HSD Rewind: Newspaper Fried Chicken

I have a little feature on my blog that announces the most frequently viewed post on the blog. I titled it the post of the week. I was surprised over the weekend to find that the most viewed post was a recipe post Amy wrote for Works for me Wednesday 2 years ago. So let's review the taste sensation that's sweeping the nation and get in the (not so) way back machine to

Original Air Date: June 30th, 2009


I have asked my lovely wife to contribute one of my favorite recipes for this special themed edition of WFMW. This dish works for us as a dish to pass at summer cookouts but also makes a great family dinner. Here is the lovely and Talented Mrs. Dad . . .



This is called "newspaper chicken" because we got the recipe from the newspaper. Creative huh.


**NOTE: This is a two-day affair, but well worth it!


Here's how I make it, but there are any number of variations you can make to make it your own. I take 5 lbs of boneless chicken breasts and cut them into small strips or chunks (I get the bag-o-frozen chicken from Aldi.) I cover them in water in a large tupperware bowl and add 1 cup of salt. Yes, one entire cup of salt. I put the cover on it, and shake it a few times, and refrigerate it overnight. Sometimes during the night, if I happen to get up, I shake it a few more times. In the morning, I dump out the salt water and rinse the chicken well. Really well. This brining isn't for flavoring. Then, using the same bowl while the chicken is on a plate or drainer, I put 2 cups of milk (I use skim) in the bowl and 2 tablespoons of vinegar and stir that up (handy dandy buttermilk.) Then return the chicken to the bowl and make sure the chicken is covered. If not, add more milk. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. I like to double dip my chicken because it comes out so crunchy, really good. I put 2 cups of flour, along with 1 tsp of the following: salt, garlic powder, chili powder, and 1/2 tsp of pepper and dry mustard. Mix it really well in a large ziplock bag (I've tried doing it in a bowl, but doesn't work as well.) So you take chicken out of buttermilk and save the buttermilk! Put chicken on a plate. Then with a pair of tongs or "grabbers" put a few pieces of chicken in the flour mixture to coat, then grab with grabbers, drop in buttermilk, and then back into flour mixture.

Place coated chicken on a tray (I use my pampered chef "stackable cooling rack" laid on top of a cookie sheet.) Once all chicken is double coated, let the tray sit in the fridge for another hour. This ensures the coating will stick to the chicken. **Sometimes I do have to make another bag of flour mixture. This double coating is messy, but it really makes for nice, crunchy chicken. After an hour, get a frying pan ready with enough oil to be 1/2 way up the sides of the chicken. I fry it over medium high heat. Once the oil is hot, place a few pieces of chicken in the oil. If you're doing it right, as the hot oil is cooking the food, the salt water is coming out of the chicken, therefore, making it a nongreasy affair. Love it. So you fry it on one side for about 4 minutes (try to leave it alone here, don't check it a bunch of times), and the other side for about 4 minutes more. This, of course, varies according to size. Using bone-in chicken will take longer. Now, this is important: do not try to keep the chicken warm to try to serve in an hour or so. Either serve immediately, or allow to cool and either serve cold, or microwave to warm it up. If you try to keep it warm in the oven, it gets gooey, and nobody likes gooey chicken! This chicken also freezes quite well. I usually have enough for a meal right away, leftovers in the fridge, and then some in the freezer for a later meal.

Ingredients at a Glance:

5 lbs boneless chicken breasts
1 cup salt, water to cover chicken
2 cups milk plus 2 TBLS vinegar (or buttermilk if you have it)
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt, garlic powder, chili powder
1/2 tsp pepper and dried mustard
oil for frying

Thanks Amy. She also does a great impression of Jimmy Stewart saying chicken. She is certainly a woman of many talents.

Meanwhile back in 2011. Amy is still a woman of many talents. Today she got a job that she neither applied for nor interviewed for. She merely told some people she wanted it, and bam, it was hers. It's actually her same job just in a different school, one much closer to our house.

So she will be able to get home quicker and make this fantastic chicken. We still love it and hope you will too. If I repost this in ten years time I might have to remind people what a newspaper was.

As with last time I shared this recipe, I am sharing this @ We Are That Family for Works for me Wednesday because (wait for it) Newspaper Chicken works for me. click here to see what works for others who may not have chicken on their mind and be so easily defined.

The New Pooh Review

On January 13th I posted the trailer for the new Winnie The Pooh film entitling the post six months and two days from now to signify when the film was coming to theatres.

The film came out today (Friday July 15th 2011)

My Six words: Six Months Two Days go fast!

I mean, wow do they fly. The whole family and I were all planning on going today. Amy had other things going but I took 3 kids and 3 stuffed animals and we had a fantastic time.

The film is just over an hour which is about the only bad thing I can say about the movie. It takes all the best elements of the books and movies and blends them together for a hilarious, mesmerizing and extremely satisfying experience.

