Anyhoo, I wheeled my cart to the deli counter, and waited for service. The tray of fried chicken was overflowing! It must have been right out of the fryer. I guess I'd missed the lunch rush, since I arrived just before 2:00.
"I'd like an 8-piece chicken, and a half pound of livers."
"Oh. Here's the chicken."
Counter Man reached over to the side, to the display where I used to grab my chicken without asking. It's a heated shelf where chicken was already assembled in 8-piece black plastic trays with clear, vented tops, price stickers attached. Like they do at The Devil's Playground deli. Several months ago, however, I stopped finding chicken there. I had to ask for it. The trays were no more. Country Mart bags their chicken now.
"Yeah, I always try to bag up at least one, when I bring out the chicken. It's the same as in the case. But I put it in a bag, to be ready. Here. Just grab it and put it in your cart."
That's the catch. The fried chicken was already in a bag! You know what happens to fried chicken in a plastic bag, right? It gets sweaty. No matter how many tiny air holes are in the bag. Hot chicken in a plastic bag steams, and the condensation drips from the top of the bag back onto the chicken, and then you have soggy fried chicken.
My chicken couldn't breathe! Counter Guy had suffocated my chicken!
I was so taken aback that I took it! Counter Guy set about tonging my livers. Again into a plastic bag. That's how they sell it now. I'm used to that. But as soon as I get it out of the store, I pull open the ziplock top, to let my chicken or livers or tenders breathe.
Yes. I know I should have insisted that he make me a fresh 8-piece chicken. But he'd already asked another man, over at the meat counter, if he minded if I was served first. So I didn't want to prolong that guy's wait, because he'd actually been there first.
When I told Farmer H at home, he said,
"I'd have told him I wanted the fresh chicken, or not any chicken at all."
Well. Men are like that. Probably everyone else in the world is like that. Except me.
We get regular rotisserie chicken in bags here, but it's a whole chicken, not cut up pieces and certainly not fried chicken which really needs to breathe a bit to remain crispy, that's why KFC sells it in cardboard tubs with air gaps in the lids and even then the crispy coating gets a bit soggy if you don't get it home fast enough. Next time you'll know to ask for a fresh pack. I didn't know anyone sold cooked chicken livers, do you buy them for yourselves or for the dogs?
ReplyDeleteYeah. The customer's always right. There IS a field that's an exception... Know ing your job experience and mine, can you guess what it is?
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteThe Gas Station Chicken Store uses a cardboard box for their chicken, and I open its lid, too, to preserve the crisp. At least Country Mart's chicken crisps up again after 5 minutes in the oven.
We love fried chicken livers. The Devil's Playground quit selling them in the deli. Some restaurants smother them in white gravy. I don't like smothered chicken! So I leave off the gravy. Dipped in ketchup is how I like them.
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Sioux,
I spent a whole career being wrong, and now I can do it at home!