EVIE • We love these crispy chicken fingers so much that we sometimes serve them as hors d’oeuvres at our parties. This receipt comes from our friend Sherry Pincus, who helped us with our family parties for years. If you cut the chicken into bite-sized pieces and serve them with the delicious mango-cilantro sauce on the side, it helps disguise the fact that you are basically serving chicken nuggets at your party.

STEPHEN • Sadly for us, but happily for her, Sherry has since moved to Washington State, but these crunchy little treats bring me back to many a Christmas party, trying not to get caught in the kitchen hoovering them off a tray. And asking Eddie the bartender to make sure Evie’s wineglass was never empty. (“I swear I only had one glass last night, but I felt pretty tipsy!” “Huh…”)

Makes 4-6 main-course servings, or about 30 hors d’oeuvre servings

1/3 cup slivered almonds 
1/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons red pepper flakes 
1 1/2 tablespoons salt
8 cups cornflakes
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 large eggs
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch-wide strips
Vegetable oil for deep-frying
Mango-Cilantro Sauce (recipe follows)

Directions

Combine the almonds, sugar, sesame seeds, red pepper flakes, and salt in a food processor and pulse until the almonds are coarsely chopped. Add the cornflakes and pulse again–just a few times–until the cornflakes are also coarsely chopped. 

Set up a breading assembly line: Spread the flour out in a shallow bowl. Beat the eggs with a few drops of water in a second shallow bowl until well mixed. Spill the cornflake coating out into a third bowl. Set a cooling rack over a baking sheet at the end of the line.

Heat the oven to 200°F. Line a baking sheet with paper towels. 

Working with a few strips of chicken at a time, roll them around in the flour to coat completely. Bounce them around between your hands to get rid of excess flour, then slip them into the egg. Move the strips into the cornflake coating, letting as much egg drip off the chicken as possible first to avoid gunking up the coating. Roll-press the strips around in the coating, then move them to the rack, shaking the strips a little to get rid of the excess coating.

Pour about 1 inch of oil into a wide heavy skillet and heat over medium heat until a corner of a chicken strip lowered into the oil gives off a very lively sizzle (around 350°F on an instant-read thermometer). Carefully slip only as many of the strips into the oil as fit with an inch or so between them. As soon as the strips are in the oil, goose the heat under the pan a bit to keep the oil nice and hot. Fry, turning once, until the chicken is well browned and cooked through, 6 to 8 minutes. Remove the cooked chicken to the lined baking sheet and place it in the oven to stay warm while you fry the rest of the strips. As you cook the chicken, use a slotted spoon or wire skimmer to get rid of as many little crumbs as you can from the oil after each batch, and adjust the heat as necessary so the chicken gives off the same sizzle throughout the frying. 

Serve the chicken hot or warm, but definitely while the coating is still crunchy. Dab some mango-cilantro sauce onto each plate or pass a bowl of it around the table.