Fried Chicken - American Recipe

Fried Chicken

🌍 American, American Home Cooking Difficulty: ●○○○○

🍳 Equipment: Meat-knife, Covered saucepan, Colander, Bread-board, Deep frying-pan, Long-handled fork

Traditional fried chicken — straightforward 1920s home cooking.

Ingredients

• Chicken
• Salt
• Pepper
• Flour
• 1 cup lard or similar fat

Method

1. With — a meat-knife separate the legs and wings of the chicken from the body, cut the body in two, lengthwise along the back-bone, and cut each half of the body into two parts.
2. Wash — the pieces of chicken, and dry them on a clean cloth.
3. Unless — the chicken is very young (in which case it will not be necessary to boil it before frying) put the pieces into a saucepan, and barely cover them with boiling water. Cover the saucepan, reduce the heat so that the water will simmer, and cook for about an hour, or until the chicken is tender.
4. Take — the saucepan from the fire, drain off the water, and allow the chicken to cool.
5. Sprinkle — the bread-board thickly with flour and roll each piece of chicken in the flour, coating it thoroughly.
6. Set — the frying-pan on the fire, put the fat into it; and when the fat melts and begins to smoke, put the pieces of chicken into it. Brown the chicken well on both sides, taking each piece from the fat as it is done and shaking a little salt and pepper over it.
7. Prepare — gravy as directed in the following recipe, and pour it over the chicken on a hot platter.

Tags: chicken, pepper, flour · Source: The Plain Sailing Cook Book (1922)