Oven Fried Chicken

I absolutely love fried chicken.  Now I’m not talking any fast food place fried chicken.  I mean good ole fashioned homemade, buttermilk marinated and breaded fried chicken. 
But sadly due to time and the fact that fried chicken instantly seems to attach itself to my already ample booty I try to stay away from it.  Luckily for us I have found a pretty decent oven fried chicken recipe that is quick and easy. 
Everyone loves “fried” chicken nights here now and these are as simple to make as store bought shake and bake chicken.

Oven Fried Chicken

Ingredients

• Enough chicken legs to feed your family
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1/4 teaspoon sage
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon or less cayenne pepper
• 1/2 cup butter

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
2. Mix flour, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, paprika, sage, cayenne and pepper together in a bag. Add chicken parts in a bag and shake until well coated.
3. Melt butter/margarine in a 9x13 inch baking dish in the preheated oven. Place chicken in the baking dish skin side down and bake for 20 minutes. Turn pieces and bake another 20 minutes until tender and juices run clear.

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In a hurry? Homemade Baked Chicken Fingers

So you all know by now that we are a pretty busy household right?  Between ice skating lessons, karate classes and BMX races and practices you must wonder how we do all of that stuff and still eat home cooked, real food meals, right? 

This recipe for baked chicken fingers is one of my favorite go to recipes for a busy weeknight.  From start to finish it takes just 15 minutes for me to bread them and bake them and have them on the table for the kids.  Almost as fast as going to McDonald’s and getting the chicken nuggets and bringing them home for dinner…

Baked Chicken Fingers

Ingredients:

• 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast halves
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 cup AP Flour
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 cups Italian breadcrumbs

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 400F
• Cut chicken breasts into thin strips, about one inch wide.
• Longer sections can be cut in half to have uniform pieces.
• Mix flour and seasonings (garlic, salt, and pepper) well in a bowl.
• Dip chicken pieces into flour mixture. then egg mixture, and then finally in the Italian breadcrumbs.
• Place on baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. 6
• Bake at for 9-11 minutes, until crispy on outside and lightly browned.

***The girls like these dipped in Ranch Dressing, ketchup, BBQ Sauce or even Honey Mustard.

****To have these ready in 15 minutes I have to cut the chicken into thin strips earlier in the day.  Another time saver is to bread them and refrigerate them until ready to use and then just plop them in a preheated oven.  See you can eat well even when as busy as we are!!!

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Yummy Fried Chicken!

See how nice and crispy it turned out? How could you resist?

The other night T. and I were both wanting some fried chicken. Seeing as we don't eat meat that is from a CAFO it really limits us on where we can eat out when we do. I usually follow a vegetarian diet when eating out. Solves the ethical issues I have. But this was different and very hard. I mean, I wanted fried chicken badly!!!!

We ended up buying 2 "happy" chickens from Costco and cutting them up and making a whole slew of fried chicken! We needed enough to feed 2 extra children and then have some leftovers. It went over well and yes, we still have a bunch of leftovers. Nothing quite like cold fried chicken is there???

Fried Chicken

Ingredients:

whole chicken cut up (or just pieces of your favorite parts)
1 carton of buttermilk
Peanut or Canola Oil
5 cups of flour
1 Tbsp cayenne
2 Tbsp onion salt
1 tsp onion powder
1 Tbsp ground pepper
1 Tbsp garlic salt

Directions

• In a pan or a bowl soak the chicken in enough Buttermilk to cover for about 15 - 20 minutes (or longer if you have more time).
• Heat a cast iron skillet (or any other deep skillet) with about 1.2 to 1/4 inches of peanut or canola oil. It is hot enough when you drop a small piece of food in and it bobs right to the surface. If you have a thermometer you can place that in the oil and when it reaches 365° your oil is at the right temperature.
• * Mix together all of the dry ingredients and take the chicken pieces from the buttermilk and place it in the flour to cover.
• Remove the chicken from the flour and remove any excess flour and place in another bowl or pan and allow to sit until the oil is up to the right temperature.
• * Place each piece of chicken in the oil gently turn only when the chicken is a golden brown. Turn and cook the other side.
• You can test the chicken the old fashioned way (by cutting into it) or you can use a meat thermometer to check and ensure that it has reached 170 degrees.
• Allow to drain on a rack for several minutes and then serve immediately!

The french fries ended up incredible too. We like them nice and crispy and to acheive that with homemade ones you need to fry them twice. Do the initial fry in small batches and then toss them all back in in the end and fry them for another minute or two and they will end up nice and crispy!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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Fried Chicken-the best medicine around!

Delicious homemade buttermilk fried chicken breast with a huge salad!

Holy Crap-have I been sh** on a lot in the last couple of days! I'm sure this happens to everyone at one point or another and that is fine but I sure hate it when it happens to me!

I have as of today moved both of my children from a private Montessori school to a public elementary one. Who really cares why and it really doesn't have anything to do with a food blog now does it??? But my point is this has sucked up a lot of time and energy that I have. I am a firm believer that when you cook or bake you really need to be "feeling the love" or your food just will not be the way you want it to be. Well did I ever get a lesson on this in the last couple of days!!!

This is the cake that my daughter choose from Publix.

Yesterday was my oldest daughters last day at her old school and I had learned my lesson by the youngest daughters move to not even try to bake a cake. Last time I made 2 before I sent T. to Publix to get a cake that I would serve to people. This time I just sent T. to Publix to get a cake without me making any attempt at all to bake one. It was such a good thing that I did that so that I had so much more time to screw up everything else that I touched! Here is a brief of my day yesterday:

• Woke up and realized I needed yogurt...at 7 I started the milk boiling so that we would have yogurt by 8 last night. Forgot the yogurt and found it still in the yogurt maker at 8 this morning when I was packing lunches and looking for the yogurt!
• Made pizza dough for dinner last night but mixed up the AP Flour and the Whole Wheat flour so had to dump that down the drain and start all over.
• Got home from skating last night and I was finishing up my pizza dinner when I realized that I needed bread for the girls lunches in the morning. Started a loaf of bread at 8:30 PM and it takes 3 hrs and 50 min. for it to bake. That was fun!
• My cleaner called me to reschedule the cleaning from Friday to Thursday and then proceeded to chew me out because my house was too messy...WTF isn't that why I have you????????
• The skating competition that my daughter is in on a couple of weeks from now have informed me that I need to donate 2 hours of my time to the competition or my daughter will not be able to compete. I told them to take my name off of the list then where I have signed up to bring juice to fill up about 250 people please. Needless to say I get a free pass on the volunteering!
• Started on my entry in the Royal Foodie Joust but gave up half way through. Need to wait for "the love".
  

I guess at this point I could go on and on...but really who cares. I decided that I needed Fried Chicken for dinner. Sometime you just need that. I sure hit the spot. Served up with a great big salad with lettuce, poblano peppers, onion, tomatoes, blue cheese and dressing. It really doesn't get mush better than this...I think I can face the world again tomorrow renewed for a whole new battle!!!!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

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