Crispy Chicken And Other Matters

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Q: How can I get super crispy chicken without spending hours preparing it? I have tried many times to make extra crispy chicken and was disappointed with how mushy it becomes. I like extra crispy chicken like Banquet or Kentucky Fried chicken. Do you have any help for me?

A: The most common problem with chicken that turns mushy is poor draining technique. If you, like most home cooks (and Emeril), take the chicken out of the oil and slap it on paper towels, you're just letting the chicken sit in its own grease. Set up a rack over a pan lined with paper towels and put your chicken on that to drain. After it's been sitting for a couple of minutes, turn it to allow any hollows full of grease to drain.

You can also make a change to your coating that will up your crispiness, but you'll have to watch your oil temperature carefully. Make the coating with half flour and half cornstarch and you'll get amazingly crispy chicken. But be careful! The extra cornstarch will make the coating more susceptible to burning.

Personally, I prefer a straight flour coating. After an overnight soak in buttermilk or yogurt, I season the chicken, then flour it and cook it. Putting the seasonings directly on the meat, under the flour, protects them from burning and losing their flavor.

Q: I am having a problem with nut breads. I make banana bread & cranberry bread often. I have a new oven. I bought a thermometer and checked the temperature at all rack levels.
The pans I use are 9 5/8 by 5 ½ by 2 ¾. The recipes call for 9 by 5 by 3 pans. The last cranberry bread was quite brown on top and raw in the middle. I have tried leaving it in longer, but then the top and sides are almost crispy! I have a "help" guide which says to adjust for a different size pan than the recipe calls for, but it doesn't tell me how to adjust.
Help!!! I love to bake and I need to get this problem solved. -- Sandra K.

A: So basically you've got a bread that has a greater surface area and less thickness. I would try backing off on your temperature 25 degrees and lengthening the cooking time. Keep an eye on it via the toothpick test.

Of course, if you make a LOT of these breads, it might be a good idea just to pick up an inexpensive pan in the right size. Don't spend a ton of money on baking pans unless you're incapable of lining them with waxed paper.

Q: What’s the best oil to cook with, vegetable, corn, peanut, or olive? -- Janet P.

A: This is a question about which entire books and cooking classes have been constructed. It all depends on what you're cooking, the temperature and method.

If you're deep-frying, the most important thing to consider is smoke point. This is the temperature at which the oil begins to burn and break down, becoming unusable. My absolute favorite is peanut oil. It has a very high smoke point, is neutral in flavor and is durable enough to last for multiple frying sessions.

Peanut oil is also my preference for stir-frying, where I'll add a splash of dark sesame oil to it for flavor.

For general skillet use, corn or vegetable oil are good. There are various oils with various health claims, but not being a doctor I'm not going to speculate on their merit. I prefer canola oil, as it's lighter than corn oil and has a smoke point almost as high as peanut. There is a lot of Internet hysteria about canola oil, and I'd advise you to treat it as the bad comedy it is.

Olive oil is just about the only oil you'll find yourself using as both a cooking liquid and a condiment. Extra-virgin oil has a definite peppery flavor, and is a tasty addition to anything tomato-based ... or in my kitchen just about anything short of pancakes. I love the stuff. However, it is thermally fragile, having a fairly low smoke point. Its shelf life also isn't quite as long as more neutral oils, so avoid the giant economy size jugs unless you use it frequently.

Q: In a cookbook I recently purchased, it states that cold-pressed olive oil should NEVER be used in cooking as it turns to trans-fatty acids. I watch plenty of cooking shows and never once have I ever heard them say don't use it. It's more often the other way around, it seems TV chefs WANT you to use olive oil instead of butter. What to do? I am confused as to which is OK, as I have seen "cooking" oils that are blended oil mixtures such as Colavita which has 25 percent extra-virgin olive oil. Help... -- Patricia H.

A: Speaking of bad science. Patricia, if that cookbook has idiocy like that in it, I'd be wary of trusting any of the recipes therein. You might be thinking you're making banana bread and end up with plastique.

Olive oil, according to every resource I can lay hands on, is the healthiest oil around. Nowhere in all my reading have I ever found anything that supports what your cookbook says, and I've found numerous credible sources that say exactly the opposite.

Heck, even the folks at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, who haven't exactly been known for steering away from a good batch of hysteria when they can get some press out of it, endorse frying and cooking in olive oil.

Q: What kind of beef is a good one to grind yourself for hamburgers? -- N. Sager

A: Ah, we'll close this week with a question near and dear to my heart: Hamburgers!

I applaud you for grinding your own beef. Most people think you need a meat grinder to accomplish this, when all you really need is a food processor. With your standard blade in place, put ¾-inch cubes of meat into the hopper, a handful at a time, and pulse until you get your desired grind. It usually takes me six to eight one-second pulses to get a fine grind. And the flavor will be far beter than anything you buy in a chub at the grocery store!

As for what meat to use? For burgers, I like a 50-50 mix of sirloin and chuck, or sirloin and round if I'm going to add a smidgen of sausage to the mix.

Now you've done it. You've made me hungry.

Come back next week for more questions and answers, and don't forget to send in your own questions!