Cooking with Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home

[BadRabbit]

Anyone else not care for the garlic and onion powder in the fried chicken coating?

I made the chicken a few months ago and was so disappointed I assumed I screwed something up (still a large possibility). Now I never use either of these items so I had to go buy them for the recipe, and bought the most expensive brand at the supermarket (whatever that's worth).

The reason this just came up for me is I'm reading Ruhlman's 'Twenty' and he includes his rosemary brine version of this recipe, stating it came from when he was writing Ad Hoc with Keller, but he omit's the garlic and onion powder in the coating. Made me go hmm...

Anyway, I'm wondering if anyone else had this experience given all the raving over this chicken.

Larry

I've made his chicken three or four times and it is always amazing and I've made my fair share of fried chicken. His is the best I've done. I love how the lemon comes through in the end. I have a deep fat frier and it works really well. I find that you really need to go with the smaller chickens, which are sometimes harder to find. Most grocery stores have chickens in the 5 pound range. You really want something around 3 pounds.

For me finding a sub 3 lb chicken has been like looking for a 500 lb turkey. Even the small gourmet shops look at me like I'm crazy. Whole Foods had nothing under 4 lbs.

Anybody figured out the time and temps to get fully cooked but not overly brown chicken when using a 4-5 lb fryer?

[Paul Kierstead]

I've found that Halal chickens are often very small (around here at least). Maybe try a mid-eastern shop if you have one.

[BadRabbit]

I've found that Halal chickens are often very small (around here at least). Maybe try a mid-eastern shop if you have one.

Thanks that's a good idea that I had not thought of.

I will try that in the future but the Halal shops are on the other side of town from me and I'm cooking this tomorrow for lunch so I'm going to have to try it with what I have this time.

[BadRabbit]

After looking at the temps in the recipe, I'm thinking that lowering the temp and extending the time is not going to work. The oil temp is already below what I usually fry chicken at.

My options may be to dilute the buttermilk which should cause it to brown slower with less milk solids in the crust or I can hold in a 200 degree oven afterwards for 20 minutes which should allow them to finish cooking without affecting the crust too much.

What say ye?

[BadRabbit]

I diluted the buttermilk 1:1 with water but the chicken still browned much too quickly to fully cook. I then held the chicken in a 200F oven until it reached 158F. The crust was still perfectly crispy and the chicken moist and delicious.

I also fried in lard because I hardly ever fry food at home and decided that if I was going to make something unhealthy I was going to make it as delicious as possible.

Notes: (This was very good but there are definitely improvements to be made).

There is a slight bitter taste in the meat itself that I assume is from the lemon pith. Next time I'll use the brine Keller used in the Food & Wine recipe which has just juice and zest instead of whole lemons.

The bay is overpowering. I will cut that in half next time.

The crust is very good but I agree it's got too much in it. I think I prefer my normal breading which is virtually identical sans the garlic and onion powder.

Edited March 19, 2012 by BadRabbit (log)

[ChrisTaylor]

I made the chicken pie although I used a store-bought puff pastry (butter-based rather than the more common vegan crap). I liked it a lot.