Air Fryer KFC Chicken. Follow our homemade Kentucky Fried Chicken recipe and make your own KFC chicken in the air fryer.
The air fryer does a magical job of transforming your KFC ingredients into crispy KFC chicken that is cheaper and healthier than your favourite takeout.
We originally shared with you how to make KFC chicken in the air fryer back in the summer of 2016 and wanted to update it today for you with new photos and extra ideas.
Table of Contents
KFC Air Fryer Chicken
One of my favourite ever uses of the air fryer is to make breaded chicken. You can create a production line and have your chicken getting coated in the flour, then in the egg and finally in the breadcrumbs.
Once set up its an effortless way to make fried chicken in the air fryer.
But what I prefer to do is make KFC air fryer chicken. I have loved eating at KFC for many years and up until recently, lived in Portugal and didn’t have access to the same KFC chicken options as everyone else takes for granted.
Dominic and I would spend a little while in the kitchen making a few of our copycat KFC chicken favourites including:
- KFC Spice Blend For The Air Fryer
- Air Fryer KFC Twister Wrap
- Air Fryer KFC Zinger Burger
- Air Fryer KFC Chicken Strips
- Air Fryer KFC Popcorn Chicken
Each one of them is delicious and comes from similar KFC ingredients. You can make them all and have a feast, or you can just pick and choose which one best suit your favourite KFC menu items.
Best of all, they all cook in the air fryer and the air fryer is fantastic for making your own KFC chicken at home.
Plus, as well as our free newsletter, we also have a free air fryer mini course. It is ideal for air fryer beginners or those that want to get more confident with their air fryer. The free course runs for 5 days with a new lesson delivered each day to your inbox.
Can You Cook KFC In Air Fryer?
Yes you can. You can swap the deep fat fryer for the air fryer and add in your just breaded chicken and air fry it.
It will taste better than the deep fat fryer because it wont be loaded with fat, yet will taste a lot more crispy compared to making KFC in the oven.
What Is KFC Original Chicken?
When you look online for a Kentucky Fried Chicken recipe you will often see mentions for KFC original chicken.
What this means is that you are looking for an authentic KFC chicken copycat recipe that is similar to the KFC that is served in KFC takeout throughout the world.
It is also associated with the KFC spice blend that is used on the chicken which we will be showing you how to use today.
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- UK/Rest Of The World: Amazon UK – Waterstones –– Book Depository
KFC Chicken Ingredients
Chicken – KFC style fried chicken starts with some whole chickens, which is the best option if you want authentic KFC, and you want to save money. Simply follow our guide for how to chop up a whole chicken and use two small whole chickens. Then you will have 4 drumsticks, 4 thighs, 4 breasts and 4 wings.
Egg – I recommend cracking a few eggs into a bowl and mixing them with some extra seasoning. This helps keep your chicken more flavoursome and helps the breading stick to the chicken better.
Flour – The flour is what goes on the chicken first and helps the egg then stick to the flour. You can use any flour that you have in your pantry. I usually use this as an excuse to have a kitchen pantry clear out.
Seasoning – Its all about the delicious seasoning mix that you associate with KFC chicken. You can also mix and match if you have a food allergy which is what us Milner’s do.
Then for the kitchen gadgets that we have used in this air fryer KFC recipe, it has just been our Philips Air Fryer. We have this one and its wonderful for many types of air fryer chicken recipes and perfectly fits a big batch of KFC chicken in it.
How To Make KFC Chicken At Home?
- Seasonings. Start by mixing together your KFC spice blend in a container. I always use a container because I can then save the leftovers for next time I want homemade Kentucky fried chicken.
- Production. Its all about the production line. Create a bowl with your egg mixture, one bowl with your seasoned flour and a third with your seasoned breadcrumbs. A fourth bowl will then have your raw chicken pieces that are waiting to be breaded. Though see below for a full explanation of how this works.
- Coat. Load your chicken into the flour first, then the egg, then the breadcrumbs. Making sure each of your KFC chicken pieces are well coated.
- Load. Add to the air fryer and air fry for 16 minutes. If you are cooking a lot of chicken do a single layer, then do more batches.
