The Best Fried Chicken Tips Celebrity Chefs Have Given The World

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Lots of home cooks learn their skills at their parents' or grandparents' elbows, then give that knowledge their own particular twist. Professional chefs, while they may make a misstep or two along the way, can also be a great source of info and inspo. Those who make it as celebrity chefs have arguably the most influence of all.

Millions of us have bought their books and watched their T.V. shows or online content, hoping we can replicate what they do on the screen in our own kitchens. Sometimes it's as simple as stocking our cupboards with products celebrity chefs swear by, other times it's learning new ways to use ingredients or kitchen equipment.

When it comes to making a great plate of fried chicken, there's no end of experts with lots of things to say. This iconic dish, beloved across the United States and beyond, can be tricky to get right, whether you're a novice or an old hand. Don't worry, some of the country's most famous chefs have got you: Here are their best fried chicken tips.

Fans of celebrity chef Rachael Ray know she doesn't pull her punches when it comes to handing out culinary advice. She cut her culinary teeth at her family's Cape Cod restaurants and was a buyer at two swanky New York markets, before T.V. stardom gave Ray a platform to share her wisdom with a much bigger audience. When it comes to the subject of fried chicken, she's a whizz.

"Always be brining when it comes to birds," she quipped during an episode of her show in which restaurant owner Richard Blais demonstrated how to make it, Crack Shack style. However, in 2021, Ray let drop a priceless pearl of wisdom about the brine she puts together for her own fried chicken.

We all know soaking the meat in a brine like this supercharges fried chicken, and what you put in the liquid (be it pickle juice or water) also matters, because it's going to add a layer of flavor. Lots of herbs, garlic, salt, and pepper are crucial, but for everyone who's bitten into a hunk of chicken, only to be blasted by a stray bit of pepper, Ray has the solution. She uses full peppercorns in her brine to boost the taste, but they're also easy to spot lurking in the nooks and crannies of your meat and pick out. No more peppery surprises.

Scottish-born chef Gordon Ramsay has risen from humble roots and overcome a lot of adversity to carve out a global culinary empire. Despite his huge success — and his somewhat fearsome reputation — he never stops trying to help ordinary home cooks elevate their culinary game.

Among his many nuggets of information is Ramsay's tip for delicious fried chicken: Soak it in buttermilk. A by-product of the butter-making process, you can buy buttermilk by the carton online or at the grocery store, or make it yourself. All you need is two ingredients. For him, it's an invaluable way to ensure your fried chicken meat is always soft and chewy.

His tip is to smother the chicken with buttermilk. You can add aromatics like rosemary if you want, but the liquid is key. It will enrich the chicken flesh and help it relax, so it's delicious and tender. Ramsay encourages home cooks to let the mixture stand overnight, but if you're pressed for time, completely immersing the chicken even for five minutes will also help improve the texture and flavor.

Only Nigella Lawson could stare straight at the camera and claim that deep frying was a form of healthy eating but she's not wrong. The popular British star has spent years dispensing advice from her studio kitchen about how to cook all kinds of foods. Back in the earliest days of her T.V. career, in an episode of BBC series "Nigella Bites" devoted to "trashy food," she handed out one of her best.

Her tip for making perfectly golden-colored fried chicken at home would make a certain Colonel pack up his buckets and go home. According to Lawson, "last-meal-on-Earth" Southern fried chicken should balance tender, moist meat (which tastes better on the bone, in her opinion) with a crispy exterior, and the best way to achieve the former was to poach the chicken in milk. "This makes them so succulent," she enthused, as she pulled drumsticks and thighs from a pan of steaming, full-fat milk with a pinch of salt.

After patting the chicken dry and double-dunking it in flour and egg, Lawson fried the chicken in vegetable fat — bringing us back to her aforementioned healthy eating statement. When all the meat was cooked and arranged in a basket, she said, "If you can resist this, you do not deserve to eat," before taking her trademark big bite.

Foods we loved as children often make up our favorites as we become adults, and celebrity chef Tyler Florence is no exception. For him it was fried chicken, a recipe he admits he's great at cooking. Although he isn't shy when it comes to dishing out advice on getting the best out of all kinds of ingredients, one of his best tips about fried chicken has been in the wild since 2015.

Like many celebrity chefs, Florence uses fresh herbs to infuse the oil, turning the flavor of the chicken up to the max, and he squeezes a little lemon over the finished dish, but the real magic happens before any dredging, frying, or finishing touches take place. Florence's tip — and it applies to a whole chicken that will then be cut into several parts — is to pre-bake the bird for a couple of hours at 200 F, cutting the frying time down to around six minutes.

There are two major advantages to this. First, you can cook the chicken in advance, and as anyone who has ever fed the masses knows, time-saving tips are more than welcome. Second, pre-baking the chicken means you don't have to worry about it being underdone. The low, slow cooking will keep the meat juicy, and you'll also have a tasty, homemade chicken stock for this trendy cocktail.

Ever since he burst onto the small screen in 1991, Bobby Flay has been the inspiration for millions of home cooks across the United States. His combination of charm and culinary smarts has not only made him a successful celebrity chef, he's also a household name. So when Flay has something to say about a particular ingredient or recipe, it's worth paying attention, 'cause the man knows what he's talking about.

