By Father's Day. The strangest one yet. I'm a father whose son is at war and whose other son just got married and whose daughter just graduated and whose mother is losing her sight and whose wife is holding the universe together with a Kentucky charm necklace and a will made of Appalachian granite. I am the father of a complicated family in a complicated year and the only thing that makes it simple is the food, which doesn't care about complexity. The food just needs heat and time and attention, and I have all three.
I drove to Evarts. Earl's grave. The annual conversation with a headstone. "Earl," I said. "Clay is in Afghanistan. Amber graduated. Travis got married. Betty's eyes are worse but she's still cooking. The garden's in. The brisket is perfected. The beans are holding. I'm fifty-one and my back hurts and I miss you every day and the soup is always on." I paused. "Keep an eye on Clay, Daddy. From wherever you are. Keep him safe." I don't know if dead men keep watch. I don't know if prayer works. But I know that speaking to Earl in the Evarts cemetery on Father's Day is the closest I get to church, and the closest I get to church is the closest I get to peace.
Betty was in the kitchen when I arrived. She'd made fried chicken. Not for me — for the memory. She makes fried chicken on Father's Day because she made fried chicken for Earl on Father's Day for thirty-four years and stopping would mean admitting he's gone. She's known he's gone for eleven years. She's been making his fried chicken anyway. That's love after death. That's cooking as séance. That's a seventy-nine-year-old woman frying chicken for a ghost because the ghost deserves his Father's Day dinner and the chicken deserves to be made and the kitchen will not accept the absence of the man it was built to feed.
I ate Betty's fried chicken. Not my version — hers. From her hands, in her kitchen, at her table. It was perfect. It is always perfect. The secret ingredient isn't any ingredient — it's Betty. The woman is the recipe. When Betty is gone, the fried chicken will be my version, and my version will be ninety-eight percent, and the two percent that's missing will be the hands of a woman who stood at a coal stove in Evarts, Kentucky, for sixty years and never once made a bad piece of chicken. That two percent is irreplaceable. That two percent is Betty. I'm going to eat every bite of it while it's still available.
Betty’s hands made the chicken that day, and I’ll carry that taste for the rest of my life — but the closest I can get to it on my own stove is a proper Sunday chicken supper, the kind that asks for patience and heat and the willingness to cook for someone even when they can’t sit at the table anymore. If you’re making this on Father’s Day, make enough for the ghost. Set the plate. He deserves it.
Sunday Chicken Supper
Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 1 hr 15 min | Total Time: 1 hr 35 min | Servings: 6
Ingredients
- 3 to 4 lbs bone-in, skin-on chicken pieces (drumsticks, thighs, breasts)
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1 egg
- Vegetable oil, for frying (about 2 cups)
- 1 lb baby red potatoes, halved
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon dried rosemary
- Salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Soak the chicken. Whisk together the buttermilk and egg in a large bowl. Add chicken pieces, turning to coat. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or overnight if you have the time — the longer it soaks, the more tender it gets.
- Make the dredge. In a shallow dish, combine flour, salt, pepper, garlic powder, paprika, and onion powder. Mix well.
- Prep the potatoes. Preheat oven to 400°F. Toss halved red potatoes with olive oil, rosemary, salt, and pepper. Spread on a baking sheet and roast for 40–45 minutes, flipping once halfway, until golden and fork-tender.
- Heat the oil. Pour vegetable oil into a large heavy skillet (cast iron if you have it) to about 1/2 inch depth. Heat over medium-high until a pinch of flour dropped in sizzles immediately — around 350°F.
- Dredge and fry. Remove chicken from buttermilk, letting excess drip off. Dredge each piece thoroughly in the seasoned flour, pressing to adhere. Fry in batches without crowding, turning once, about 12–15 minutes per side for bone-in pieces. Chicken is done when golden brown and juices run clear (internal temp 165°F).
- Drain and rest. Transfer fried chicken to a wire rack set over a baking sheet. Let rest 5 minutes before serving — this keeps the crust crisp instead of steaming it soft.
- Serve together. Plate the fried chicken alongside the roasted red potatoes. Serve hot, at the table, with the people you love — and a quiet thought for the ones who aren’t there.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 520 | Protein: 38g | Fat: 28g | Carbs: 28g | Fiber: 2g | Sodium: 620mg