Achieving Crispy KFC Chicken In Air Fryer
If you feel your KFC chicken is not crispy enough in the air fryer, I recommend that you add a little extra virgin olive oil spray. Simply spray the chicken a couple of minutes before the end of the cooking time. This will achieve a super crispy texture.
Though most of the time I have found that your KFC chicken doesn’t need this because of what a great job the air fryer does.
Creating A Fried Chicken Production Line
This is my personal KFC chicken production line:
Its all about being organised and being able to make KFC chicken in the air fryer FAST.
I always make this as my first task and then any leftovers can be used in another breaded recipe.
I will create a bowl with the eggs, one with the flour, one with the breadcrumbs. Then to make the chicken more flavoursome I will coat it in the seasoning first, before it enters the flour like this:
Then into the flour it goes for a good layer of flour for the egg to stick to:
Then it will be drenched in the egg batter until thoroughly coated:
Then for the final step it goes into the breadcrumbs:
You’re now ready for the air fryer.
As you can see this has you organised and if you are cooking a lot of chicken you can prep your second lot while the air fryer is cooking your first lot.
What To Serve With Your KFC Chicken?
For a bit of fun, what I like to do is keep an old KFC chicken bucket and reuse it for serving our KFC air fryer chicken.
You can then smile thinking what a great KFC fakeaway that you have made in the air fryer and serve it with the usual sides that you normally buy from KFC.
You can make our air fryer frozen corn on the cob, our air fryer frozen French fries or pair it with our air fryer potato wedges.
More KFC Chicken In Air Fryer
Would you like more KFC chicken in the air fryer? Or like me do you have leftovers that need using up and you want to make something else.
If so, follow the rest of our air fryer KFC series below:
- KFC Spice Blend For The Air Fryer
- Air Fryer KFC Twister Wrap
- Air Fryer KFC Zinger Burger
- Air Fryer KFC Chicken Strips
- Air Fryer KFC Popcorn Chicken
Air Fryer KFC Chicken
Ingredients
Kitchen Gadgets:
Air Fryer KFC Chicken Ingredients:
- 6 Tbsp KFC Spice Blend
- 2 Small Whole Chickens
- 150 g Plain Flour
- 4 Large Eggs
- 150 g Breadcrumbs
- 1 Tbsp Chicken Seasoning
- Salt & Pepper
Instructions
- Chop up your whole chickens into drumsticks, thighs, wings, and breasts. Put to one side.
- Create your production line. Crack eggs into a bowl and mix with a fork. Place flour in a bowl and season well with chicken seasoning, salt, and pepper. Place breadcrumbs into a bowl and mix with half your KFC rub.
- Toss the chicken in half your KFC rub. Then load chicken into the flour mixture, then into the egg, and then into the breadcrumbs bowl. Make sure each piece of chicken is well coated from each bowl.
- Place the KFC chicken into the air fryer basket on a single layer.
- Cook for 12 minutes at 180c/360f. Then turn and cook for a further 4 minutes at the same temperature. If doing a big batch doing in lots making sure you on don’t over fill the air fryer.
- Serve warm in your old KFC bucket.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Can’t make it now? Then pin it for later!
This is America, not Europe.Please use
American measurments. Were not mixing pharmaceuticals.
Hi Mike,
Thank you for your comment.
Unfortunately not everyone who reads our blog lives in America so we make any recipes on our personal experience so that they work correctly, if we used American measurements then we could not be sure how the food would turn out. We have on our blog a conversion chart which converts any European measurements into American measurements, you can access it here:
http://recipethis.com/about-us/
As for using pharmaceuticals in our recipes I´m not too sure what you mean :/ but it could be the anti-depressant tablet i gave to the chicken because it was feeling too stressed before i cooked it 😉
The kindest regards
Dom & Sam
Gosh that was a brilliant response to Mike! Well done. Oh and the recipe was great as well. Thanks for sharing. I’ve passed on to friends who have been looking for a decent air fryer copycat KFC.
Thank you Adrian and glad you liked it!
Good answer, I was very happy for an answer back to that and very impressed it was so polite.
Mike the idiot.
WELL WE LIVE IN Canada. .and use metric and Fahrenheit so it works out Great for us.?
Mike is close minded and ignorant. I’m also American and had no issues with the measurements. As for the chicken… it’s ok but doesn’t taste like kfc. Just being honest.
