Food & Drink

Build a Better Chicken Biscuit

Serves 4

Chef Jason Roy’s contribution to brunch


Jason Roy makes biscuits. Pulled pork biscuits, country ham biscuits, biscuits loaded with black-eyed pea cakes and green chile hollandaise, and with fried green tomatoes and hunks of halfway melted brie. The two locations of his Asheville, North Carolina restaurant, Biscuit Head, may be two of the only places in the country where a person can enjoy a gravy flight—a selection of several options from a list that includes pork gravy, fried chicken gravy, sweet potato and coconut gravy, and smoked tomato gravy, as well as a changing but reliably eccentric gravy of the day. To garnish further: bananas foster jam, smoked apple butter, chocolate banana butter, and many other condiments from the self-serve jam bar.

Roy’s most significant contribution to brunch, though, just might be his mimosa fried chicken biscuit, a fusion of two morning staples that he serves with spicy slaw, sweet potato butter, and a single poached egg. While he won’t give away the secrets to his rich, crumbly buttermilk biscuits, we managed to get our hands on the rest of the recipe. Look no further than the back of your White Lily bag to finish it off. (A note from the chef: For best results, prepare the condiments the night before serving, at the same time the chicken goes into the marinade.)

 


Ingredients

  • Chicken

    • 2 tbsp. kosher salt

    • 3 tbsp. sugar

    • 2 tsp. ground coriander

    • 1 bay leaf

    • 2 cups water

    • 2 tsp. paprika

    • 1 tsp. curry powder

    • 2 cups orange juice

    • 4 large boneless, skinless chicken thighs

  • Sriracha slaw

    • 1 cup mayonnaise

    • 1 tbsp. minced ginger

    • 1 tbsp. minced garlic

    • 1 tbsp. salt

    • 2 tsp. black pepper

    • 1/2 cup brown sugar

    • 1 good squirt Sriracha, plus more to taste

    • 1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

    • 1 quart chopped cabbage

  • Sweet potato butter

    • 1 large sweet potato, peeled

    • 1 cup brown sugar

    • 2 tsp. cinnamon

    • Pinch of allspice

    • Pinch of nutmeg

    • Pinch of ground cloves

    • Pinch of ground ginger


Preparation

  1. For the chicken:

    Mix all ingredients except for chicken. Add chicken and marinate overnight.

  2. For the sriracha slaw:

    Mix all ingredients except for cabbage. Add cabbage and refrigerate overnight.

  3. For the sweet potato butter:

    Boil sweet potato until fork-tender, then drain all water and mash potato with sugar and spices. (If you have a food processor, you can whip the potato for a smoother butter.)

  4. To assemble the biscuit:

    Fill a skillet or deep-fryer with peanut or canola oil and heat it to 325 degrees.

  5. Remove the chicken from the brine and add it to a grocery bag full of flour. Shake the bag to coat the chicken, and then let it rest for several minutes. Fry, turning once, until the chicken reaches an internal temperature of 165 degrees.

  6. Split 4 biscuits, place slaw and chicken inside each one, and top each with sweet potato butter and a hot poached egg.

Recipes from chef Jason Roy of Biscuit Head in Asheville, North Carolina and Greenville, South Carolina


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