A proper mature take on everyones favourite nostalgic takeout foods. This recipe takes fried chicken to a whole new level, with a special extra crispy dredge, and lathered with a fish sauce caramel packed full of Thai aromatics.
Method
Start with butchering and marinating your chicken. Of course you can get a chicken already cut into pieces, but if you want to save money, buy a whole chicken, and butcher so you’re left with 2x drumsticks, thighs and wings, and 2x breasts cut into four pieces. Add the chicken pieces to a bowl of our marinade ingredients, mix well together and allow to marinade for an hour minimum, overnight if you have time! Next, make the fish sauce caramel. In a pan, add our sugar, fish sauce, Inch’s cider and our aromatics, and bring to a boil. Allow to simmer until thickened. It should resemble a very loose caramel when hot, and will become thicker once cooled. Once marinated, remove from the fridge allow the marinated chicken to come to room temperature. Prepare your dredge mixtures - half the flours into two different bowls. Add the salt, pepper and msg to one bowl, and to the other add the bicarbonate of soda. We'll add the Inch's cider to our seasoned dredge just before frying. Fill a heavy duty, high-walled pot with frying oil. If you're making crispy shallots from scratch, heat the oil over medium heat, and add thinly sliced shallots. Slowly bring the oil up to 165°c, and whilst this happens, check on the shallots, stirring once in a while to prevent our shallots from sticking together. Cook until golden brown and drain on a paper towel. Nothing will happen for a while, but these will go from raw to crispy very quickly so don't get distracted! Now reduce the heat so you can maintain 165°c temperature. On your counter, place the two bowls of our dredge near our frying pot. Add Inch’s to seasoned dredge and whisk quickly until smooth. Take the pieces of chicken, allowing the marinade to drain slightly, and place into our dry dredge bowl. Shake off excess flour and dunk into the wet dredge. Drain off excess and put back in our dry dredge for a final time, coating and flipping at least 10 times.. Shake off the excess again, before carefully, and slowly drop our chicken pieces into our hot oil. These will need to cook for 15-20 minutes. Boneless pieces and wings for 10-12 minutes.Whilst they're cooking, make up a quick finishing salt with a combination of our crushed spice seeds and powders, for a very fragrant and delicious way to finish off our dish. To plate up, start by layering on our fried chicken, and start lathering on that fish sauce caramel. on the plate. Garnish liberally with our fresh chillis, coriander, spring onions, and our crispy shallots. And finally give the whole platter a good sprinkle of our spice dust. 
