Recipe: Buttermilk-brined Fried Chicken

I was flipping through my favorite recipe book when he suddenly said "Oooh, that looks good," pointing to the picture on the recipe book. "You want it?" I asked, and he replied "sure, I haven't eaten fried chicken for a long time, and I'm craving for it."

Poor hubby, he has sensitive stomach. He often gets diarrhea when he eats outside, even at the fast food restaurants. He once got stomach problem from eating at the KFC restaurant, and he hasn't gone there again since. 

So this chicken was specially made for him. Hoping it was good enough for his appetite and taste :D

Brining makes the meat juicier. I always do it when I roast chicken or turkey, and this is the first time I do it for frying chicken. The taste? It was awesome! brining in buttermilk brings out such flavorful and wonderful taste. I have never thought it would taste that good considering I only use buttermilk for baking. I was wrong,  and I would use it again whenever I'm going to brine our favorite poultry meats :D

Buttermilk-brined Fried Chicken (adapted from Better Homes and Gardens New Cook
book)

For brining
3 cups buttermilk (3 cups milk combined with 3 tablespoons vinegar)
1/4 cup salt (or less)
1 tablespoon sugar
2 1/2 pound chicken

For the coating
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
a dash of thyme
3/4 cup buttermilk
Cooking oil
*you can add dry breadcrumbs to make the chicken crunchier, or add chili powder for spicier taste.

Direction


1. Combine chicken, 3 cups buttermilk, salt, sugar in a large Ziploc bag . Chill for 2 to 4 hours, remove chicken from brine. Drain chicken and pat dry. Discard brine.

2. In a large bowl, combine flour, salt, black pepper, and thyme. Place the 3/4 cup buttermilk in a shallow dish. Coat chicken with a flour mixture, dip in the buttermilk, and coat again with the flour mixture. Fry chicken for about 15 minutes or  until cooked. Enjoy! :D

Click here to print the recipe

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Chicken fricassee for lunch

I flipped through the German Cooking Today cookbook given by one of my husband's relatives, and I have been wanting to try this recipe for a loong time, but was intimidated with the "Advanced cook" logo on top of the recipe O_O 

Today I finally decided to try the recipe out with few modifications, and I must say that it was not as hard as I had imagined :D The taste was great, not too creamy and full of flavor :)

Chicken fricassee adapted from German cooking today with few modifications

4 pieces of chicken (breast part)

4 cups water

1 cup celery, 1 cup carrot, 1 cup leek (I used 2 cups celery because I didn't have carrot and leek :D)

1 onion

1 clove

salt

For the sauce

1 tablespoon butter

3 tablespoon flour

Chicken stock (from above)

2 limau kasturi

1 teaspoon sugar

5 tablespoon milk (you can use heavy cream too)

2 egg yolks (medium)

salt

pepper

Worcestershire suce

1. Boil water in a pot. Combine chicken, salt,  celery, carrot, leek, onion, clove and simmer with low heat for 1 hour. Skim off the foam that forms.

2. Separate the stock from the rest using sieve, set aside. Remove the meat from the bones, remove the skin, and cut up the meat into bite-size pieces.

3. To make the sauce, melt butter in a pan and add flour. Stir until smooth pale yellow mixture formed. Add chicken stock and whisk until there is no lump. Bring the sauce to boil and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Combine sugar and lime juice .

4. Whisk together the egg yolk and milk until the sauce thicken.  Season with salt, pepper, Worcestershire sauce and lemon juice.

You can put mushroom and asparagus spear too if you like :) Serve chicken fricassee with rice and salad.

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Naan and tandoori chicken for yummy dinner

The night before my husband was craving to eat naan and tandoori chicken at mamak (24 hours Indian Muslim restaurant in Malaysia is commonly called mamak), but we were too lazy and ended up ordering McDonald delivery hoho. Naan and tandoori chicken have always been our favorite, I even  tried making them before but failed. After few adjustments, I found a way to make it tastes as good as the one in Maulana    (our favorite mamak restaurant in Sri Serdang)

The color of the tandoori chicken was not as red as the one we commonly see in Indian restaurants. An Indian friend of mine said that they usually put red coloring, but I am not really sure about it.

Anyway, here are the recipe that I used to make this yummy naan and tandoori chicken. 

Naan (Make 4 naans)

• 1/2 package yeast
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1/8 cup white sugar
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoons salt
• 2 cups bread flour, or more
• 1/4 teapoon baking soda
• 1/8 cup butter, melted
• 
  
• 1. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water with a little bit of sugar. Let stand about 10 minutes until frothy. Stir in sugar, milk, egg, salt, and  flour to make a soft dough (sometimes it takes more than 2 cups of flour) . Knead until smooth. Place dough in a well oiled bowl cover with a damp cloth, and set aside for 1 hour to rise (double in volume).
• 2. Punch down dough and make 4 small balls and put them on a tray.  Cover with a towel, and allow to rise until doubled in size (about 30 minutes)
• 3. Preheat oven to high heat (I used 220 degrees Celcius, top and bottom grill)
• 4. Roll one ball into circle and put on a tray near to the upper grill for 2 to 3 minutes until lightly browned. To the same for the other side, and brush the naan with melted butter. 

Chicken tandoori

5 to 6 pieces chicken

1 teaspoon salt

3 limau nipis (key lime), take the juice

1/2 cup yogurt

1/2 onion, blended

1 garlic clove, blended

1 inch ginger, blended

2 teaspoons garama masala (can be bought in Giant's)

1. Deep slits the chicken, and cover the chicken with salt and limau nipis juice. Set aside for 20 minutes

2. Combine yogurt, onion, garlic, ginger and garam masala in a small bowl, and cover it to the chicken. Rub the marinade into the slits, and marinade overnight (I only marinated for 1 hour haha)

3. Preheat the oven to the highest temperature. Remove the chicken from the marinade and put on a tray (the yogurt will curd on high temperature, hence you need to remove the yogurt from the chicken). Bake for 20 - 25 minutes until cook. 

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