The Jury's Still Out On Whether You Should Reheat Fried Chicken With Ice
Fried chicken is the ultimate comfort food. Filling, juicy, crispy, and easy to keep eating, it has a passionate following across the U.S. and abroad and is, of course, a staple of southern cuisine. You'll find some of the best fried chicken down south, and coast to coast, food chains like KFC, Popeyes, and Chick-Fil-A peddle their version of this culinary treasure.
Cooks can make their own fried chicken at home as well. A recipe for crunchy, sumptuous fried chicken can be the hit of any gathering, but what about your leftovers? Or even leftovers from the Colonel himself? You don't want to waste those, that would be a tragedy! The good news is, there are multiple methods you can use to reheat fried chicken. The trusty microwave tends to be the most convenient for the hungry and desperate, but the results leave a lot to be desired. However, there is a new fried chicken reheating "hack" making the rounds on TikTok. User @dessert.hound shares a clip where he uses the exact opposite of heat to help bring his leftover chicken back to life — he uses ice cubes to steam it!
To steam or not to steam?
With his presumably day or two-old chicken (at least we hope it's not any older) sitting on a pan, @dessert.hound places ice cubes around his piece of chicken, closes the lid and steams it. The chicken itself seems to have gained back some of its luster after its sauna, but then again, this is TikTok, and anyone can edit a video. This method does sound like it's a bit more convenient than the oven or shallow frying in oil. There's only one pan to clean, and all you need are ice cubes.
@dessert.hound
From the looks of it, the results do have more nuance to them than any shriveled-up pieces of nuked chicken borne out of the desperation that is late-night hunger. But at the end of the day, this is still a piece of chicken getting steamed in a pan, which will infuse the chicken with moisture, and as commenter @kianamechelle3 put it, "Nobody want no soggy chicken." Using ice cubes to reheat your chicken might be the way to go for some, like @dessert.hound, but if you do want to make sure your chicken gets back some of its essential crispiness, there are definitely other ways to go — many TikTok commenters suggest popping it in an air fryer.