Second Time's The Charm: The Secret Step You're Missing For Juicy & Tender Fried Chicken

Fried chicken is a dish with a thousand variations and techniques, all of which bring with them varying levels of deliciousness. By now it's common knowledge that double-frying chicken leads to the most beautifully crispy exterior, but did you know there's another kind of double-cooking you can put your chicken through to ensure that meat is as juicy and tender as possible? This technique is called twice-cooked chicken, and while it requires some foreplanning, it can lead to amazing results. 

As opposed to the double-fried chicken that makes Korean fried chicken so popular, twice-cooked chicken involves slow cooking a full, cut-up chicken in broth and a combination of spices for three to four hours, until the meat is tender but not at the point of falling apart. The chicken is then soaked in a combination of buttermilk and hot sauce before being dredged and fried as usual. 

By allowing the chicken to reach such a tender point in the initial cooking process, you ensure that the meat will not dry out while frying, especially if you include corn starch, potato starch, or baking powder in your fry dredge: ingredients that are guaranteed to take your fried chicken skin to the next level. All three of these items can help make a lighter, crunchier skin that allows the extra-juicy meat to shine through.

The concept of poaching chicken in order to twice-cook it has long been utilized in Asian cuisines, whether fully-fried or stir-fried. A common Chinese tradition involves offering a poached chicken to the ancestors during certain holidays and festivals, and then using the leftovers of that chicken to flavor stir-fries. Twice-cooked soy sauce chicken is another dish that starts with well-sauced chicken in the oven that is then stir-fried in the pan to get a crispy, caramelized skin.

A nice middle ground between the more classic dishes with the modern twice-cooked recipes starts by simmering a whole chicken in soy sauce and aromatics for 20 minutes, then allowing the chicken to cool before cleaving it in half and deep-frying each half for approximately 10 minutes and serving with a chili-vinegar sauce. This produces beautifully crispy skin with Asian-infused flavors while ensuring the meat stays tender.

For an alternate form of a more American style of twice-cooked chicken that doesn't involve a slow cooker, you can try either soaking the chicken in cold salt water, to utilize the best practice of brining your bird before frying it, or marinating it in buttermilk, hot sauce, and spices and frying the chicken until it just reaches golden brown before moving it over to a 350-degree oven to finish. This will give a similarly crispy exterior while keeping the meat juicy and perfectly moist.