what does popeyes use to fry their chicken

This Is Why Popeyes Chicken Is So Succulent

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Fast nutrient mainstay Popeyes has made quite a improvement in recent years, with steady growth over the course of the 2010s. Many attribute that increased success to when Popeyes changed its name from Popeyes Chicken & Biscuits to Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen. Remind people that the nutrient is from Louisiana, and they will come. And let's non forget the explosive popularity of the craven sandwich it introduced in 2019.

If you love that chicken from Popeyes (deplorable for getting their infamous jingle stuck in your head for all of eternity), you certainly aren't solitary. The fried craven from this Louisiana-born fast food staple is even a favorite amidst world course chefs. The chicken really is spectacular, despite the general assumption that fast food tin't perchance exist the all-time tasting version of a nutrient. Read on to learn why this Cajun outpost has developed royal status for its consistent fried poultry perfection.

The superior crispiness of Popeyes chicken is undeniable

You want some crispy chicken? Popeyes tin can guarantee you some crispy craven. The crisp factor is undeniably ane of their signature menu item'due south biggest selling points. It'due south certainly crispier than possibly i of its biggest competitors, Chick-fil-A. In 2015, the Popeyes CEO at the time, Cheryl Bachelder, threw shade at her rivals, KFC and Chick-fil-A, in an interview with The Advocate. She explained that the Popeyes chicken is fried with more batter, hence boasting a superior well-baked. Bachelder also specified that their "...chicken is dipped in an egg-and-flour batter before information technology'southward fried. That gives it a actually crisp texture." Preach, Cheryl, considering we are here for information technology.

Popeyes chicken is crispy all over the individual piece, likewise. There are no "soggy spots" to ruin your chicken-eating feel. Essentially, as chicken sandwich consumers take pointed out, you go a crispy mouthful with every single bite. Some Popeyes recipe replicators attribute Popeyes extreme crispiness to the extra flour in the breading process.

Bottom line: If you taste tested the peak chain fried chicken brands, you'd no doubt be able to acknowledge that Popeyes' top notch crispiness is role of why information technology stays on top.

The breading consistently sticks to the pare of Popeyes chicken

Not simply is Popeyes chicken supremely crispy, but it also has that special magical quality we all hope for in a piece of fried chicken (bone in or out) — breading that actually sticks to the meat. Is there anything worse than a craven finger that loses the bulk of its breading the minute yous take a seize with teeth? Okay, there are probably worse things but it'south even so very disappointing. Regardless, you lot tin can ever count on Popeyes to deliver in the "breading with every bite" department.

The honor-winning chef J. Kenji Lopez-Alt praises Popeyes chicken (via the Vice MUNCHIES column) considering the breading stays put so well. When the virtually recent craven sandwich hitting the Popeyes carte, one very satisfied customer and Brooklyn-based food writer proclaimed on Twitter (via The New Yorker), "The craven is perfectly fried! The breading isn't falling off." When you get breading in every seize with teeth, the chef is doing something right.

The synchronistic union of meat and breadstuff on a slice of Popeyes chicken is maybe a big part of why it is such a stand out fast food jewel.

The Popeyes marinade penetrates the entire chicken

Marinade can make or suspension your fried chicken recipe. Good luck getting a satisfied chicken consumer if you lot don't soak that meat in a decent marinade for several hours prior to cooking it. Popeyes knows the importance of a solid pre-frying marinade, and their marinade is office of what makes their chicken and then special. Former Popeyes CEO Cheryl Bachelder told The Advocate, "The commencement thing you notice about Popeyes is the marinade. It's a real reddish, orange color. It sticks to the craven, you encounter it all through the chicken, and that's where the flavor is." Aha! We knew that season was superb for a reason — the reason is patently the marinade'south full-on craven infusion.

According to Popeyes website, the "chicken is marinated for at least 12 hours" and then that'due south definitely the correct chicken prep etiquette. (It seems like whatsoever chicken recipe that'southward worth its weight e'er says to marinate for at least a certain amount of hours just ideally, overnight.) Stellar marinade that permeates throughout the meat of the chicken is definitely a Popeyes selling point.

The cajun spice in Popeyes craven is authentic to New Orleans

Eric Baradat/Getty Images

Popeyes started as a donut stand exterior New Orleans, but information technology wasn't called Popeyes yet. When founder Al Copeland noticed a neighbor having much more success selling fried chicken, he traded in his dough for some poultry, hatched an ultra spicy recipe, and changed the name to honor a famous movie graphic symbol (Gene Hackman'due south character in the film, The French Connexion). And that's when he started making a killing. Even when he sold Popeyes, he maintained buying of the signature spice recipe, which he licensed to the chain until they officially bought it from him for a whopping $43 million in 2014.

