This herby, crispy, succulent fried chicken is surprisingly easy and features all of our favourite Italian flavours. Have a look at our instagram feed to see a video of how we made it. We used one of our whole, free range chickens, broken down into joints but you could use just thighs, or a mix of thigh and breast meat. You can find it all in our shop.
Ingredients (for four):
1 whole, free-range chicken, broken down into drumsticks, thighs, breasts (halved), and wings
500ml whole milk
2 tablespoons white wine or cider vinegar
1 egg
1 tbsp fennel seeds, ground
1 tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp dried rosemary
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
400g plain flour
Sunflower or vegetable oil for frying
50g parmesan to serve (optional)
Method:
Pour the milk into a large bowl and add the vinegar. This will curdle the milk to create buttermilk.
Mix together all of the herbs, spices, salt and pepper in a small bowl.
Add the chicken pieces and a teaspoon of the spice mix into the milk mixture and mix well. Cover with cling film and place in the fridge for at least two hours, ideally overnight.
When ready to cook, heat the oil in a deep fat fryer or in a large, high sided frying pan to 180C.
Add the remaining spice mix to the flour and mix well.
Take the chicken pieces out of the marinade and dip into the flour, then back into the marinade and into the flour again before carefully placing in the hot oil in batches. Be careful not to crowd the pan, otherwise it won't get super crispy. Remove and drain on kitchen paper.
Once all the chicken has been fried, transfer to a serving plate, season with salt and freshly grated parmesan. Serve either by itself or with some garlicky mayo.