This was a workmate's response when I explained the lengthy process behind preparing and cooking these buttery breadcrumbed beauts at home from scratch. And it's true - it is about 3 hours of your life you won't get back... However, if like me, you have happy memories of childhood comfort meals (kiev, potato waffles, peas) and in adulthood you still succumb to the temptation of a gourmet buttermilk fried chicken piece (or ten) - then at least attempting to kiev a chicken at least once in your life is a no brainer and defo worth a shot. Not least for that satisfaction of cutting through a crisp crust to release the molten garlic lava within...
I have been banging on about making my own chicken kievs for years, and finally got round to cooking them for friends. An extensive search of various recipes online gave me all sorts of different methods, but in the end I settled on Felicity Cloake's perfect recipe as featured by the Guardian.
Let's face it, I'd never really considered how the butter gets in the chicken in the first place but it seemed a messy business... I knew that I didn't trust the 'make a pocket in the chicken' bit that most people seemed to advise. Any fool can see the garlic butter is likely to ooze straight out. Equally, messing about with mini fillets and using them to plug in the butter, was never going to work for me. My mate Mike suggested wrapping the chicken fillets in parma ham before breadcrumbing to stop the spillage, but I'm one of those philistines that doesn't like mixing meats so this was also a no no.
Turns out the best way of doing it, is to butterfly the fillets and then batter tham out, good n hard, until they're really flat and thin. You can then wrap the meat tightly around a frozen tube of garlic butter, completely enclosing it, and pop the whole thing in some clingfilm and back in the freezer to harden. This means the kiev holds it's shape and makes the butter less likely to ooze through the meat. Done.
The breadcrumbing thing was another messy business. I didn't want a greasy crumb coating my kievs, and using Japanese panko breadcrumbs worked a treat as they're much lighter and crispier than your average. Back out of the freezer the fillets came, dipped in flour, then egg, then panko, then flour, then egg, then panko - then back in the freezer again. At this point your hands are claggy and gluey and you begin to wonder whether this is really worth it. (It is). The more thorough your breadcrumbing, the less chance your butter will escape.
I also knew I didn't want to deep fry the kievs, even though Felicity recommended it. Not only am I shit scared of vats of bubbling hot oil but I also preferred the idea of a slightly healthier, baked version. Plus I was making baked sweet potato fries to go with so I could lump them all on the same tray. So instead I lightly fried mine in a pan until golden brown and then finished them off in the oven for another 20 minutes, which seemed to work a treat.
The result was special! A Friday night treat... Bon appetit.
Makes 2
2 chicken breasts
50g salted butter, at room temperature
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 tbsp parsley, finely chopped
1 tbsp tarragon, finely chopped
½ lemon
2 tbsp flour, seasoned
2 eggs, beaten
4 tbsp breadcrumbs, panko if possible, seasoned
1. Mash together the butter, garlic and herbs, and season with black pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice. Form into 2 sausages, and wrap in clingfilm. Put in the fridge to chill.
2. Butterfly each chicken breast by opening it out using a knife, and then put it between 2 sheets of cling film and bash with a rolling pin or meat tenderiser until about 0.5cm thick, being careful not to create any holes. Season both sides well.
3. Put a sausage of butter near one edge of the chicken and begin rolling the meat up around it, tucking in the ends as you go (use some egg and flour as glue if they prove obstinate). Roll into a tight sausage using the clingfilm, and freeze for 2 hours.
4. Put the seasoned flour, eggs and breadcrumbs into 3 shallow dishes and then roll the frozen kievs in each in turn, then again in the eggs and crumbs to double coat. Put in the fridge to defrost, which should take about an hour. Preheat the oven to 200C.
5. Fry until golden brown then place in oven for around 15-20 mins. Serve with veg and potatoes of some description.
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