Chicken feet are a delicacy in China and South Africa, and are used in Eastern European and American Southern cuisine. They are high in collagen and often used in soup broth. They should be blanched and trimmed before use.
Chicken feet are exactly what they sound like: the feet of a chicken. When detached from chicken, they are considered a culinary delicacy in some regions of the world, particularly in China and South Africa. This ingredient has also played a part in the cuisines of Eastern Europe and the American South, where people often come up with creative ways to use offal, ensuring that every part of the animal is used to its full potential.
A look at your feet will give you an idea of what’s involved in chicken feet: a series of small bones, tendons, and skin. They don’t have much muscle and are also extremely high in collagen, so they tend to cook into a gelatinous mass, with the tendons and skin adding a chewy texture. The high collagen, incidentally, makes them great for skin, hair and nails, when consumed in large quantities.
Most chicken feet recipes call for the stews to simmer slowly to bring out the flavor and make them more tender. Consumers eat the feet whole, spitting out the small bones along the way; learning how to eat them properly can take some time, as it’s difficult to eat them without accidentally swallowing the bones. Gently spitting bones out is also hard to do, especially if you crack them between your teeth to get the marrow out first.
In China, chicken feet are commonly featured on the menu of many dim sum restaurants as “phoenix feet,” and the menu may include duck feet as well. They are also sold as street food, often fried, in other parts of Asia. Many cooks swear by chicken feet as an ingredient in soup broth, claiming they increase the gelatin content and make the broth richer and more flavorful.
Getting crow’s feet can be a challenge, depending on where you live. Boutique butchers are often willing to sell them, and they can also be found fresh and frozen at Chinese markets. In regions where they are particularly hard to find, consumers can order food directly through merchants who will ship frozen chicken feet.
Before using chicken feet in a recipe, you should blanch them in hot water for about five minutes to remove any impurities. You should also trim your toes, along with particularly thick calluses on the skin.
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