When you think about making fried chicken, you might imagine using a deep fryer to submerge the chicken pieces in hot oil. A better method, which uses less oil, is to use a large cast iron pan for frying instead.
The Amateur Gourmet explains:
There’s some mystical, magical mojo that happens in a cast iron skillet when you fry chicken in there. My theory is that, because it’s cast iron, it maintains the heat better than any large vessel (like a Dutch oven) can at home. It better replicates a deep fryer at a restaurant. And it’s important to maintain that heat because the lower the temperature of the oil goes, the more of it that gets absorbed into the chicken. If your fried chicken is greasy, it’s because your oil didn’t stay hot.
Hence the cast iron. Once you have that — and you’ll want to use a large one (I borrowed my friend Diana’s) — the rest takes care of itself.
Bonus tips: make the chicken even crispier with a double frying method or ensure each piece is thoroughly cooked by precooking the chicken before you fry it.
The Best Fried Chicken of Your Life [The Amateur Gourmet]
Comments
2 responses to “Make Tastier Fried Chicken In A Cast Iron Pan”
Cast iron isn’t the best thermal conductor, it’ll keep more heat at the bottom helping convection through the oil and with that convection stirs the oil distributing heat more evenly as oppose to pressed steel pans which heat up the sides more evenly and the loose heat through external transfer with surrounding air.
cast iron pots also means that the meat you’re frying sticks to the bottom a little more, which helps to crisp thing up better.
You also have to remember to turn food in a cast iron vessel more but that helps to make it taste better.