Today’s images brought to you by the camera I used when I started Meathenge over 2 years ago. A sturdy little Nikon Coolpix 950 (2 megapixels) with a Nikon SB-50DX Speedlite held together cool lookin’ flash bracket. It was tough going back to framing images by looking at the lcd screen on the back, but after a bit it was okay.

The day? Saturday after the farmer’s market. I’d picked up my rabbit pate with chives and an olive tapanade stuffed lamb leg roast from Fatted Calf, but had to stop off at El Nat grocery for some milk. That’s when the inspiration hit, it was time to once again (5 or 6 tries, I forget now) to attempt John Bell’s Southern Fried Chicken. My previous attempt was some of the worse food I’ve ever produced. But this time I had all my ducks in a row and was sure success was in my near future. Man, I love duck fat.

Here is the chicken I’m shooting for, John Bell’s Southern Fried Chicken. The process is simple, the prep and ingredients are straight forward and the results are amazing. This is what I want, amazing results. So far? Zilch.
It’s supposed to be easy, cheap ol’ vegetable oil, low fat milk, AP flour and chicken pieces. THAT’S IT AND SINCE MARCH OF 2004 I HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO DO IT !!! I know it sounds crazy and I shouldn’t be admitting this to everyone in the world, but I surely can’t be the only one having trouble deep frying food. Or can I?
The last few batches were ruined by oil temperature, one cheap little deep fryer ruined the first few runs (and that’s just what it gave us all). Then having the incorrect type of thermometer for my cast iron dutch ruined the last batch. And one batch had too much egg or not enough milk in the wash, dang that was some nasty crap. But this time I have a spiffy new Taylor deep fryer clip-on thermometer and a wicked propane stove loaned to me by Chilebrown for last week’s Food Bloggers Picnic.
The set up is real easy, you’ll need:
A chicken or two, I suggest two. Cut it up in to nice pieces.
Several cups of All Purpose flour, maybe more.
2 eggs and enough milk so it’s watery. If you had a standard bread loaf pan, about a 1/3 to 1/2 up the side.
Salt.
Vegetable Oil, the large container, a gallon.
Put about 2 to 3 inches of oil in to your dutch oven or cast iron chicken fryer, bring up to 375 degrees. Why? Cause that’s what everyone says and if everyone says it, it must be true right?
At this point I realize I’ve got two 5 pound chickens that I plan to be cooking and I’m the only one here. I ran to the phone, while the oil was heating up (I knew better) to call my sister and her husband (Meathead). They were on their way, even though they’d spent the day in Santa Cruz at a wedding and were trashed. When I got back to the stove and dutch, the temp was at 400 degrees and I remember Alton Brown saying something about once your oil goes past 400 degrees F, it’s not reusable. That was okay cause I tend not to reuse oil, it’s pretty abused by the time I get done with it anyway.
In maybe 20 minutes there were a total of 5 adults, a fifth of good scotch and some beers. Hooboy, here we go, our first fried chicken orgy of the summer!
The first little chicken pieces arrived from the depths.

They looked a little dark, yet were cooked perfectly and we all agreed it was “missing something”.

A sprinkle of kosher salt did the trick.

While we all gnawed, chewed and picked at the crispy skin the conversation was what to do and how to improve the chicken.
Scotch, beer and the lighting of the tiki torches slowed the process a bit. Oh well, what’re you going to do? It was okay because we’d consumed and entire chicken, we needed a breather.

I got back to work and pieced out another Rocky Jr. chicken, lightly salted this one. I didn’t last time, because that’s how John Bell did it, but dangit the stuff needed salt.
I did a dry (in the flour, foo), wet, dry, wet sequence and lowered the temp down to 325 degrees. Move the chicken around frequently, keeps hot oil next to the chicky. While 375 may be fine for chicken wings or something equally as small, it was just too darned hot for larger pieces such as the thigh meat and most certainly the breast. The skin was really dark and the center of the breast wasn’t even NEAR being done.

Nailed it. Dropping the temp to 325, moving chicken around dialed it in perfectly. Scotch and Southern Fried Chicken with a back of cold beer sent the evening quickly in to bliss central.

Here we see our last chicken being sliced open, just to see how pretty it is. I’ve finally done it, after a year and a half, I’ve completed my quest and can move on to other fried chicken recipes I’ve been holding on to, yay!!!
But that’s not all, no sir. The sun had done down, the wind picked up and we were getting chilled. The booze only goes so far, so I wheeled over the weber and Meathead started up a nice almond wood fire. As we sipped scotch and warmed ourselves it was clear something was missing. That’s right, s’mores! Sister and the kids flew to the grocery store for fixin’s. And that’s where I’ll leave you today. By the fire after a wonderful fried chicken meal served with fancy alcohol and roasting marshmallows on an open fire.

fini