Is it OK to cook fried chicken without using flour? I intend to defrost the chicken legs, wash them, dry them on kitchen paper and then fry them in sunflower oil. No other ingredients.

Does it matter whether I shallow or deep fry?

Hello radamfi

No need to use flour when frying chicken and you can either shallow or deep fry (I'd personally opt for the former).

You can fry it without flour but it wont be the typical southern fried style.
Personally if I was having it plain then I would roast it in the oven.

Thanks for the info guys (fancy bumping into you on this section jojo01 ). I was curious whether there was some important (e.g. hygienic) reason for using flour as every recipe I've seen online for fried chicken seems to use flour.

I think the flour may just add a bit of a coating/crunch.

I'm often here talking about my favourite subject.... food!

Boil the chicken for nearly 10 minutes then bung them in the oven with a little olive oil, salt n pepar and your special spices till cooked. Whallah!

Dunk the chicken in beaten egg, then in 50-50 mixture of breadcrumbs & grated parmesan + spices if you like.
Shallow-fry as you wouldn't want to contaminate the oil in your deep-fat fryer with that lot!
Also works well with cod or pork chops.