Recipe: James Cochran’s signature fried chicken

My mum is the reason I have such a love for Caribbean food as she got me into cooking from a very young age, says James Cochran, chef-owner of 12:51 restaurant in Islington, London. I was always around food, both at home and when out in the community.

My mum’s family is Caribbean and she was determined that I knew about my heritage – which food is a big part of. When cooking, I’m eager to represent my roots on a plate. Alongside my Caribbean influence, my dad was from Glasgow and I was raised in Whitstable on the Kent coast. I use all of these different locations as inspiration for creating new dishes – with a London twang, of course.

Ingredients

• 2l veg oil
• 500g boneless/skinless chicken (thigh, breast or wings will all work)
• 250ml buttermilk (you should be able to pick up some in most supermarkets; if you can’t, you can make your own substitute: stir one tablespoon of lemon juice into 250ml milk, leave it to settle for ten minutes and you’re done)
• 100g flour
• 4 eggs, whisked
• 300g breadcrumbs, or stale bread, blitzed
• 50g of any store cupboard spices (I like to use jerk spice but anything with a kick will work – mild curry, chilli, paprika, turmeric, garam masala, whatever you’ve got)
• A handful of crushed nuts (corn nuts, peanuts, almonds, cashews – again, just grab what’s in the cupboard)

Method

• Cut the chicken into bite-size pieces and mix them with the buttermilk and spices. Season with salt and leave for six hours; the acid in the buttermilk will tenderise the chicken and penetrate the spice into it.
• Panne the chicken – start by mixing the bread crumbs with the flour. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs. Then dip the chicken in egg mix, and coat with the flour and breadcrumb mix.
• If you have a fryer, set it to 180C. If you don’t, heat a deep saucepan with enough oil to fill it three-quarters of the way up, and get it nice and hot – a kitchen thermometer will obviously be handy here, if you’ve got one.
• Fry the chicken for six minutes, or until golden brown.
• Remove the chicken and let it drain on paper.
• Serve with your sauce and herbs of choice, and enjoy with an ice-cold beer. I like to garnish with coriander, spring onion, peanuts and lots of chilli jam, but mayonnaise, mustard mayo, ketchup and yoghurt with smoked paprika all work too, and if you’re not into coriander then parsley, basil, mint and tarragon will all do.

James Cochran is the chef-owner of 12:51 restaurant and Valderrama’s sports bar, both located on Upper Street in London. He opened 12:51 in 2018, the same year that he won the BBC’s Great British Menu – an achievement he repeated in 2020. Valderrama’s, which opened in summer 2022, is London’s first ever inclusive sports bar and the permanent home for Around the Cluck, the popular fried chicken concept launched in lockdown.

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