Have you ever seen that Seinfeld episode where Jerry and George dare Elaine to grab food from another customer’s plate at a restaurant and carry on walking as though nothing was out of the ordinary? She can’t work up the courage despite being ravenous, but that courage comes easily to our independent 2-year-old.
After a long afternoon at a big airport event on the weekend, we were all hungry and chilly and in need of something quick to eat. We stopped at a fast-food restaurant and, while we were ordering, no one noticed Theo sidle over to some unattended table and help himself. The girl he snitched fries from was lovely and friendly and pleasantly amused, which probably didn’t dissuade him at all for next time some unsuspecting person heads for the ketchup dispenser.
Good thing we don’t eat out very often.
Or maybe we need to eat out more in order to instil proper eating-out etiquette?
Mostly we’ll probably stay home and eat chicken. We eat a LOT of chicken. But not a lot of crispy chicken, because you can only eat so much fried chicken and call yourself a balanced eater.
But crispy baked chicken? You can eat as much of this as you want.
This also happens to taste delicious cold (if you like cold chicken, which I do), making it perfect picnic food. I don’t know why, but picnics to me say macaroni salad, crispy chicken, chips and fruit. I don’t picnic often, so you’ll have to tell me if that’s normal picnic fare or not.
Fair warning: to get the super tender buttermilk chicken, you want to let the chicken marinate. You can prep it in the morning or I like to mix this up the night before – I’ve done it as early as 24 hours before and it works great. When it comes time to make it, all you need to do is dredge the chicken in the crumb mixture and bake, perfect for an easy weeknight meal. Long live the winner chicken dinners.
- 8 large chicken drumsticks, skin removed
- MARINADE:
- 1 tsp seasoning salt
- 1 tsp paprika
- ½ tsp poultry seasoning
- ½ tsp garlic powder
- ¼ tsp pepper
- 1 cup buttermilk
- Juice of ½ a lemon (approx 1½ Tbsp)
- Cooking spray
- COATING:
- ⅔ cup panko bread crumbs
- ½ cup crushed cornflake crumbs
- 2 Tbsp grated Parmesan
- 1½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp dried parsley
- 1½ tsp paprika
- ½ tsp garlic powder
- ¼ tsp chili powder
- Put drumsticks in a medium bowl and season with salt, paprika, poultry seasoning, garlic powder and pepper. Pour buttermilk and lemon juice over chicken, cover and refrigerate 6-8 hours, or up to 24 hours.
- When ready to cook, preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit, line a baking sheet with foil and spray with cooking spray.
- For coating, combine panko, cornflake crumbs, Parmesan and seasonings in a shallow dish. Remove chicken from buttermilk mixture and dredge each piece in crumb mixture, thoroughly coating all sides. Put on prepared baking sheet, spray tops of chicken with cooking spray, and bake 40-45 minutes, until golden brown and chicken is cooked through.
Adapted from the Joy the Baker Cookbook.
Theo is now my hero.
ps. I live for crispy buttermilk chicken. so you’re my hero too.
Your crispy chicken looks perfect!
That is a VERY cute food-stealing story. I’ve always wondered what would happen if I reached over and grabbed a french fry off of a stranger’s plate :-).
This chicken looks amazing! Love that there is no egg in it. I’m going to try it!
Oh my, this looks delicious. I am a huge fan of fried chicken, but am usually too lazy to deep fry, so this is even more perfect. Thanks for sharing, Anna.
Tried this chicken recipe for dinner last night! It was a HUGE hit! All the meat eaters in my house loved it. (My non meat eater had a yogurt! :))
Do you have a good Macaroni Salad recipe to go with the chicken? I’ve never made a Macaroni Salad before, but would love to try it!
I have one we like but I’ve never shared one here. The one I grew up with and still make is 2 cups uncooked macaroni, cooked and then tossed with whatever “toppings” you like (green onion, tomato, carrots, celery, peppers, etc.) and dress with 1 1/4 cup Miracle Whip or other mayo-type dressing combined with 5 tsp vinegar and 1/4 tsp each salt and pepper. If you don’t like mayo-based dressings a nice Italian dressing is also really good!
Thanks for that! I made it for dinner tonight (added a little finely chopped salami too!), and it was delicious! We’ve just sweated through another 40 degree day here in Perth, West Australia, so a salad dinner was great :-)
Glad you liked it! It’s hard to imagine you being in such a different season from us :) It’s been gorgeous here, but nowhere near sweaty yet (which is good with me :)).