Heh, yup, Southern fried chicken is with flour. Skip those crumbs. I don't mind crumbs on lots of stuff and like it on the chicken strips or on pounded chicken, but... regular fried chicken is not the same, to Me, unless is straight flour with plenty of salt. I do put some garlic powder in the flour. Also flavor the egg wash with salt and garlic powder. Gotta stick your finger and taste that flour to make sure it tastes good. Sometimes I'll add a little bit of cayenne too. I too put about an inch of oil in the pan to heat. That way when you put the pieces in it comes halfway up the pieces. Sometimes I'll use a bit less oil, but find it cooks faster and absorbs less oil when you use more oil. Smiles.

My MIL used to make a country fried steak that my kids and DH loved...I hated...! She said the secret was to get a 1 1/2 inch thick piece of round steak, and work a lot of flour into it. She said you take the edge of a plate and just pound that flour in until there is much worked in as you can get....then brown it on both sides in hot Crisco, add a little water and cover and simmer until it's tender. She probably also added a can of cream of.... soup! When we would go away and would leave the kids with her....that was her special treat. They chose to go to Grandma's even after they were well old enough to stay alone because of that durned country fried steak!

Since I first posted that, I've made that recipe a few dozen times. Observations: 1. I find I hardly ever bother with the sauce. The thighs are plenty good on their own. 2. While it's tasty with just salt & pepper, you can use whatever herb or spice you want. Chipotle powder is good, as is the Penzey spice mixture 'Arizona Dreaming'. 3. If after 18 minutes the flesh side doesn't look quite done, it's okay to flip the thighs and cook the flesh side for a minute or two. 4. What's really nice is that if you haven't planned for a dinner, you can stop on the way home from work and pick up as many chicken thighs as you want, and have 'fried' chicken in under a half hour. I wouldn't try it with any other cut but a thigh; the thigh flattens out nicely in the pan when you make those flesh cuts parallel to the bone. What you're doing, from a food-science-geek perspective, is rendering the skin fat and frying the skin side in that fat, while the vapors in the covered skillet are steaming the flesh side.

A Bit of Nostalgia.......does anyone remember the Chalfont in Cape May, N.J. or the Chalfont-Haddon Hall in Atlantic City ?? Chalfonte's Southern Fried Chicken 1 frying chicken -- (3-pound) quartered Salt 1 cup flour 2 tablespoons paprika Black pepper to taste 2 cups shortening or corn oil (or a 2-inch depth for frying) 1 medium onion -- sliced 1. Soak the chicken in salted water for 1 hour. (Add 1 tablespoon salt to each quart of water.) Drain chicken and pat dry. 2. Meanwhile, in a bag or bowl, mix flour, paprika, salt to taste and pepper. Add the chicken and shake to coat thoroughly. 3. In a large skillet or deep fryer, heat the shortening or oil to 365 to 375 degrees. Place the onion in the hot oil. (Adjust the heat as needed to keep the oil sizzling moderately, but don't let it burn.) 4. Add the chicken to hot oil, again adjusting the heat. Fry for 10 minutes. Turn chicken and fry until tender, crisp and browned, about 10 more minutes. (Test for doneness with a fork, or watch for the breast meat to split along the muscle.) Note: As long as the oil is sizzling, moisture is being forced out of the chicken as steam, preventing the meat from absorbing excess oil. The Chalfonte chicken still sizzles in the pan Today's request takes us back to 1990, when a visit to the Chalfonte in Cape May, N.J., found the chef at that grand Victorian resort hotel holding court in her bright, airy kitchen on a sunny August day. Quick as any teen, Helen Dickerson simul- taneously supervised the dinner preparation, answered a reporter's questions, and kept an ear tuned to her favorite afternoon soaps. At 81, Miss Helen (as she liked to be called) still ruled her kitchen domain, though the heavier cooking chores had been delegated to her two assistants, her daughters Dorothy Burton, then 63, and Lucille Thompson, 61. Miss Helen shared memories of her more than 70 years at the Chalfonte, 45 of them in charge of the kitchen, along with recipes for dishes such as the fried chicken that continues as the star item on the hotel's Sunday dinner menu. It is that recipe, clipped from The Inquirer's Food section but later mislaid, that reader Joe Ochman mentioned first in his recent e-mail to us. Miss Helen's talent for Southern-style cooking brought her national attention. Her recipes were collected into a cookbooklet by the hotel. And the outspoken Miss Helen often stole the show during television appearances with talk-show hosts such as Phil Donahue. Miss Helen died just a few months after our article about her was published. Her daughters, now 75 and 72, inherited their mother's kitchen at the Chalfonte. And hundreds of chickens continue to be fried there on summer Sundays in the aged, oversize cast-iron skillets, each holding a dozen or more chicken quarters at a time. Keys to the recipe's success are the soaking, which keeps the chicken moist, plus the onion flavor and the sizzling temperature of the oil. The onions go into the hot fat first and stay there until the chicken is done, Burton said. Source: "Marilyn Marter Column, Phila Inquirer, April 4, 2001 Yield: "4 servings"