Feature article
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Sure-fire fudge and fine fried chicken
By Fred Sauceman
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| “Chicken Lady” Donna King (left) and Linda and George Markham, Bon Ton Mini-Mart, Henderson, Kentucky. |
Around Henderson, Kentucky, Donna King is known as “The Chicken Lady.” Donna is head chicken fryer at a tiny restaurant outside town called the Bon Ton Mini-Mart.
In a state that’s made Southern fried chicken an international commodity, fryer wars can be fierce.
Henderson’s a long stretch away from Corbin, where Colonel Sanders sold his first breasts, thighs and wings, and the Bon Ton’s owners have no ideas about franchising.
There’s not much near the Bon Ton. It’s a pretty isolated little place, and especially seems so at 4 o’clock in the morning when breakfast begins.
Yet people from all over America have found it. Gourmet magazine did. And there’s a man from West Virginia who flies in every Labor Day weekend for a load of chicken, then flies right back out.
It’s easy to get the skin of a piece of chicken seasoned right. The trick, of course, is to infuse the entire piece of meat with spicing, right down to the bone. That’s the method Donna King inherited from a former employer in Henderson.
What brought us through town back in February was a rendezvous in Owensboro with a group of Roadfood friends to study, firsthand, the tradition of barbecuing mutton on the banks of the Ohio River, as it’s practiced by restaurants like the Moonlite.
It was the only real snowfall we got to see last winter. We savored Kentucky burgoo and mutton barbecue with friends from Indiana, New York, Kentucky, Georgia and Texas.
The night before, we had stopped in Henderson for fried chicken at the Bon Ton and a visit with the affable owners, George and Linda Markham.
Fortunately, after a tour of the mid-19th-century Gatton family farm in Bremen, Kentucky, with Charlie Gatton, the “mad scientist of bacon,” we called ahead and placed our chicken order, for by the time we arrived at the Bon Ton way past dark, there was no more chicken in the house, other than ours.
Donna marinates, or “brines,” her chicken for 24 hours in a seasoning, and a separate seasoning is added to the breading before the chicken is deep-fried, to order. Donna says the marinade pulls the blood away from the bone, allowing the chicken to absorb the flavor. And she’s right. The tastes of cayenne and garlic permeate every bite.
Just about closing time on that Friday night, Jean King walked in with a tray of her homemade peanut butter fudge, to share with everyone at the Bon Ton.
Jean’s and Donna’s husbands are brothers. Jean readily shared the recipe with us.
I’ve taken to calling it “Sure-Fire Peanut Butter Fudge,” for two reasons.
First is its dependability. This is tolerant fudge. The second reason is its danger, at least in the hands of fudge novices like me. Usually I yield my kitchen counterspace to more experienced confectioners, but this recipe had to be tested before it made its way into our annual Christmas card.
“When you come home, you’re going to smell smoke and fire, but don’t think anything,” I told my wife Jill on the phone as she was volunteering in Jonesborough during the Progressive Dinner.
I had mixed the fudge in too small a pot. The liquid boiled over and caught fire. Some of the flames were green. I considered the fire extinguisher but thought that would have made an even bigger mess, so I just let the flames burn off.
Despite the disruption of the cooking time, a few lost ounces of ingredients, and the transferring of the molten fudge to an eight-quart pot, it turned out perfectly.
-----------RECIPE-----------
Sure-Fire Peanut Butter Fudge
Chapel Hill United Methodist Church, Henderson, Kentucky
3 cups sugar
1¼ sticks margarine
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 12-ounce can evaporated milk (could be less if you want a less creamy fudge)
12 ounces creamy peanut butter
7 ounces marshmallow cream
Mix sugar, margarine, vanilla and evaporated milk, leaving margarine whole. Bring to a rolling boil. Place a lid on the pot and cook for 3 minutes. Remove lid and cook for 5 minutes more, without stirring. Remove from heat and mix in peanut butter and marshmallow cream. Stir until well blended, then beat with a spatula. Pour into a buttered 9 x 13-inch dish. Let fudge cool and set at room temperature. When it’s completely cool, refrigerate.
--------GoTriCities--------
Food writer Fred Sauceman, author of the book “The Place Setting: Timeless Tastes of the Mountain South — from Bright Hope to Frog Level,” is senior writer and executive assistant to the president for public affairs at East Tennessee State University. E-mail him at sauceman@etsu.edu.
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