into any frying vessel, and it’s basic relationship to the taste of the finished product.
When you load a frying pan with chicken it drops the temperature of the grease, and it changes the taste because the chicken absorbs the grease, as the moisture evaporates into the cooking chamber. If just before you load the pan with chicken parts you’d turn up the burner to high and then load the chicken parts you will seal the chicken very quickly and the chicken will retain more of its moisture. But that said after you have loaded the pan and the grease is rolling turn down the heat to your normal frying temperature, and cover the pan with the lid.
When the top of the chicken starts to turn golden brown turn each piece over and recover the pan. With the correct lid some of the moisture will evaporate from the chicken, collect on the lid and drip back down onto the chicken. This will cause a self basting process and your chicken will be very moist/juicy and tender.
Now when you follow the above directions when you’re finished you’ll get the original recipe chicken with the soft very moist meat and crust.
If you want the extra crispy just remove the lid just before the chicken is finished and again turn up the heat. You’ll lose some of the moisture but the chicken crust will firm up and become very crispy.
You’ll find a much more detailed description in one of Gloria Pitzer’s books plus a bunch of other recipes that have been brought up on this thread.
Good Luck
Jack
