This Perfect Fried Chicken Recipe Took 100 Attempts to Develop
The cook behind the Food Lab perfects the fried chicken sandwich in Harlem.
This article is for subscribers only.
On Saturday, the writer and recipe developer J. Kenji López-Alt could be found butchering raw chickens at Harlem Shake, a bustling retro-style diner on Malcolm X Boulevard. As he broke down the birds, an audience of about 15 crowded in and cheered him on, while others slurped red velvet milkshakes and wondered what all the fuss was about.
It was about fried chicken. López-Alt was preparing to fry some for the day's popup following the method detailed in his new cookbook The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, where a meticulous, 20-page lesson on frying introduces his recipe for Extra-Crunchy Southern Fried Chicken (see recipe below).