Don’t forget entitled
I thought the lady commenting on the recipe was very nice. I would have said a typical everything is America comment from you. BTW there is no America, it is the United States of America. A message from Canada.
Correct but should be North America. (I too am Canadian). Truthfully I agree with the measurements I hate the ml and grams etc I try to accommodate bu t still hate it. A lot of chefs recipes online sometimes show both conversations
Grow up Mike and join the human race.
Psst Mike did you see that they DONT live in America? It says it through out the post and in the bio 😉
Sorry, not all Americans are xenophobic. Your response was very respectful.
I live in America and I loved it..great recipes. keep em coming
How do you cook the chicken without all of the flour still being visible on the chicken.
Hi Judy,
The flour would not be visible because the it is used to make sure the egg sticks to the chicken. After coating the chicken in the flour you put it in the beaten egg and then place it in the breadcrumbs give it a shake and press the breadcrumbs into the chicken thus all the chicken is coated in the breadcrumbs and you should not be seeing any flour 🙂
Hope this helps.
Many thanks.
Dom
We are looking forward to trying this recipe out tonight. Thank you for sharing, this American can handle the measuring……take care!
Hi Jayne,
Great stuff, hope you like the recipe. We will be adding something in the near future where you can click a button and it will turn the measurements into American ones and back again, so we hope it will be a big help to everyone.
Many Thanks.
Sam
kfc is my weakness so I am really excited to try this recipe. I am Australian so not sure what to do about the measurements lol 🙂
Hi Dani,
Enjoy! And when I visit Aussie blogs the measurements are not that different, so you should be okay. Though do ask if you have any issues.
Kind regards
Sam
X
Show both, American & European measurements “please”!
Hi Brian
They are already on the recipe. If you press word imperial then you will see the American measurements and then when you press metric it will take you back to the European measurements 😉
Kind Regards
Sam
X
Hi.
Great recepie. We don`t have KFC in Norway so this is close to the real thing.
Kind regards
Lars
Hi Lars
Glad you like it, did not know about KFC not been available in Norway :/
Kind Regards
Sam
X
Do you leave the skin on the chicken
Hi Tim,
Yes we do. We love our chicken skin and it helps with the crispy coating if you use the skin. However if you are on a diet you can remove it if you wish.
Kind regards
Sam
X
hi
i live in england where can i buy the kfc spices for you recipe
thanks
phyl
Hi Phyllis
We use are own blend of the kfc spice blend which you can find here:
http://recipethis.com/how-to-make-the-kfc-secret-chicken-rub/
Hope you try and enjoy it.
Kind Regards
Sam
X
hi
tried it for my son who loves kfc he thinks i did i brill job thansk to you both
phyllis england
Thank you Phyllis for choosing to make one of our recipes we greatly appreciate it, and happy your son loved it 🙂
Thanks.
Sam
In this recipe you say to add the spices to the breadcrumbs and in the KFC spice recipe you say to add the spices to the flour. Which is it? Thanks.
Hi Deb
We do both. We do not think it matters which you do only that you seem to get a better coating of the spices when added to the flour and we found that when the spices are added to the breadcrumbs you can taste them alot more. In the flour they are alot more subtle.
Kind Regards
Sam
I’m Canadian. Metric AND imperial measurements are not a problem. Ha!
can you stack pieces of chicken in the fryer or do you have to lay the pieces flat with no overlapping?
Hi Bonnie,
Its best not to, as they will stick together and not turn out as well.
If you are doing a lot, I recommend the oven on its lowest setting and then transfer each batch, while waiting for the last. This way it will stop it from going cold.
Kind regards
Sam
X
Your recipe for KFC is fantastic .tryed it An love it.
Thank you for the great feedback Shelby 🙂
Many Thanks
Dom
Thanks so much for this recipe. I am in Australia so have no problem with the weights in Imperial or metric….
My Grandson will love me being able to make KFC at home. He has a nasty reaction to KFC…..not sure what it is in it but it will be great for him not to miss out on a favourite food.
Hi Cakebaker
Really glad you get to make this recipe for your grandson,hope he likes it as much as we do ?
I really like your blog.. very nice recipes and your KFC chicken is the best so far.
I am amazed by how good KFC chicken is in the air fryer. Didn’t think much of the air fryer, well until now.
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