Can I brine chicken in buttermilk after I boil the chicken?
I want to make crispy fried chicken and waffles. I have had great luck boiling chicken wings and then deep frying them. Can I do the same thing for fried chicken? Boil, brine in buttermilk mixture, coat and then fry? Or is there a better way?
Best Answer
Short answer: Brining after boiling won't do much (if anything), and you probably don't want to boil all parts of the chicken anyway.
One primary purpose of brining is to hydrate the cells of the muscle tissue before cooking, which allows the cells to hold on to more moisture during the cooking process via denaturation of the proteins. If you cook the meat first, then the heat will permanently denature the proteins first, so the brine will essentially be useless.
The reason why you want to pre-cook chicken wings is that (a) they have a lot of fat which melts off into the cooking liquid, and (b) they have a good amount of connective tissue (collagen) which needs to be cooked low and slow to soften into delicious gelatin. Most of the other parts of the chicken don't have nearly as much fat and collagen, so boiling them would likely only serve to overcook them.
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Can you brine and boil chicken?
Brine boiling chicken is another cooking option, where you put the chicken in a pot with the brine and bring it to a boil. When you boil chicken in a brine before grilling, you add flavor and moisture to the meat.What does Soaking chicken in buttermilk do to the chicken?
What does marinating chicken in buttermilk do? Because of its slight acidity, buttermilk has the ability to tenderize the chicken, without it becoming tough and chewy. Using buttermilk also helps the chicken go nice and flaky when you dredge it through the dry mix.What happens if you soak chicken in buttermilk for too long?
For most cases, just marinating chicken for 1-3 hours in buttermilk will be good enough. What is this? The longer you keep the chicken, the more the likelihood of the marinade excessively breaking the protein structure of meat and making it mushy.How long can chicken sit in buttermilk brine?
How long do you brine a chicken in buttermilk? For this recipe or any other where you use buttermilk to brine chicken, the minimum time is generally agreed to be 12 hours, the optimal time 24 hours, and the maximum time 72 hours.Why you should (almost) always brine your chicken
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Answer 2
My wife soaks her chicken in buttermilk and spices overnight. However there is no boiling involved. I'm not sure how boiling would affect the soaking process, but I'd guess not favorably. Are you just looking to reduce the frying time by boiling the chicken first? If so, maybe you could go with an "easy" fried chicken technique, where you finish in the oven.
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