Simple chicken katsu is the perfect "fakeaway" dinner. Crispy, shallow fried chicken that's been breaded with katsu crumb. This is perfect served with rice and curry sauce, or as a burger stuffed into a fluffy brioche bun. Either way, crispy fried chicken is the perfect budget-friendly dinner.

Katsu is a super crispy Japanese style fried chicken. Flavours of onion powder, coriander, cumin, fenugreek and turmeric. I know that sounds like a lot of different spices but have no fear. You don't have to go out and buy all (or any) of these spices. We're using the new katsu crumb from Aldi. I love picking up new items and showing new ways to use them.

Chicken Katsu
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Ingredients needed
Step by step directions
Variations
Storage
Tools used
Recipe

Ingredients needed

Boneless skinless chicken breast or thigh- You can use either one here. Chicken breast is leaner and has the potential to be overcooked. Thigh has more fat, so isn't as easy to overcook. However, I always choose breast as I just prefer them.
Katsu curry crumb- This amazing little herb crumb has the perfect mix of spices, so you don't need to buy everything individually. And 1 packet is the perfect size for 2 medium chicken breasts.
Plain flour- eggs- The flour and eggs is the method we're using to get the crumb to stick to the chicken. Breading the chicken this way creates a super crispy bread crumb coating.
Herbs- thyme, basil and parsley- I scatter my fried chicken with fresh herbs. I just find it brings out the flavour of the Katsu crumb.

Step by step directions

Prepping the chicken

Because we're shallow frying the chicken it really needs to be even thickness the whole length of the breast. You can butterfly the chicken breast, but my preferred method is to pound out the chicken with a rolling pin.
Wrap the chicken in baking paper and using a rolling pin gently pound out the thick part of the chicken breast until the whole breast is the thickness of about 1.5cm.

Step 1 & 2

You'll need 3 small-ish bowls.
In bowl 1 place the flour and some salt and black pepper.
In bowl 2 place the eggs and beat them well. Again, season with some salt and pepper.
Bowl 3 place the Katsu curry crumb.
Take a flattened chicken breast and coat it in the flour. Then place it into the beaten egg and coat both sides. Lastly, coat the chicken in the Katsu crumb.

Step 3 & 4

Place the breaded chicken onto a baking tray or plate while you heat some oil in a nonstick frying pan. Heat the oil over medium heat. If the oil is too hot the crumb will burn before the chicken is cooked in the middle.
Cook the chicken for about 8 minutes on each side. The internal temperature of the chicken should be 75ºC. You can serve this super simple dinner with some rice, or noodles or in a burger. Either way, it's going to be a HUGE hit with your family.

Variations

Q. Can the chicken be baked?

A. Kind of. You absolutely can bake this Katsu, but if you're doing it to save calories then it's probably not worth it because you'd have to drizzle so much oil over the chicken to get it to brown and crisp up properly. Sometimes, fried chicken just really needs to be fried chicken, ya know.

You can also use different kinds of meat.

Pork
Beef
Oysters
Flaky white fish
Prawns

A great sauce to make to go with this is a shortcut Tonkatsu sauce (the traditional sauce accompaniment) is to whisk up a 50:50 ratio of ketchup and Worcestershire sauce.

Storage

Because this is fried chicken, the crispy factor is truly what it's all about. So, this really is not great for leftovers.

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Tools used

Recipe

Crispy Fried Chicken Katsu

Author: Deborah Thompson
Prep Time: 10
Cook Time: 20
Total Time: 30 minutes
Yield: serves 2 1x

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Ingredients

Scale

2 chicken breasts, flattened to 1.5cm
150g flour, seasoned with salt and pepper
2 eggs beaten
1 package Katsu crumb
fresh herbs- parsley, basil and thyme (optional)
175-200ml vegetable oil for frying

Instructions

Wrap the chicken in baking paper and using a rolling pin gently pound out the thick part of the chicken breast until the whole breast is the thickness of about 1.5cm.

Get 3 medium bowls

In bowl 1 place the flour and some salt and black pepper.
In bowl 2 place the eggs and beat them well. Again, season with some salt and pepper.
Bowl 3 place the Katsu curry crumb.
Take a flattened chicken breast and coat it in the flour. Then place it into the beaten egg and coat both sides. Lastly, coat the chicken in the Katsu crumb.
Place the breaded chicken onto a baking tray or plate while you heat some oil in a nonstick frying pan. Heat the oil over medium heat. If the oil is too hot the crumb will burn before the chicken is cooked in the middle.
Cook the chicken for about 8 minutes on each side. The internal temperature of the chicken should be 75ºC.

Category: Easy Dinners
Method: Stovetop
Cuisine: Japanese Inspired

Keywords: Katsu chicken, easy dinner, budget meal

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