Oven Fried Chicken

I LOVE fried chicken. When I think of making fried chicken though, I almost always come up with a number of reasons not to make it. For starters, it's time consuming and makes a huge mess of the kitchen, then there's that pesky nutrition thing... fried chicken is just plain bad for you. So, it was time to come up with an alternative.

I've always looked at oven fried chicken recipes a little suspiciously, to me they just never looked they would work well or the recipe used bread crumbs, which... well , just reminds me a bit of shake n bake. This week, however, I decided to try one of the recipes I had set aside a while back and give it a shot. Not only was it healthier than fried chicken, it tastes really good and was a whole lot easier and less messy. I was actually very surprised with how well this recipe turned out, it was crispy, flavorful and the coating stayed on! This will now be making regular appearances in our monthly menus as it's quite affordable on top of everything else... WIN WIN WIN!

1 cup low fat buttermilk
1 heaping Tbs whole grain Dijon mustard
1-2 Tbs your favorite hot sauce
12 chicken legs (you can remove the skin to make it healthier, but I left it on)
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
salt and pepper to taste
cajun seasoning to taste
2 tsp paprika
olive oil cooking spray

Combine buttermilk, mustard and hot sauce in a gallon size zipper top bag, add chicken legs and allow to marinate 2 to 4 hours (you can even let this go overnight if you want).

Preheat oven to 425ºF. Line a baking sheet with foil and place a baking rack large enough to hold all of the chicken pieces on it. Spray the rack with olive oil spray.

Mix flour and seasonings in a medium bowl. Remove chicken from marinade, shaking off excess, and coat in flour. Place on prepared rack. Spray chicken pieces with olive oil spray, turn and spray the other sides. Place in oven and bake 40 minutes, turn and continue baking another 15-20 minutes or until chicken is browned and cooked through.