Inspired by the pressure-frying machine in which Colonel Sanders created his famous fried chicken, we set out to find a faster way to fry that would get all the chicken on the table at the same time. For fast frying, we cooked the chicken all in one batch and covered the pot for the first half of cooking. The lid allowed the oil, which dropped in temperature when we added the chicken, to quickly heat up again. We let the pieces fry undisturbed so the coating set almost entirely around each piece before flipping and frying the chicken uncovered for the second half of cooking.
Ingredients
Brine and Chicken
- 2 cups buttermilk - for brining
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 3 pounds bone-in chicken pieces - 2 split breasts cut in half crosswise, 2 drumsticks, and 2 thighs, trimmed
- 1½ quarts vegetable oil - for frying
Coating
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 tablespoons white pepper
- 1 tablespoon pepper
- 1 tablespoon celery salt
- 1 tablespoon granulated garlic
- 1 tablespoon ground ginger
- 1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 6 tablespoons buttermilk
Instructions
Brine the chicken
- Whisk buttermilk and salt in a large bowl until the salt is dissolved.
- Submerge the chicken in the buttermilk mixture.
- Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or up to 24 hours.
Make the coating
- Whisk flour, white pepper, pepper, celery salt, granulated garlic, ginger, Italian seasoning, baking powder, and salt together in a large bowl.
- Add buttermilk and, using your fingers, rub flour mixture and buttermilk together until craggy bits form throughout.
Coat the chicken
- Set wire rack in a rimmed baking sheet.
- Working with 1 piece of chicken at a time, remove from the buttermilk mixture, allowing excess to drip off, then drop into the flour mixture, turning to thoroughly coat and pressing to adhere.
- Transfer to the prepared rack, skin side up.
- Refrigerate, uncovered, for at least 1 hour or up to 2 hours.
Fry first side covered
- Set a second wire rack in a second rimmed baking sheet and line with a triple layer of paper towels.
- Add oil to a large Dutch oven until it measures about 1 inch deep and heat over medium-high heat to 350 degrees.
- Add all chicken to oil, skin side down in a single layer (some slight overlap is OK) so that pieces are mostly submerged.
- Cover and fry for 10 minutes, rotating pot after 5 minutes.
- Adjust burner, if necessary, to maintain oil temperature around 300 degrees.
Fry second side uncovered
- Uncover pot (chicken will be golden on sides and bottom but unset and gray on top) and carefully flip the chicken.
- Continue to fry, uncovered, until the chicken is golden brown and breasts register 160 degrees and drumsticks/thighs register 175 degrees, 7 to 9 minutes longer.
- Transfer the chicken to a paper towel-lined rack and let cool for 10 minutes before serving.