Fried & True: More than 50 Recipes for America's Best Fried Chicken and Sides: A Cookbook

by Lee Brian Schrager, Adeena Sussman, Whoopi Goldberg (Foreword by)

Overview

Whether you prefer it cold out of the fridge or hot and crispy on a buttery biscuit, you will find your new favorite fried chicken recipe in Fried & True, serving up more than 50 recipes for America’s most decadently delicious food.

Lee Schrager has left no stone unturned in his quest to find America’s best fried chicken. From four-star restaurants to roadside fry shacks, you’ll learn how to brine your bird, give it a buttermilk bath, batter or even double batter it, season with loads of spices, and fry it up to golden perfection. Recipes to savor include:

-Hattie B’s Hot Chicken
-Yotam Ottolenghi’s Seeded Chicken Schnitzel with Parsley-Caper Mayonnaise
-Marcus Samuelsson’s Coconut Fried Chicken with Collards and Gravy
-Jacques-Imo’s Fried Chicken and Smothered Cabbage
-The Loveless Café’s Fried Chicken and Hash Brown Casserole
-Blackberry Farm’s Sweet Tea–Brined Fried Chicken
-Charles Phan’s Hard Water Fried Chicken
-Thomas Keller’s Buttermilk Fried Chicken
-Wylie Dufresne’s Popeyes-Style Chicken Tenders and Biscuits

Sink your teeth into Fried & True, the source of your next great fried chicken masterpiece and a tribute to America’s most beloved culinary treasure.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780770435233
Publisher:	Clarkson Potter/Ten Speed
Publication date:	05/20/2014
Sold by:	Random House
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	40 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

LEE BRIAN SCHRAGER is the founder and director of the Food Network & Cooking Channel South Beach and New York City Wine & Food Festivals. He is also the vice president of corporate communications and national events at Southern Wine & Spirits of America and the author of Fried and True and The Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival Cookbook. A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Lee has appeared on Today and Rachael Ray, and serves on the board of directors for the Food Bank of New York City. He lives in Miami and New York City.
 
ADEENA SUSSMAN is a cookbook writer and recipe authority. In addition to this book she also collaborated with Lee Schrager on Fried and True, and is the coauthor of many other cookbooks. Her work has also been published in Food & Wine, The Wall Street Journal, Martha Stewart Living, Every Day with Rachael Ray, and on Epicurious and Food Republic.

EVAN SUNG is a prominent food, lifestyle, and travel photographer based in Brooklyn. His work appears regularly in the New York Times and he has worked on cookbooks with some of the top chefs from around the world.

Read an Excerpt

Who doesn’t dig fried chicken?

If you’re a vegan you probably don’t, and in that case put this book down, ’coz you’re not going to be able to resist the desire for that chicken. Fried chicken is a staple in many cultures. It’s comfort food, and it isn’t a black, Asian, or white Southern thing—it’s a human thing. I LOVE my fried chicken. I mean I really, really, really, really LOVE my fried chicken. Nothing makes me or my mouth happier. I remember my mom taking the brown paper bag, adding the flour, putting in the chicken and shaking, shaking, shaking. And when it hit the oil . . . that smell! I’m not much of a cook myself, but I do know my fried chicken. (I cook a mean turkey once a year at Thanksgiving; really slow, all night, and baste, baste, baste). But fried chicken is my one true love.

Each year there is something called the Food Network South Beach and New York City Wine & Food Festivals. A few years ago, the very amazing Rachael Ray couldn’t make it to her event, the Burger Bash. The most generous man, Lee Schrager, approached me to fill in. Now, who doesn’t like a great burger? So that was an easy “yes” for me! But as I was walking from station to station sampling all the burgers from everywhere, I turned to Lee and suggested a fried chicken event for the following year. I’m proud to be part of Chicken Coupe, now going into its fourth year in New York and its third year in Miami. (Thanks, Lee!) But who knew Lee was such a fried chicken fan, too? He says writing a fried chicken cookbook wasn’t always on his bucket list . . . but now I’m not so sure.

Fried & True doesn’t just give you 50-plus fried chicken recipes—from the ones Lee picked up on his road trip to some from the best restaurants, in some of the best cities in the world—but also the stories that go along with them and make for some good reading. My favorite is “Fried Chicken 101”—yup, tips! Um-hm . . . “don’t crowd, and give each piece time.” That’s good advice. Thanks, Lee—I’m hoping to meet some of these recipes at the next Chicken Coupe event.

Editorial Reviews

★ 03/03/2014
Despite a degree in culinary arts and countless hours spent cooking in restaurants, author Schrager had only prepared fried chicken a single time before he began work on this crunchy, savory valentine to one of America’s classic dishes. Making up for lost time, Schrager scoured the country, uncovering myriad ways to make a dish that is fundamentally simple. Profiling holes-in-the-wall restaurants as well as tres chic eateries such as Cafe Boulud and the Union Square Cafe, Schrager illustrates that fried chicken is one of the nation’s common culinary denominators. Some regional specialties, such as Nashville’s famous hot chicken, an incendiary dish incorporating liberal glugs of hot sauce and cayenne in the preparation, are singled out, as are riffs on key steps like brining in Coca-Cola or sweet tea or adding ham scraps, bacon, and butter to flavor the oil. A handful of carefully selected sides such as smothered cabbage, hash brown casserole, giblet gravy, and classic buttermilk biscuits from Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock help cooks round out the meal. Even veterans will likely appreciate Schrager’s attention to detail, such as the suggestion to chill the bird before frying to ensure maximum crispness and the hedonistic suggestion of adding bacon grease to the frying oil for smoky goodness. While it might not be the healthiest cookbook, it’s certainly one of the most mouth-watering. (May)

Publishers Weekly