Mark Hix recipe: Buttermilk fried chicken with Ramsons mayonnaise

Serves 4

Mark's buttermilk fried chicken is the perfect nibble with a drink or cocktail (Jason Lowe)

This goes down a treat as a bar snack in my restaurants and is the perfect nibble with a drink or cocktail. We make our own butter, so we use the excess buttermilk for the marinade, but you can buy it in Waitrose and good supermarkets.

The best cut for this is the first joint of the chicken wing nearest the breast, which supermarkets and butchers do sell and sometimes call the tulip. If you can't find these, then boned and skinned thighs work well.

16 chicken wing joints, skinned
1 chicken stock cube dissolved in 500ml hot water
200ml buttermilk
½tsp ground cumin
½tsp chilli powder
2tsp onion salt
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
100g self-raising flour
Vegetable or corn oil for deep frying
2-3tbsp good-quality or homemade mayonnaise
A couple of tablespoons of wild garlic purée (see risotto recipe in related link below)

Pull the thickest part of the chicken wing flesh down the bone, and turn it inside out so it looks a bit like a lollipop. Place in a saucepan, cover with the stock, bring to the boil and simmer for 6-7 minutes, then remove from the heat and leave to cool in the stock. Once cool, remove the wings and put them in a container with the buttermilk and half of the spices, season and leave to sit in the buttermilk for an hour. Mix.

Preheat about 8cm of oil to 160-180C in a large, thick-bottomed saucepan or electric deep-fat fryer. Remove the chicken from the buttermilk, season the flour and mix with the rest of the spices, then pass the chicken through the flour, shaking off any excess, then dip in the buttermilk and finally back through the flour.

Deep-fry the chicken in two batches, moving the pieces around with a perforated spoon as they are cooking, for 3-4 minutes, until light-golden; then transfer to some kitchen paper. Mix the mayonnaise and purée together, and serve alongside the chicken.