TAMPA, Fla. — How do you make a crispy chicken sandwich crispier?
It might come down to technique.
That’s the rub at Booming Brands Test Kitchen--Tampa’s homegrown restaurant machine that brought you Outback Steakhouse and their buddy Aussie Grill.
In honor of their latest Aussie Grill opening in Brandon, we got tips from the heavy hitters, like Efrem Cutler, the Vice President for Research and Development.
Here’s how they stack their chicken sandwich starting at the bun: it’s brioche.
They layer smoky aioli sauce, fresh from-scratch pickles, iceberg lettuce, a Beefsteak tomato slice, fried chicken breast, honey shriracha, and add a top bun.
“So that's really all these all these textures and flavors have been symphonic balanced,” explained Cutler, “so that when you taste this, it's a marriage made in heaven.”
Okay – heavenly marriage comparisons aside, we have some pretty interesting tips on technique.
First-- dredge the chicken twice through the breading. Do it before and after the dip in the soda batter…(as in club soda)
And on that second pass, you have to get all “kitty” with it.
“We make little kitty cat biscuits like a little kitty cat,” said Cutler, mimicking a cat pushing his paws into the chicken and “kneading dough.”
“What you're doing is you're literally creating texture, right? It's called seeding in the industry,” said McAllister, “and it's layers of texture of flour and protein from the chicken. And once it fries up, it gets super crispy in layers and it catches the sauce as well.”