by John T. Edge
I usually prefer chickens cut into the dual breast, wing, thigh, drumstick portions now standard in most grocery stores. But for any bird that tips the scales at more than three pounds, I cut the breasts crosswise into two portions, for a total of ten pieces. If you want to buy whole chickens and cut them up yourself, you might want to invest in a tome like The Complete Book of Chicken, written by the editors of Cook’s Illustrated magazine. Though they snub fried chicken, devoting just twelve of the 486 pages to our beloved subject, they do provide a clear and well-illustrated primer on butchering poultry. If you cook your way through this book and are still looking for more fried chicken recipes, try Damon Lee Fowler’s Fried Chicken: The World’s Best Recipes from Memphis to Milan, from Buffalo to Bangkok. If you fall in love with frying and want to move beyond chicken, try John Martin Taylor’s definitive Fearless Frying.
If lard is specified in the recipe, get fresh leaf lard from your butcher. But if all you can find is the shelf-stable hydrogenated stuff, you might as well go with Crisco (or a similar vegetable shortening), supplemented by a bit of bacon grease. If you choose oil, make it peanut oil, which has a better flavor and a higher smoke point than many others. A little bacon grease won’t hurt here either.
Thoughts on Equipment
At a bare minimum, have on hand a cast-iron or other heavy skillet of at least ten inches in diameter and two inches in depth. Get a wider one if you can, for that means more chicken per skillet and less batch cooking. If you are buying a new skillet, choose a model with a lid. Lodge Manufacturing of South Pittsburgh, Tennessee, makes a wide variety of cast-iron models that are available at your local hardware store or at www.lodgemfg.com. Some of these recipes call for deep-frying. To do that you need a heavy skillet or pot at least four inches deep. You will also benefit from a candy/oil thermometer with a clip to fix on the side of the pot and an instant-read thermometer to measure the doneness of chicken pieces. If you lack such vessels and thermometers, you can modify oil amounts and cooking times, bringing them into line with the basic skillet-fried recipe on page 93.
Last, keep in mind that most of these recipes are easily doubled. But if you plan on serving a crowd, be sure to check the seasoning; that’s the first thing to go out of whack when it comes to fried chicken.
My Little Black Book of Favorite Chicken Houses
Keep in mind that many of these spots are small, family-owned enterprises. As such they may not be open for business seven days a week. (Some owners and staff work eight days a week.) In any event, call ahead to be sure they’re open when you plan to visit. And always be respectful of local eaters. Remember, they were there first.
NORTHEAST
Anchor Bar
1047 Main St., Buffalo,
New York
716-886-8920
Beppe
45 E. 22nd St., New York,
New York
212-982-8422
Blue Smoke
116 E. 27th St., New York,
New York
212-447-7733
Chalfonte Hotel
309 Howard St., Cape May,
New Jersey
609-898-1265
New Caporal
3772 Broadway, New York,
New York
212-862-8986
Sal’s Birdland
1851 Stone Rd., Rochester,
New York
585-621-1040
SOUTH
Breakfast Klub
3711 Travis St., Houston,
Texas
713-528-8561
Frenchy’s
3919 Scott St., Houston, Texas
713-748-2233
Greenwood’s on Green Street
1087 Green St., Roswell,
Georgia
770-992-5383
Gus’s World Famous
Fried Chicken
505 Hwy. 70 W., Mason,
Tennessee
901-294-2028
Harue Café
872 Buford Hwy., Atlanta,
Georgia
770-220-3013
Inn at Blackberry Farm
1471 West Miller’s Cove Rd.,
Walland, Tennessee
865-984-8166
Jacques-Imo’s
8324 Oak St.,
New Orleans,
Louisiana
504-861-0886
Julep Restaurant
1305 E. Northside Dr.,
Jackson, Mississippi
601-982-5107
Mr. Boo’s
501 Donelson Pike,
Nashville,
Tennessee
615-391-9300
Prince’s Hot Chicken
Shack
123 Ewing Dr.,
Nashville,
Tennessee
615-226-9442
Son’s Place
160 Hurt St., Atlanta,
Georgia
404-581-0530
Watershed
406 W. Ponce de Leon Ave.,
Decatur, Georgia
404-378-4900
Whole Truth Church and
Lunchroom
515 Walnut St. S., Wilson,
North Carolina
252-237-5595
Willie Mae’s Scotch House
2401 St. Anne St.,
New Orleans,
Louisiana
504-822-9503
MIDWEST
Belgrade Gardens
401 E. State St., Barberton,
Ohio
330-745-0113
Eat N Run
8040 S. Ashland Ave.,
Chicago, Illinois
773-892-0867
Gourmet Fried Chicken
43 E. Cermak, Chicago,
Illinois
