Running with the Colonel!

I'm not a quitter.  You have to know that about me.  And that's sometimes good, and sometimes bad.  But in this case, it's delicious! 

You may recall my secret recipe for "Coal Black Chicken".  Not too many people have requested it, but I understand.  But, I don't give up.  So, I kept forging ahead in my quest for perfect edible decent basic fried chicken.  I found a secret source, right next door! 

My neighbor is around 85 and from the midwest.  I started thinking, "Is there an 85 year old woman, from a farming state, who doesn't know how to make fried chicken?"  So one night I dropped by Floy's house (you knew her name wouldn't be Karen or Carly) and told her my dilemma with fried chicken.  She looked at me and said, "Well, honey, I think your oil is too hot!"  I explained to her that I was using a recipe from Fine Cooking Magazine, and that I had bought a cast iron skillet and a fancy deep fry thermometer from Sur La Table.  And asked her how hot she thought my oil should be, since the recipe stated 350 degrees.  She looked at me like I had just come down from the planet Mars, and said, "Well, I don't know how hot it's supposed to be, but if your oil is smoking, it's too hot."

So, against my better judgement, I put away my Fine Cooking magazine, and my fancy thermometer and went "old-school" and just eyeballed my oil on my next foray into Fried Chicken.  And, to my amazement, it turned out fantastically!  I think KFC may be calling me soon for samples!

Golden Brown Chicken!



Delicious enough to send next door!

Well, there is something to say about "eyeballing" your cooking.  I have to remember that people have been cooking for 1,000s of years without fancy cooking tools and accessories from "hoity-toity" stores.  I may just throw away all my fancy cooking magazines and my kitchen full of uni-tasker tools.  Let me check at Sur La Table and see if they have a book that tells me how to do all that!