Popeyes' New Orleans roots proved helpful in solidifying the brand. Cajun cuisine was in the spotlight in the early 1980s when a Louisiana eating house, Thousand-Paul's Louisiana Kitchen, dazzled palates with popular-ups in New York Urban center and San Francisco. Around that time, Popeyes was hitting its stride, and later fifty-fifty touted its Cajun spice ties past including the special pepper sauce of the 1000-Paul's chef, Paul Prudhomme, every bit a costless gift with meal purchases.

Popeyes has also fabricated the endeavor to pair upwardly with other famous Louisiana brands, including menu items such as chicken tenders marinated with Tabasco and fried shrimp prepared with Zatarain's spice blend.

Y'all can say a lot of things about Popeyes but you definitely tin't fence the fact that it's Cajun to the cadre.

Popeyes chicken is salted to perfection

If you lot're craving something rich and savory, does it get whatsoever meliorate than the salty sensation that is fried chicken? The saltiness is one of the delicacy'due south most beautiful assets (yes, we just called fried chicken a effeminateness, come at us). Salty fried craven is essentially the ultimate comfort food. So it'south not surprising that chefs and non-chefs alike commonly concord, Popeyes really knows how to season a slice of chicken.

The chicken joint'due south salting technique is pretty flawless. When questioned well-nigh the secret behind Popeyes' chicken'due south star status, prized chef Ashley Christensen told Vice, "I like the level of salt in the craven. They push it just enough. It'southward got a affect of spice to it." We all know, in that location is a fine line betwixt fried-chicken-advisable salty and wow-did-I-merely-brand-out-with-a-salt-lick salty.

Popeyes has the perfect balance of common salt and other spices, forth with its fantastic batter and superbly marinated meat of form.

Popeyes uses industrial strength, high-tech fryers

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Popeyes does not mess around with one of the virtually important tools in a chicken frying arsenal— the ole' fryer. While a lot of chicken-oriented fast nutrient places might utilise pressure cookers (ahem, KFC), or restaurants dedicated to stuff besides chicken might use dutch ovens, woks, or cast iron skillets, Popeyes only uses deep fryers to cook the craven. And they're non just any deep fryers, they're like the smartphone of deep fryers.

When the oil gets to a sure temperature on your average, run-of-the-mill fryer, the temperature of said oil immediately lowers when y'all drib a piece of chicken in it. The fryer than works to quickly jack the temperature back to the starting temp, which, in the case of fried chicken, tin affect the quality of the concluding product. In the fryers at Popeyes, the oil actually stays at the lower temperature that results from the craven being dropped in, considering that cooks the chicken more evenly inside and out. The temp doesn't go up again until the very end of the process, so that you nonetheless get that crispy crust.

There are also multiple settings available (the setting tin can vary depending on the chicken part) and engineering that simplifies the oil irresolute and filtering. We certainly will slumber meliorate knowing our Popeyes chicken isn't hitting our gullets afterward being doused in a vat of dingy oil. The Popeyes fryers are no doubt a contributor to the unparalleled taste of their chicken.

Ane of the secret ingredients of Popeyes chicken is MSG

Shutterstock

In this instance, we're talking nigh MSG the season enhancer, not the famous arena in New York Urban center. Allegedly, one of the summit secret ingredients in Popeyes signature spice blend is monosodium glutamate, also known as MSG. At the grocery shop, the controversial spice is often sold as the brand name Accent. There are some experts that merits MSG leads to too much glutamate in the brain and an excess of nerve cell stimulation, which can supposedly cause harm since that makes it an excitotoxin.

Due to its potential excitotoxin condition, the verdict is still sort of out on whether MSG is completely safe just information technology seems like the full general sense is that it'due south okay to consume as long as yous're non doing so in massive quantities. MSG enhances the flavors of foods so it's probably in a lot of the stuff we're addicted to, like Popeyes fried craven.

Popeyes doesn't care nigh making the chicken "healthy"

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

When it comes to eating healthy, Popeyes is definitely more of a "cheat day" splurge. If you're looking for a salad, or something that's not loaded with fat and calories, Popeyes craven probably won't be your become-to lunch selection. And the make doesn't really requite a flip. They are in the concern of good fried craven, not expert greens. In 2015, Popeyes and then-CEO Cheryl Bachelder admitted to Financial Mail service that health isn't the Popeyes priority. "I like to say we eat boring, healthy food at home, and we eat things like Popeyes when we go out to enjoy a special evening," she quipped.