312-326-3450
Harold’s Chicken Shack
Multiple locations throughout
Chicago, Illinois
773-723-9006
Milich’s Village Inn
4444 Cleveland Massillon Rd.,
Barberton, Ohio
330-825-4553
Opal’s Kitchen
423 Southwest Blvd., Kansas
City, Missouri
816-472-6725
St. Paul’s Church Picnic
(Second Sunday in August)
New Alsace, Indiana
812-623-2631
Stroud’s
1015 E. 85th St., Kansas City,
Missouri
816-333-2132
WEST
Chicken Valley
1507 Pike Pl., Seattle,
Washington
206-624-2774
Ezell’s
502 23rd Ave., Seattle,
Washington
206-324-2121
Pollo Campero
Multiple locations in Los
Angeles, California (and
elsewhere)
323-587-3743
Roscoe’s Chicken and
Waffles
1518 N. Gower St.,
Los Angeles, California
323-466-7453
Zeke’s Smokehouse
2209 Honolulu Ave.,
Montrose (Los Angeles),
California
818-957-7045
Thanks
My deep appreciation goes to recipe testers Lenore Hobbs, Beckett Howorth, and Sharon Hunt of Oxford, and to the Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow for a fellowship that afforded me a month of work in their culinary suite. (If you are in need of a quiet place to write and cook, get thee to their nunnery.) Different versions of a couple of these essays originally appeared in Gourmet and Attaché. I thank my editors there, Jane Daniels Lear, Lance Elko, and Cari Jackson, for unflagging support.
My wife, Blair Hobbs, ate fried chicken with gusto and read the manuscript with a gimlet eye and a knowing palate. My friend and colleague Linda Peal offered strong edits and insights for which I am thankful. My pal Amy Evans shot the fine photographs that adorn these pages. Without the energy and intellect of my agent, David Black, this boo
k would never have been born. I also sing the praises of my editor, Jennifer Hershey, a kind woman with a sharp pencil and a keen eye for improving a manuscript. Her assistant, Rich Florest, was a prince.
Many of the people who took me in, fed me meals, shared their secrets, lent me cars, and listened to me babble on and on about fried chicken are chronicled in the text. Among those who are not, and to whom I am indebted, are Hsiao-Ching Chou, Peter McKee, Susan Tucker, Tyler Florence, Ron Brandon, Paige Osborne, Jessica Harris, John Martin Taylor, Becky Mercuri, Tom Franklin, Beth Ann Fennelly, Marc Smirnoff, Lolis Elie, John Egerton, Ronni Lundy, Elizabeth Sims, Robin Kline, Sarah Etheridge, Sara Roahen, Robert Sietsema, Matt Konigsmark, Judith Fertig, Jane Snow, John Long, Bill Addison, Reagan Walker, Christiane Lauterbach, and the desk clerk at the Avalon who helped me plot the thirty-seven stops on my Los Angeles trip. And then there’s Brett Anderson, Pete Wells, Susan Choi, Ed Levine, Bill Summers, Ted Lee, Matt Lee, Emily Winkey, Sarah Fritschner, Michael Griffith, Bob Yeats, Carol Daily, Viviana Carbollo, Kathleen Purvis, and Barbara Kuck of the Culinary Archives & Museum at Johnson & Wales University. And let’s not forget my colleagues at the Southern Foodways Alliance, or Mary Beth Lasseter, Mary Hartwell Howorth, Charles Wilson, Ann Abadie, and my colleagues at the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.
About the Author
John T. Edge writes for Gourmet, Saveur, and other publications. His work was featured in the 2001 through 2004 editions of the Best Food Writing compilation. Edge has a number of books to his credit, including the James Beard Award-nominated cookbook A Gracious Plenty: Recipes and Recollections from the American South. He is a finalist for the 2004 M. F. K. Fisher Distinguished Writing Award from the James Beard Foundation.
Edge holds a master’s degree in Southern Studies and is director of the Southern Foodways Alliance, an institute of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi, where he dedicates his time to studying, celebrating, promoting, and preserving America’s diverse food cultures.
He is one of the founders and principals of the Civil Rights Commemoration Initiative, which is working to install a memorial to the civil rights movement at the University of Mississippi. In 2003, he was named “One of Twenty Southerners to Watch” by the Financial Times of London. The recognition singles out people “whose achievements will have a greater impact in the future, both on the national and international stage.”
Edge lives in Oxford, Mississippi, with his son, Jesse, and his wife, Blair Hobbs, a painter. Visit the author’s website at www.johntedge.com.
