Chipper Chicken Recipe and a Giveaway
/My mom taught us girls how to cook when we were very young.
During the summers, when my sisters and I were out of school, she devised a rotating system of teaching us Homemaking, the Cuban Way.
My older sisters were already married and gone, but the three of us younger ones, Miriam, Alina and myself still needed to be groomed to be Perfect Cuban Wives (or PCW).
I think our education began with the Making of the Perfect Cup of Cuban Espresso. From there we ventured on to Table Setting and Party Planning, with a minor in Clearing and Dishwashing. (<--I was never any good at this one, and I still haven't quite gotten the hang of it, but that's not important right now.)
The Meal Planning portion of our PCW Education consisted of pulling out all of the cookbooks in the house, finding two recipes that sounded good to us, making a list of ingredients, checking the cupboards for what we already had, and then adding what we needed to the weekly grocery shopping list.
Can you believe I still plan my weekly meals this way? (The whole Clearing and Dishwashing thing is still problematic for me, but again, that's not important right now.)
I always like trying new recipes and I love cookbooks. But every now and then, I remember that we girls made some pretty delicious meals during our Summers of Cuban Home Ec. And I still have a few of my mom's original cookbooks from back in the day.
Exhibit A:
The publishing date on this beauty is 1962. Based on my love of All Things Betty these days, I decided to pull it out and see if one of our favorite recipes still held up. (I love old, grease-stained cookbooks. They make me happy somehow.)
It was called Chipper Chicken. It was a lot like the Oven-Fried Chicken (notice that they still used shortening unapologetically - I love that!) but it was made with crushed potato chips. (<--Brilliant!)
I made it a few times when my older kids were little and it was always a hit, so I thought I'd give it a shot in 2010, with a few personal revisions.
Chipper Chicken Recipe
- 2-3 lbs. chicken pieces
- 1 medium bag potato chips
- 1/4 cup butter (<--YES!!)
- 1 Tbsp. Garlic powder
- Coarse ground pepper
1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees.
2. Crush potato chips finely. (I put them into a ziplock and just crush with my hands.)
3. Melt butter in frying pan and add the garlic powder. (The garlic salt that it originally called for made the thing too crazy-salty.)
4. Pass the chicken pieces through the seasoned butter, then in the crushed chips.
5. Place chicken in oblong baking pan.
6. Bake for just over an hour or until potato chips are golden and juices run clear.
Ta-da! The Chipper Chicken is just as delicious as I remembered. (Umm....yeah....butter and potato chips. Hello?!!)
I have a few more Betty Crocker cookbooks that I've collected through the years. (I think it's those eye-catchingly RED covers that get me every time.)
So, today, I'll be giving away one of Betty Crocker's newest (and elaborately detailed) cookbooks along with a beautiful RED logo serving spoon: (I confess that I loved this book so much that I was tempted to keep it, but happily for you, I'm a giver. *sigh*)
To be entered in the drawing for the cookbook & spoon, just answer one or all of the following questions in the comment section of this post:
- Who taught you to cook?
- Do you have a favorite "go to" cookbook or recipe?
I'll choose a winner on Friday, September 10th at 11:00 AM Pacific Time.
[Disclosure: General Mills provided this cool stuff because I asked to do these giveaways. They've asked nothing in return. It is my pleasure to write about this stuff because I genuinely want to. Thanks, General Mills, for your generosity!
*And a reminder, if you haven't already voted, please vote for My Big, Fat, Cuban Family for Best Personal and Family Blog in the Just Spotted 2010 Orange County Blog Awards. Here's the link. Please vote before Sunday, September 12th at 11:59 pm, because after that, the “polls” will be closed* Thank you!
