Chicken tenders

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Chicken tenders
Crispy Chicken Strips - FotoosVanRobin.jpg
Alternative namesChicken fingers, chicken fillets, chicken goujons, chicken strips
Course Appetizer, main course
Place of origin Manchester, New Hampshire, United States
Serving temperatureHot
Main ingredients Chicken, breading
  •   Commons-logo.svg Media: Chicken tenders
Chicken fingers from an American fast food chain, usually served with french fries and sauce of choice. Dairy Queen - May 2022 - Sarah Stierch 02.jpg
Chicken fingers from an American fast food chain, usually served with french fries and sauce of choice.
Batter-coated deep-fried golden fingers with a dipping sauce, served in an American Chinese restaurant AmericanChinese Chickenfingers.jpg
Batter-coated deep-fried golden fingers with a dipping sauce, served in an American Chinese restaurant

Chicken tenders (also known as chicken goujons, chicken strips, chicken fingers, or chicken fillets)[ citation needed ] are chicken meat prepared from the pectoralis minor muscles of the bird. [1] [2] These strips of white meat are located on either side of the breastbone, under the breast meat (pectoralis major). [3] They may also be made with similarly shaped pieces cut from chicken meat, usually the breast, or sometimes just pulverized chicken flesh. [4]

Contents

Chicken tenders are prepared by coating chicken meat in a breading mixture and then deep frying them, in a manner similar to the preparation of schnitzel. [5] They are a very popular fast-food snack or main course due to their convenience and have become a staple across the United States. [6] Some of the most popular fast-food restaurants that sell chicken tenders include Guthrie's, Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers, Chick-fil-A, Church's Chicken, KFC, Popeyes, Zaxby's and Culver's. [7]

History

Chicken tenders were first made at the Puritan Backroom in Manchester, New Hampshire, in 1974. [8] Charlie Pappas salvaged chicken pieces that had been trimmed from larger cuts of chicken, marinating and frying them to create chicken tenders. [2] [9]

Other restaurants in Savannah, Georgia, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, have challenged this claim with later assertions to the invention of chicken tenders, although the consensus supports the claim in Manchester. [10] In 2023, Manchester was officially declared the "Chicken Tender Capital of the World" by Mayor Joyce Craig. [11]

Mass production

Chicken tenders are a mass-produced product in the United States. [12] [13] They gained popularity in the mid-to-late 1980s as an alternative fast food choice to chicken nuggets, since they retained more chicken meat. [14] Production can involve coating chicken meat with spices, polyphosphate and breading or crumbs, flash-frying the product to hold the breading in place, and then freezing it [12] prior to shipment for consumer, retail and commercial use. Tyson Foods is one such company that mass-produces chicken fingers. [13] Some are manufactured with a specific flavor profile, such as with a Buffalo-style hot sauce flavor. [13] They are also manufactured with flavors such as Honey BBQ and Parmesan Herb Encrusted. [15]

Variants

Chicken tenders are sometimes grilled rather than fried; they may accompany salads or pasta. [16]

The chicken tenders invented at the Puritan Backroom in 1974 were marinated in duck sauce, and marinated "Manchester chicken tenders" can be found at other restaurants in the Manchester area. [17]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The History of Chicken Fingers" (Archived 2016-01-09 at the Wayback Machine ). Leite's Culinaria.
  2. 1 2 Wells, Pete (1 October 2024). "How Chicken Tenders Conquered America". The New York Times . Retrieved 1 October 2024.
  3. ↑ "Chicken – Description of Parts" (Archived 2007-02-20 at the Wayback Machine ). RecipeTips.
  4. ↑ "Give a hand for homemade chicken fingers".
  5. ↑ Ellie Krieger. Crispy Chicken Fingers Recipe (Archived 2017-04-19 at the Wayback Machine ). Food Network.
  6. ↑ How can I make Chinese chicken fingers like in the northeast? (Archived 2011-07-18 at the Wayback Machine ). Cooking.stackexchange.com. Retrieved on 2012-04-19.
  7. ↑ McDowell, Erin. "I ordered chicken tenders from 8 fast-food chains and the best were from the smallest chain". Insider. Retrieved 2022-04-25.
  8. ↑ Sylvia, Byline: Andrew (2025-04-18). "Puritan Backroom hosts celebration honoring 50 years of chicken tenders, feeds Jersey Shore gang - Manchester Ink Link" . Retrieved 2025-05-06.
  9. ↑ "The History of Chicken Tenders and the Best Places to Get Them". The Epicentre. 2020-07-06. Retrieved 2021-11-01.
  10. ↑ SouthFloridaReporter.com (2019-07-27). "Chicken Fingers Were Created In Baton Rouge, Savannah Or Manchester (NH)?". South Florida Reporter. Retrieved 2022-01-30.
  11. ↑ "Reviewing culinary history in Manchester, the Chicken Tender Capital of the World". Liu, Michelle and Furukawa, Julia. New Hampshire Public Radio. Published August 18, 2023. Accessed December 20, 2023.
  12. 1 2 Booth, R.G. (2012). Snack Food. Springer US. p. 222. ISBN   978-1-4613-1477-6 . Retrieved April 26, 2019.
  13. 1 2 3 Bangura, Fatima (April 17, 2019). "You still can't eat Tyson Buffalo-style chicken strips sold in Michigan". WSYM-TV . Retrieved April 26, 2019.
  14. ↑ Simon 2020, p. 102.
  15. ↑ "Breaded Chicken". Tyson.com. Retrieved 2022-04-25.
  16. ↑ Jawad, Yumna (8 December 2019). "Grilled Chicken Tenders". FeelGoodFoodie. Retrieved 2022-04-25.
  17. ↑ Jagoda, Caleb (2023-02-15). "Love Me Tenders: A Chicken Tender Crawl Through Manchester". New Hampshire Magazine. Retrieved 2024-05-24.

Works cited

Further reading

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