WK Buffalo-Butter Chicken Drumsticks

Ok, so last week I made up some Buffalo-Butter Wings. This week, I changed things up and got some cheap chicken drumsticks at the store. I did them very close to last weeks recipe, but I changed a few things up, so I'm not going to bother making this an official recipe.

My plan was to marinate the chicken, dust, deep fry, then maybe sauce the drumsticks. The first thing I did was marinate the chicken for 3 days in Laredo hot sauce. I was off to a good start, but there was a problem come deep fry day: how was I going to remove the excess sauce from the cold chicken so that they could be dusted then deep fried? I could 'bread' the drumsticks with the sauce, but I was sure that was going to make a mess. What to do what to do? I can't use a paper towel - that would be so messy and wasteful. Then it hit me, I could bake the drumsticks until the sauce was sufficiently roasted in - brilliant!

Here the drumsticks about to go in the oven - so saucy and marinated.

Now the drumsticks are baked, then dusted in cayenne/flour/s&p. Shake shake shake.


Deep fried. I was a little nervous pulling them out because they looked over cooked/burnt. Uh oh.

Oh, I also did some Deep Fried Ravioli. How do you do that you say? Well you take frozen mini ravioli, dunk them in milk (butter milk is best, but I only had milk), dredge them in Italian bread crumbs (see picture above), then deep fry. Simple. I screwed these up.

First, the ravioli was crap (do not buy Equity products, they just suck). Second, get the mini ravioli, can't stress that enough. Full size was too much. I got this recipe from Giada over at Everyday Italian and I did it once for my students back in rez where it went over well. Today, not so much.

Final product. I knew the ravioli went wrong, but would the chicken?

Well, the chicken drumstick turned out great. A bit spicy, crispy skin, juicy chicken meat. The darkened spot was just flavour colouring, not burnt skin.



The BBS was good to - it highlighted the spice and add some extra moisture.

Good for mopping up the skinless chicken.

I also did a few pieces of chicken in the oven, to contrast the two. The oven baked pieces were MUCH spicier. Clearly the baking process protected the heat from the cayenne, while the deep frying eliminated most of the spice. But after eating one roasted, I tossed the rest into the deep fryer for the deliciously crispy skin.

WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN DONE DIFFERENTLY?

The ravioli was a loss. No equity, and only mini next time. They should be light and fluffy. These were heavy and, well, not fluffy.

As for the chicken, I'm at a loss. The marinade didn't really get into the chicken; I suppose I could have pricked the chicken first with a fork. I really like the spice of the cayenne on the roasted drumsticks, but the crispy skin of the deep fried was so tasty.

All in all, the chicken was good. I had planned to have about half for lunches, but only 2 remained. They will make a great lunch tomorrow!