He has so much to say, in fact, that he uses his podcast, "Always Hungry," to take a deeper dive into his favorite subject. In one episode called "The Art of Deep Frying," Flay revealed his unique step when frying chicken that makes the labor-intensive process a little easier. "I slowly steam the chicken in the buttermilk in the oven about three quarters of the way cooked," he said, then allow it to cool before popping the meat in the buttermilk, double-coating, and frying it.

For Flay, including the extra step of steaming the meat helps him (and us) achieve the two most difficult things about great fried chicken: a golden crispy, outside, with juicy, perfectly cooked meat inside. "People that make great fried chicken are geniuses," he quipped. With his tip, we might end up among them.

Great fried chicken should always taste delicious, so there's always a lot of focus on what to put in the brine, buttermilk, and coating to maximize flavor. But the coating is crucial, too. If yours always fell off during the frying process, take some smart advice from French chef Ludo Lefebvre.

He's one of several celebrity chefs who drizzle a little of the buttermilk that coated the chicken pieces into his flour coating to create little clumps, adding it took him and his team a long time to figure out how to do it. As a messy dredger, with fingers that end up covered in lumps of coating that always end up in the bowl, he could have asked me, but Lefebvre has another trick up his sleeve: Don't be afraid to roughhouse the chicken when covering it in the flour.

Alton Brown suggests pressing the coating onto the chicken like you're giving it a shiatsu massage, and Lefebvre does exactly the same. "That's what's going to make your chicken very, very crispy, and very light too," he said in an episode of his series "Mind of a Chef."

As the instantly recognizable Mayor of Flavortown, Guy Fieri has won an army of fans who hang on his every word. Although they were surprised by his 2026 birthday social media post, the celebrity chef remains a reliable source when it comes to handing out cooking tips. That extends to amazing fried chicken.

It's a recipe Fieri is passionate about with a capital "P," and is eager for home cooks to include what he dubbed "a phenomenal canvas of flavor." As you would expect, he adds plenty of oomph to his brine, including pickle juice and a splash of hot sauce, while Fieri's coating is a blend of flour and cornmeal, topped with a sprinkle of paprika (the smoked kind), onion and mustard powders, chopped garlic, and fresh black pepper. So far so good. But it's just after this stage that the celebrity chef hits us with his secret weapon: Let that freshly dredged chicken rest for around a half hour.

Not only will it give all the flavors in the coating a chance to bind to the meat, which has been gorging on the brine of your choice for at least 12 hours (though two will do in a pinch), it allows the meat to warm up a little and will fry slightly faster, resulting in tasty, golden brown goodness.

Some celebrity chefs have a professional, restaurant background, think Gordon Ramsay or Dominique Crenn. Others have achieved stardom thanks to their internet presence, and one of the finest examples is Ree Drummond. As The Pioneer Woman, what started as a personal blog has become a go-to resource for millions of home cooks, packed with recipes, handy hints, and money-saving hacks.

Of course the busy mom-of-five has a tip or two for making top-drawer fried chicken that will please the whole tribe. For Drummond, one of the most important ingredients for this classic dish is the oil. It doesn't matter which kind you use (though you could try this for next-level fried chicken) but it is crucial to know when it's ready to be used. Drummond fries her chicken at 360 F, and recommends using a candy thermometer like this one, which is perfect for deep frying.

Why does it matter? Having the oil at the right temperature means it's going to fry the chicken quickly. Put the meat in when it's too cold and it will soak up the oil, resulting in heavy, greasy food. Likewise, let it get too hot and the outside will be cooked but the meat inside will stay raw. Once the frying is done, don't throw that oil away. Drummond recommends letting it cool completely, straining it, and storing it in the fridge so you can use it again.

In 2021, Marcus Samuelsson told his social media followers that his earliest food memory was the smell of his grandmother's house. The James Beard award-winning celebrity chef has come a long way and is a much-loved figure among American foodies. So, when he encourages us to use an ingredient or cook something a particular way, it's wise to listen and follow Samuelsson's advice.

Of course he loves fried chicken, and describes biting into super-crispy skin as a "happy sound," but achieving that result can be a challenge. Luckily, Samuelsson has a handy tip: Always fry the chicken pieces twice. For the first go-around, cook the pieces until they're turning a gorgeous golden brown color, then take them out of the oil and let them rest for 10 minutes, so the meat relaxes. Then — and this is the key part — pop them back into the skillet again for just three minutes.

Samuelsson says this method will result in "super-crispy" chicken that will taste delicious. He loves tearing into his fried chicken after it's been dipped in hot sauce, but who else is going to reach for a bottle of this?

Where Ina Garten goes, millions of people follow. We're obsessed with everything about her, from the kind of butter she keeps in her kitchen to how she organizes her pantry. But there's more to the Barefoot Contessa than blind adoration: She's got years of practical culinary experience under her belt and she is no stranger to handing out cooking tips.

One of her most popular snippets of advice covers fried chicken, and her tip can be used two ways. Garten uses her oven — not like Bobby Flay, to cook the meat before it's been fried — but after the coating has been crisped in the oil. The length of time the fried chicken stays in the oven depends on how she's cooking it. For her oven-fried chicken, Ina briefly fries the pieces in oil for around three minutes, before transferring them to a 350 F oven, where they cook for up to 40 minutes.

Garten's classic fried chicken relies on the oil to cook the meat, but because she works in small batches, she pops the fried chicken in a low, 250 F oven on a sheet pan while she finishes the rest. It's hot enough to keep the chicken warm, without the coating turning soggy. When the fried pieces are all reunited, everything's golden, crispy and delicious.