The food lab better home cooking through science ( PDFDrive ) 1086

EXPERIMENT: Is It Best to Rest? Here’s a question that has always vexed me: many existing recipes for fried chicken advise you to let the chicken rest for a half hour or so after breading it before frying it But very few offer an explanation as to why, which led me to question the very practice Is fried chicken really better when you let it rest? I cooked a few batches of chicken side by side to find out Materials • See the recipe for Extra-Crunchy Southern Fried Chicken (here) Procedure Follow the recipe as directed through step 3, but do not heat the oil yet In step 4, dredge half the chicken pieces in the seasoned flour, place them on a rack set on a rimmed baking sheet and let sit undisturbed for at least 30 minutes, and up to 1 hour Heat up the oil as directed in step Dredge the remaining chicken pieces and immediately fry and finish baking all the chicken as directed, being careful to keep track of which batch is which Taste both batches of chicken and note their texture Results and Analysis While neither batch will be bad, the chicken that was allowed to rest before frying should end up significantly tougher with a hard, brittle crust ... See the recipe for Extra-Crunchy Southern Fried Chicken (here) Procedure Follow the recipe as directed through step 3, but do not heat the oil yet In step 4, dredge half the chicken pieces in the seasoned flour, place them on a rack set... all the chicken as directed, being careful to keep track of which batch is which Taste both batches of chicken and note their texture Results and Analysis While neither batch will be bad, the chicken that was... pieces in the seasoned flour, place them on a rack set on a rimmed baking sheet and let sit undisturbed for at least 30 minutes, and up to 1 hour Heat up the oil as directed in step Dredge the remaining chicken