How to combine the 2 best bar foods

"Yo, meet me at Burkes!" My cousin Tye always said. "Hurry up before you miss happy hour!" 

Cousin Tye was one of the only dudes in my family that kept a nine-to-five and never wanted anything to do with street stuff. Dude was allergic to selling drugs. He was also the cousin whom I talked to about those classic American dramas that most teenagers go through, like what I should wear to the prom, potential places that would hire me if I decided to get a legit job like him and fantastic places to hang around the city where trouble never cared to visit. Kicking it with Tye was like a break from the reality of the violent neighborhood I lived in. 

I started hitting Burkes with Tye when I was 19 years old, which means I was two years too young to drink. Tye was 23 and had developed a taste for booze that could easily rival the taste I was born with. Here's how it worked: Tye gave me his ID, told MVA he lost his ID and then got himself another ID. 

So as Tye One and Tye Two, we hit all of the downtown bars my cousin loved — those white people college bars, those trendy tourist spots, the old head Black Auntie spots and Burkes.

But we always started and ended at Burkes.

I loved Burkes, not just because of its clientele full of randoms that would never frequent my neighborhood, but because it had a long bar. I mean, the longest bar you've ever seen, which easily sat about 40 people. I could sit back and watch all the different patrons from different places get lost in food and drink: The best burger, the most potent cocktails — and chicken mozzarella fingers. And there were a lot of chicken mozzarella fingers going around, because they were on the happy hour menu, they were huge and I promise that one serving could feed two people. 

My wife Caron and I recently dedicated a night to eating greasy fried foods — onion rings, buffalo wings, and all the bad stuff. And we did, agreeing that everything is okay in moderation. But still even as we ate, I felt like something was missing. I felt bad about the food we were eating, but not bad enough. "Remember Burkes," I said while tearing into a drumstick, "I would be satisfied if I had some of those . . ."

"Chicken mozzarella fingers!" Caron said. 

We went on for about 45 minutes: Oh, how much we used to love that appetizer. I was surprised that the two of us had never crossed paths at that restaurant back in the day when she also used to frequent it regularly. She even remembered bumping into Tye there a few times, which makes sense because he played the spot way more than me. 

Since Burke's is no more, and my craving for those chicken mozzarella sticks remained, I decided to recreate them at home. Surprisingly, the result gave me that Burkes feeling, which is all I was asking for. I thought about calling Tye, so he could come over and have some, but decided that he needs to learn to make his own: Here's how.

Chicken mozzarella fingers 

Yields

6 to 8 servings

Prep Time

10 minutes

Cook Time

25 minutes 

Ingredients

2 pounds chicken breast tenders

½ cup hot sauce

½ pound mozzarella 

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon red pepper

1 teaspoon black pepper 

4 eggs beaten 

1 cup of buttermilk 

½ teaspoon smoked paprika

Canola oil, for frying

Directions

1. Make batter by whisking the eggs together with the hot sauce and buttermilk.
2. Mix red pepper, black pepper, flour and paprika together. 
3. Slice mozzarella into strips about the same size as the tenders.
4. Align mozzarella strips on top of the chicken tenders. Dredge into batter, letting excess drip off, and then dip into flour mixture, coating chicken mozzarella fingers as best as possible. 
5. Heat four inches of oil to about 350 degrees F.
6. Cook in batches, each for about 6 minutes at a time, draining on a paper towel once browned and crisp. 
7. Serve hot with marinara sauce.