Pratyush Chalasani

Lately I’ve been experimenting with transglutaminase (a.k.a “meat glue”).
With my new learnings, and following the philosophy that snack food is always better in ring form, we can take chicken nuggets to their next stage of evolution — Chicken Rings:

Making them is relatively straight forward, although there is bit of lead time as you’ll need to let them rest for an hour to let the transglutaminase bind properly.
I’m not aware of any stores which sell transglutaminase powder, but there are many online sellers which you can order from.
I purchased my packet off a seller on eBay: https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Transglutaminase-Meat-Glue-RM-Formula-15g/152003410409

Start with transglutaminase powder, chicken breast, and a knife to cut it up:

I’d recommend using whole breast pieces, as they’ll need to be cut into long thin pieces to make this work:

Apply the transglutaminase powder to the freshly cut face of the chicken strip as it will adhere better this way:

Shake off the excess, bring the other end around and press it firmly into a ring shape:

Do this for all remaining strips and leave them to rest for an hour at room temperature:

This won’t create quite as strong a bond as other techniques you may have seen. But it really only needs to be strong enough to survive the battering process. Once fried, the rings will hold their shape pretty well.

After resting, batter them with your choice of ingredients. I’m using a straight-forward sequence of flour, egg-wash, and bread-crumbs:

To deep-fry the rings, I’m using my Instant Pot in Sauté mode (set to the More option) with rice bran oil:

If you’re frying on the stove, I’d suggest heating the oil to about 180°C (365°F).

Carefully lower the rings in small batches at a time, and fry until golden brown:

You’ll need to experiment with frying times to make sure the chicken inside is cooked properly. I’ve found 5 minutes to be ideal with my setup.

When cooked, rest them on some paper towel for a couple of minutes to get rid of excess oil:

Then serve with your choice of condiment. I’ve found the toroidal geometry allows for very even cooking of the chicken breast. The meat is well cooked, but still moist and tasty:

It also provides for superior sauce retention properties:

Overall I’d say the experiment has been a success.
Although, I don’t think I’ll be making them too often considering how long it takes to make even small batch.