Finger-lickin’ chicken

by Shauna Ferry

February is an underrated month. Some people feel it's just depressing – it’s cold, the holidays are over, New Year's resolutions have already gone out the window, and Valentine’s Day is overrated and just another “all about the money” holiday.

I personally love February. As a dairy farmer, this is the quietest and most relaxing month we have in the whole year. February is the month in which everyone should self-reflect and try new things! For my part, I’m reading new books and continuing to make new meals with as many locally made items as possible. It really makes dinner fun and I’ve become conscious of looking at labels to find out where my food is coming from.

My husband, Andrew, chose one of the meals of the week we took on. It was a delicious, but a feel-good, football Sunday kind of meal: southern-style fried chicken sandwiches. Andrew is constantly finding recipes that consist of some type of deep fried anything – chicken, turkey, okra, broccoli. He loves following different people on TikTok who make all these creative deep-fried recipes, so this was a meal he has been wanting to try for a long time.

For my part, I’m reading new books and continuing to make new meals with as many locally made items as possible.

This recipe was basic, so I didn’t use a whole lot of local ingredients, but I did my best to use what I could. Firstly, I needed chicken breast. I haven’t found any local farms that sell chicken breast, but I did go to a local meat shop, Gene’s Meat Market in Westport. I always have good experiences with Gene’s. Their meat is fresh and the pricing is always great. Another thing about Gene’s is the service. I find meat buying intimidating, but they’re always helpful and answer any questions I have. The flour and seasonings that went into the seasoning mixture I already had in my pantry, but I did make the buttermilk because I didn’t have any on hand. I used our vat-pasteurized milk from Westport Dairy with store-bought apple cider vinegar. I never realized how easy it was to make buttermilk until I read this recipe! The egg that I added into the buttermilk was just from a local friend who has chickens. (They don’t sell their chicken eggs, but they should with how crazy the egg prices are right now!) After coating each pounded-out chicken breast, we deep-fried them until golden brown.

Fried Chicken Sandwich

The recipe was strictly for the chicken, but we did want to make chicken sandwiches, so the add-ons of bread, spicy mayo, and pickles were all influenced from other random southern-style recipes we had come across, and we weren’t disappointed with their inclusion!

For our bread, I used Calise bulkie rolls. Calise Bakery is out of Rhode Island and has been around for over 100 years – they’re the only bulkie rolls we buy. After toasting the bulkie roll and placing one of the chicken breasts on it, it was time to add the finishing touches.

The sauce we used was a spicy mayo – just a drizzle on the bread. I could not find any locally made spicy mayo (and I did look far and wide), so I had to use Lee Kum Kee Siracha Mayo. This product is manufactured out of California. While I was disappointed to not find a local product, it did have great flavor and was a good stand-in until I can find something made a little closer.

Last was the pickle on top, brought to us by Grillo’s. Grillo’s is out of Boston and they have a pretty cool backstory. The owner, Travis, lost a job opportunity and decided to try making and selling pickles using an old family recipe with cucumbers right out of his garden. After selling out of the trunk of his car, then pickle carts, he quickly moved into Whole Foods, Fenway Park, and other larger stores like Target. Sometimes in dark times, you just have to get creative and find your inspiration. After adding one slice of their “pickle sandwich makers'' pickles, the sandwich was finally complete.

The verdict? The sandwich was absolutely delicious, and I was highly impressed. The one change I would make would be to put half the seasonings called for in the recipe directly on the chicken as well as into the flour mix, just to give it a little extra flavor. I will be making this recipe again – I think as sliders for my next get-together.

For the full recipe, visit thesoulfoodpot.com/ soul-food-southern-friedchicken/

Bon appetit!

After adding one slice of their “pickle sandwich makers'' pickles, the sandwich was finally complete.