Food In The Fort

You know how sometimes you plan ahead and think you’ve got all your ducks in a row and all that but things still go south, way south? It was an experience like that for me on a Friday evening a couple of weeks ago. My daughter was having friends over (well, it turned out to be “friends;” it was advertised as just “friend,” but that’s another rant entirely). I was going to make this Thai chicken thing that sounded wonderful – peanut-crusted chicken with dipping sauce – and thought I was going to be so clever by chopping everything up for the breading the night before. Big mistake. Nightmarishly big mistake. The breading somehow transmogrified into – I don’t know – peanut cilantro mud (quite tasty, but not so good for using as breading) and refused to stick to the chicken at all. Undeterred, I grabbed clumps of breading and did my best to smoosh it onto the chicken. Imagine trying to cover chicken in a thin layer of sculpey clay. It adhered in places, leaving others bald and looking really, really hideous. Still, I had to feed five kids, so I slammed it in the oven and hoped for the best. When I had to turn the chicken after fifteen minutes, whatever scant amount of breading had managed to cling to it feebly fell onto the baking sheet. I decided to cut my losses and take them to the food court where they bought Chinese food and snuck it into the movies under the coats. Clever girls!

So I failed at this recipe completely, but I think it’s worth another try. If you’d like to give it a shot, here it is:

Peanut-crusted chicken with dipping sauce

Chicken breading:

• 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
• 1 inch piece fresh gingerroot, peeled and finely grated
• 1 lemongrass stalk, outer leaves removed, finely chopped
• 2 Tbsp chopped, fresh cilantro leaves
• scant 1 ⅓ cups salted peanuts
• ¾ cups flour
• 2 eggs
• 4 Tbsp milk

• 12 chicken drumsticks, skin removed

Dipping sauce:

• 1 fresh red chili, seeded and finely chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
• ½ cup white wine vinegar
• 2 Tbsp dark brown sugar

Chicken prep:

1. Preheat the oven to 350˚
2. Place the garlic, gingerroot, lemongrass, cilantro leaves, peanuts and 2 Tbsp of the flour in a food processor; blend until finely ground; transfer to a shallow dish
3. In a bowl, beat together the eggs and milk
4. Spread the remaining flour on a plate
5. Dip the drumsticks into the flour, then the egg mixture and finally the peanut mixture; arrange them in an oiled roasting pan
6. Bake for 30 minutes, then turn and cook for another 30 minutes; pour off any excess oil and bake for another 5 minutes or until very crisp

Sauce prep:

1. Grind the chili and garlic to a paste using a mortar and pestle
2. Put the vinegar and sugar in a pan; heat gently until the sugar dissolves; bring to a boil and simmer for 2 minutes
3. Stir in the chili-garlic paste and transfer to a bowl
4. Drain the drumsticks on paper towels and serve with the sauce.

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Notes:

1. The amounts of garlic suggested are, of course, ridiculously scanty.
2. I don’t know what lemongrass looks like or where to find it, so I ignored that bit.
3. The cooking time and temperature may not be spot-on; the temp is reduced and the time is increased from the original (since the original resulted in chicken which was burnt on the outside and a health hazard on the inside).

About the author:  I'm a Latin-teaching foodie who has lived (and eaten) in Fort Wayne for the past 10 years. I love all the ethnic grocery stores here and the great Mexican restaurants. Cooking is something that I really enjoy, although I tend to improvise a lot and experience my share of disasters. My parents are both wonderful cooks, as was my paternal grandmother (Oma), and I'm always trying to make things the way mom, dad or Oma did. Read more from this author