Spring Menu Hot List: Forget fried chicken. CBD Provisions serves a fried ROOSTER

Now that Richard Blankenship runs the farm and the table at CBD Provisions, the F2T restaurant in the Joule Hotel downtown that opened with a big splash a couple of years ago, he’s set about refining an already good menu. Michael Sindoni’s excellent strozzapretti is exiting with Sindoni, who’s moved upstairs as grand corporate wizard of CBD’s and the Joule Hotel’s culinary operations. Fish and produce are rotating, too, and so are the desserts, which have always been among the best in town. The burger is staying. So is the pig head carnitas. But those were Sindoni’s magic rings. What’s Blankenship’s wheelhouse? Well, it’s sure not fried chicken.

Anybody can make fried chicken, right? Popeye can make fried chicken, Bubba can make fried chicken. Dudes named Bojangle, Clucker and Cane can make fried chicken. Hell, even a repressed southern colonel could toss some yard bird in herbs and spices and fry up a decent bucket of dinner. You know who can’t fry chicken? Richie Blankenship. He doesn’t need to. Because Blankenship knows how to fry up a rooster and make it taste better than fried chicken. Even better than the fried chicken Dean Fearing makes in his cast iron skillet from Kentucky.

Blankenship slow cooks a local, free-range strutter until its dark flesh is deeply flavorful and moist, purged it of all its school yard brawl. Then he rolls it around in cumin and orange peel and Szechuan peppers, crisps it in the fryer, and serves it crackling, crunchy, golden brown and delicious. It’s some damn fine fried rooster. For sure, the best GB&D legs, thighs and feet on this side of the tracks — or the other side.

1530 Main Street, Dallas, 214-261-4500.