One review of this movie said this was a perfect film for Pre K and Kindergartners and they are not wrong. I think it is also a perfect film for older children and adults. My soon to be 7th grader was laughing the loudest of anyone in the theatre.

Animated movies have grown up a lot over the years. There are some that are so adult that I wouldn't ever consider taking my children to. Winnie The Pooh is quite the opposite. It is a film that I would want to watch even if I didn't have children. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

For more Six Word Saturday click here.

I thought Super Hero Movies were for Kids.

Friday Fragment Time here at the pretty good Coral.

First of all let me start out with a rant. My temp job ended on Tuesday, so I have had the ability to do things between 3 p.m and 11 p.m. that eluded me when I was working. So, Wednesday I went to see Green Lantern. Over the past 5 years there have been a plethora of super hero movies, the majority of these films feature the comic book heroes I grew up with.

Now when I think of super heroes, I think of 6 - 12 year old boys. If I were making Super Hero films they would be my target demographic My problem is that with few exceptions almost every super hero movie that has come out in the past ten years is not one I would want a 6-12 year boy to go to. Especially not my 6-12 year old boy.

Green Lantern is no exception. It is a dark scary movie that would certainly give my son nightmares. There is also sexual content that would preclude me from having good old Spider Droid watch it.

Over the past 5 years I have previewed many of the super hero movies, Iron Man, Spider Man 1&2, Fantastic 4 among others and there was always something in those films that kept me from letting Spider Droid watch it.

What bothers me is that many of these movies are marketed for children and that children would love watching super hero movies. My son is always disappointed when he asks about a movie I have screened and I tell him it's not for kids. He always gives me a look that says a Super hero movie that's not for kids, what's the point of that?

For Fragment 2 I will move from rant to review.


I recently had the joy of reading a great book to my kids. It is called Marvin Beeederman, Super Hero - The curse of the bologna sandwich.

The thing I really liked about this book is not just that it's funny, it's how it's funny. It uses one of my favorite methods of humor, repetition. It repeats parts of the book over and over until the mere mention of certain words are pure hilarity. I am looking forward to reading other books in this series.

Fragment 3

Continuing the superhero theme. Here is a video of one of the super heroes of the animal kingdom, the mighty dolphin.




Well that's all the fragments I have time for today. I have had a super time. For more Friday Fragments click here.

I"m Back

Late Tuesday night. My temp job at the box company ended. So, I may have a little more time for blogging in the near future.

I have lots of good ideas for posts. Here are a few . . .

Don't Know much about History.

Tweeting the Carnival.

Why my Son won't be seeing Green Lantern.

I will also be participating in a few meme's in the near future as well.

Until next time adieu.

How work can effect diet.

The nice thing about working late in Friday night is by the time I get home Six Word Saturday is already posted. Now if I were more together I would write the post prior to work and just link in when I get home. The truth is I have not done a lot of blogging since I started my temp job last week. I have quite a few posts that I could spend time on but I am not sure how people who work 8 hour days blog as well. Sure being a home educator is a full time job and yet I find time to blog then. What will be interesting is if I continue to do 2nd shift temp assignments after Amy goes back to school in August. This job I am on now has me leaving the house at about 2:15 which school is usually done by, so I guess it is doable. I just don't know what that will do to the blogging. Let's wait and see.

Oh I almost forgot. Six Word Saturday. Look up at the title of this post if you have forgotten it. I'm looking too.

Here are my six words:

May never eat graham crackers again.

Here is my explanation. A good part of my assignment is loading cardboard into big machines so they can be made into cardboard boxes. The thing is I'm putting thousands of these in per job and I have discovered that cardboard looks like graham crackers. So at times I am looking at graham cracker looking box, after graham cracker looking box. My fear is that one day soon I will be eating a graham cracker and it will taste like, you guessed it, cardboard.

For more Six Word Saturday. Click Here.

Next Time: A Trip to the Zoo.

White Sox Week in Review

On my other blog I participate in a little meme called Six Word Saturday. I have done it here before. The skinny is you give your six words and if you want you can explain them. So, now that we've explained that go review the title of this post.

Here are my six words:

I go to work. Sox lose.

Last Friday, I started a job at a box factory. It is an assignment from a temp company. I work the second shift 3-11. We didn't work on Monday as it was the 4th of July. Since then every day this week the White Sox have played or finishing playing while I have been making boxes. They now have lost 4 games in a row. This may not seem like a big deal. But it is. Box making is hard work and generally speaking my family is asleep when I get home, I would like a bit of good news like say a White Sox victory. Also, last week they got to .500 for the first time since early April. For those stopping in from Six Word Saturday who might not know what .500 means it means they have won as many games as they've lost. Now with these 4 losses they are back to below .500 where they will remain through the All Star break and perhaps the rest of their season.

Maybe if I quit my job they will start winning again. Although back then they only won 1/2 the time and I didn't get paid. So, I think I'll keep working.

For more Six Word Saturday click here.