Ingredients
Units
Scale
- 1 whole chicken, ideally about 3 lbs. before spatchcocking
- garlic toum (WILDLY optional TFD addition, omit for original)
- ***
- Batter:
- 1/4 cup potato starch
- 2 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
- 2 Tbsp. roasted soybean powder
- 2 tsp. turmeric
- 1/4 tsp. baking powder
- 2 1/2 tsp. chicken seasoning blend 99-X
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 cup ice-cold water
- ***
- Garlic Sauce:
- 4 garlic heads, papery skins removed - TFD strongly prefers heirloom garlic, especially the Pyongyang variety for this recipe
- 6 large black garlic cloves, mashed (optional TFD addition, replace with one extra head of garlic for original)
- 2 garlic cloves, grated 10 minutes before sauce is made to let the allicin form to maximize health and flavor benefits
- 1 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
- 1/2 Tbsp. sesame oil (TFD endorses only Kadoya brand)
- 1 Tbsp. local honey of your choice (TFD prefers a lighter honey)
- 2 tsp. gochujang (optional but recommended TFD addition for a little spice, omit for original)
- 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
- 1 1/2 tsp. chicken seasoning blend 99-X (highly optional but recommended TFD addition, replace with seasoning salt or kosher salt for original)
- ***
- peanut and corn oil in a 50/50 ratio to fry
Instructions
- Cut off the very top of the garlic heads. Place the garlic bulbs on aluminium foil and drizzle with olive oil. Wrap tightly and bake at 400F for 30 minutes.
- Squeeze out the baked garlic cloves. Add in rest of the ingredients and blend. Refrigerate.
- Spatchcock the chicken (or have your butcher do it for you). If doing it yourself, cut down the center of the chicken breast. Pop open the center collar bone and flatten. Dislocate the joint connecting the thigh to the body so that the chicken lays flat.
- Cut slashes into the breasts and the thighs to help even out their cook time – it also helps the toum penetrate.
- Pat the chicken dry with a paper towel and salt liberally with kosher salt. Keep it uncovered in the fridge for at least an hour, preferably overnight. This process allows all the excess moisture to be drawn out of the chicken and makes for a crispier fry.
- Prepare a large pot or wok with ample oil to fry (TFD prefers a 50/50 blend of peanut and corn oils). Heat on high until the oil reaches 170C / 340F. (We’ll be frying it twice, once at a lower temperature around 160C/320F and again at 180C/355F. You want the oil to be higher because the temperature will drop once we put the chicken in!)
- Prepare the batter, remove chicken from fridge 30 minutes before cooking – brush off any loose salt and dry it with paper towels.
- Coat the chicken with a VERY thin coating of toum, and massage it into the cut slits. Then, dip the chicken in the batter, making sure the batter coats all of the chicken.
- Gently drop the chicken into the oil.
- Using a sieve, fish out any of the excess batter that floats to the top. You might think that there’s not enough batter on the chicken and that the chicken looks like there’s nothing coating it. Trust the process, the batter should be so thin that it barely covers the chicken and the result will be super golden brown and crunchy.
- Fry on each side for about 10 minutes on each side. The cook time will depend on the size of the bird. It should be around 6 minutes per pound of meat.
- Take out once golden and let it rest for 10 minutes.
- Heat the oil back on high to 355F and double-fry again for 1 minute on each side.
- Place the chicken on a wired rack and let it rest again for ten minutes.
- Smother in the garlic sauce and enjoy!