Every now and then I crave junk food.
Vegetables are all very well, but there’s nothing quite like an occasional meal made of what I’d normally call complete rubbish.
I think of this as a cathartic palate cleanser, and it usually hits me about once a year.
Often it’s fried chicken — I’ll find myself in a motorway service station late at night, rain lashing down, on the way home from somewhere, tearing into some fried chicken while feeling mildly guilty.
Once it’s over, it’s over, and I don’t go back for months.
It’s perfectly possible to make a superior version of this guilty pleasure at home, and I’ll show you how. That said, the High Street, utter-junk variety has its own appeal. Pressure frying keeps the chicken crisp and hot while trapping moisture that would otherwise evaporate during a longer cook. Add that secret blend of herbs and spices — usually lots of salt — and you get something hard to resist.
Before you judge me, I keep this under control. I look after myself, and fast-food fried chicken doesn’t belong in a balanced diet. But an occasional treat is fine — moderation matters.
So here’s a homemade version:
Significantly healthier, just as tasty, but different.
Start with the chicken. Good-quality poultry makes a big difference. Upgrading from budget “two for a fiver” birds to a free-range chicken is worth it. Use the whole bird — nothing should be wasted. The carcass becomes a great base for stock.
Joint a chicken into twelve pieces: remove the legs and separate drumsticks and thighs, take off the wings, then cut the backbone away from the breast and split the crown through the bone. Cut each breast into three pieces. Remove the skin and add it to the carcass for stock.
Cook the chicken in two stages. For the first stage, dredge the pieces in a mixture of cornmeal and Cajun seasoning — about a tablespoon of each. Add two crushed garlic cloves and a generous glug of olive oil. Rub the mixture into the chicken so it is well coated, then roast at 190°C for twenty minutes.
While the chicken is roasting, process about 150g of stale bread into fine breadcrumbs. I save the ends of loaves for this: dry them for a couple of days and store them in a jar until needed — one less thing in the bin.
Season the breadcrumbs, add two more crushed garlic cloves, and tip everything into a large, shallow tray or roasting dish.
After the initial twenty minutes, remove the chicken and brush each piece with a thin paste made from two tablespoons of plain flour mixed with roughly double the amount of water. This creates an adhesive coat so the breadcrumbs will stick, but be careful not to remove the cornmeal and Cajun crust formed during the first roast.
Using tongs, press each piece of chicken into the breadcrumbs so it is fully coated, then return it to the tray. Repeat until all pieces are crumbed. Drizzle with olive oil and roast for another forty minutes.
This staged method produces two distinct crunchy layers: a spiced, slightly coarse cornmeal base and a crackling breadcrumb top layer.
The recipe is based on a well-known version by Jamie Oliver, often called Jamie’s Fried Chicken. Call it what you like — it’s a seriously upgraded, far superior take on humble High Street fried chicken.
Do not serve this in a bucket.