In the chicken sandwich boxing, Chick-fil-A comes out on top in terms of caloric harm — as in, it has less calories than the 1 from Popeyes. Merely again, who'south thinking nearly their half dozen pack when they're indulging in a fried chicken sandwich on white bread? Certainly not Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen diners, that'south for sure. We're glad Popeyes doesn't care most existence healthy. Nosotros don't need to feel guilty about ordering what nosotros really came in for, which is greasy fried chicken, non some sort of air fried or grilled nonsense.

Virtually of the chicken Popeyes serves has never been frozen

Eric Baradat/Getty Images

People really insist on getting food that's fresh these days. Heaven forbid someone find out their food has been previously frozen (except Starbucks, everyone seems to make an exception for their freezer burned broiled goods). According to a supposed old employee on a Reddit AMA thread, Popeyes bone-in craven is always fresh, never frozen, but the craven tenders are cooked from a frozen state.

The os-in chicken arrives at each restaurant fresh, then the staff brines, batters and chips the bird in-firm. Own't nobody serving y'all microwaved, previously frozen fried chicken at Popeyes — at least if you guild it bone-in.

Fifty-fifty though Popeyes fried craven is produced on a massive scale since it'southward such a pop chain restaurant with over 3,000 locations worldwide, information technology has to operate with an independent restaurant's spirit since it'due south frying fresh poultry past the batch from raw ingredients. That spirit is just one of the things that makes their chicken and then delicious.

Popeyes always aims for consistency in its chicken frying process

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Consistency is pretty much the reason why we relish fast food equally a whole. We know what we're getting at Popeyes, no thing where we're eating information technology. Popeyes fried chicken is consistently skilful because they've perfected the art of frying chicken, which can actually be harder to do in the context of a concatenation than say, hamburgers. Chicken has to be cooked very precisely, with the right amount of breading and the perfect temperature. Sure, you can get a hamburger medium rare but if your chicken is slightly undercooked, you're staring down the barrel of food  poisoning. And if the chicken is overcooked, well, you're serving your customers fried rubber. Popeyes employees have to follow the rules for frying pretty deliberately, every bit there isn't much room for improvisation without potentially ruining the final product.

The restaurant is even really picky almost the size of bird information technology will take from its supplier, besides little or too big can jack upwardly their frying technique, which needs to exist uniform in lodge to deliver that signature Cajun taste in every piece of chicken they serve. This consistency is why Popeyes chicken is ever a reliable option for your tardily night fried drumstick cravings.

The bun on the Popeyes chicken sandwich complements the chicken perfectly

When you're talking well-nigh the chicken sandwich dominance that put Popeyes in the spotlight in the summertime of 2019, yes, we can concord the chicken itself is divine on so many levels. However, you have to acknowledge that another reason why the chicken might taste so on-another-level good is because of the bread that accompanies it. Allow's get existent, every element of a good sandwich deserves a trivial credit merely the bread and the meat are doing the brunt of the work. The bread on the now legendary Popeyes chicken sandwich is (or was—it'south nevertheless "sold out" and Popeyes has anybody on edge wondering when information technology will be available once more) a brioche bun. This buttery pillow top of a bun commonly comes at a higher price just the Popeyes chicken sandwich is (was) simply $3.99! Sorry but a regular ole white hamburger bun (sesame seed or otherwise) for a chicken sandwich simply seems similar a offense now.

This brioche bun propped upward the Popeyes craven so that it could really be the star it was always meant to be. You only tin can't rant nearly how slap-up Popeyes chicken is without paying your respect to its non-poultry counterpart. The Popeyes biscuits that come every bit a side with craven buckets are pretty dope too.

The Popeyes chicken sandwich is a modern curiosity

It was the chicken sandwich that launched a thousand ships. In the summer of 2019, Popeyes introduced a chicken sandwich that was so beloved, information technology became the darling of Twitter, Instagram and blogs (which are all the same a thing, believe it or not). People could non stop raving about the sandwich. Many volition at present expect dorsum to Baronial of 2019 as the commencement of the Great Chicken Sandwich Wars. The chicken sandwich was so pop, information technology actually helped the sales of competitor chicken sandwiches at Wendy'southward and Chick-fil-A. Millennials and Gen Xers were credited as the most enthusiastic sandwich consumers, which also sort of gave Popeyes more street cred.

It seemed like no i was talking near anything about chicken sandwiches for weeks, which shows you how distressing the state of the globe is that nosotros're all then drastic to escape it with chicken sandwich comparison recollect pieces on the Internet.

conollyovelinterst.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.mashed.com/170062/this-is-why-popeyes-chicken-is-so-delicious/

Share this post