What up with that?

Watching the Oscars tonight, the best way I could describe the outfits, speeches and winners was: What up with that?

Getting ready to watch the Oscars tonight, I made my award-winning fried chicken...
What?
You haven't heard of my fried chicken?
Well, to be honest, it hasn't had much wide-spread attention, but if it did, my guys wouldn't be the only ones giving it a standing ovation, if I do say so myself. My mom actually asked for it as part of her birthday present one year...

My backstory opens with a overly-obsessed woman in a tiny kitchen...
I used to have a Fear of Frying - OMG, all that FAT??? - so much so that John still teases me that I would refuse to bread and fry fish fillets when we first started living together. (Aaaages ago! Don't ask!)

But one day, I craved fried chicken that the fast-food-in-a-paper-bucket version couldn't assuage...so I made it myself. And it was good. And Look! It didn't soak up nearly as much oil as I thought it would. Yay! I was on to something...

I played around with it a bit over time - dutch oven deep frying v. cast iron skillet shallow frying/one dip v. two - and became partial to the double-dipping shallow method...to each her own.

Details?
Here goes:

-In a big bowl, soak a cut-up, bone-in, chicken or your favorite parts - today I used just thighs and breasts (that I cut in half for more-reasonable portions) 'cuz they were the most-economical at the market - in about a quart of buttermilk with about a half cup or more of Frank's Hot Sauce. Marinate for 20 mins to 2 hours...whatever time you have.
-Prepare the dredge mixing 1 and a half to 2 cups flour, 3 T salt, 2 T ground black pepper and 1 T smoked paprika.
-Heat enough canola oil to fill a cast iron skillet about half way (an inch to an inch and a half deep) to 350 degrees. The Behemoth took about a half gallon...that's enough to frighten even the most fool hearty, but really I got most of it back in the end. Yes, recycling strained oil is cool.
-Start dippin. Pull each piece out of the buttermilk, dredge in flour and repeat, placing the pieces on a wire rack over a sheet pan (gotta limit the mess!) to dry.
-Carefully place the chicken into the pan, being sure not to crowd it so the oil temp stays somewhat constant. I keep a thermometer probe in the pan and fool with the flame to achieve this.
-Cook on one side until only about a third of the top looks raw, then flip to get the nice same brown crust on the other side.
-Drain on another rack over a baking sheet. Cooking in batches, be careful to keep the raw stuff away from the cooked stuff, two sets of tongs and everything.

We also had a salad of diced tomatoes, green pepper, shallot, celery and dressed with 1 t salt, ground pepper, 1 T olive oil and 1 T basil chiffonade...I made this earlier and the salt drew out enough juice that the salad didn't need additional acid.

My trusty soux chef contributed one of his favorite things: Buttermilk biscuits...and in a bit of a twist, he used the drop method - as opposed to rolling and cutting - in a muffin tin. Yummy!

Overall, the curtain fell on a winning evening...the awards may be over, but I still have plenty of golden fried chicken waiting for me in the freezer!

Epilogue...
John asked me if I considered making any improvements to the chicken and I had a thought: What if I use matzoh meal instead of flour? Then we could have it at Passover. Wouldn't the look on my mother's face be priceless when she says, "What up with that?"