I have lived in quite a few locations over the course of my lifetime, the South being one of them.  Living in the South is where I was first exposed to fried chicken gizzards and, to this day, I absolutely LOVE THEM when they are prepared correctly! And therein lies the problem...because when they are NOT prepared correctly, there are few items less palatable! If they are not prepared correctly, they can be as tough as shoe leather, unable to be chewed into pieces small enough to swallow!

In the past, I always ordered gizzards at a restaurant or cafe, which means someone else prepared them! In recent years, as I've taken to learning and experimenting a bit more with cooking, I have been trying to learn how to prepare gizzards correctly! I cannot even guess how many videos and articles I have watched and read about "how to prepare chicken gizzards" to ensure they are TENDER! After several years and many, many attempts, I was just about to give up trying to do this myself, almost accepting defeat...by chicken gizzards! My gizzards NEVER turned out as tender as I recall having at restaurants. When I prepared gizzards, having to toss out about half of them was expected, as so often many of them just could NOT be called "food", and they surely could not be eaten!

Then, I happened to watch yet another video, and this time the fella mentioned using an Insta-Pot! To my knowledge there is no such animal as an "insta-pot". It is actually a slang term for Instant Pot, a brand of pressure cooker! I also believe that many folks refer to their pressure cookers as "insta-pots", regardless of the brand of their pressure cooker! Why, I do not know!  Anyway, I watched and listened very carefully and figured if I ever hoped to master the art of creating quality, tender, edible chicken gizzards, I was going to have to invest in a pressure cooker!

I convinced myself that not only would this be just about my last attempt at creating a good, quality, tender, edible chicken gizzard, but there must be other items I could prepare more quickly or efficiently with a pressure cooker! But, one thing I did NOT do was to rush out and buy an expensive one so large you could park a small VW in it and with so many functions that a computer course was required prior to actually using it! NO! I actually bought the least expensive brand I could find!  I believe it cost right at $50!

When it arrived, I opened the box, removed the manual and read it thoroughly as I had not had any experience with pressure cookers since my days working at KFC back in the mid 1960's! And let me tell you, the ones we used "back in the day" at KFC weren't a whole lot larger, but they WERE a whole lot simpler to use! Just put the lid on, turn on the burner, and wait for the jingling sound indicating the pressure had built up. It was just a matter of using a timer after that!

This contraption, at first, appeared a bit intimidating! Lots of buttons, options and so forth!  However, after reading through the manual I did a small "test" that the manual suggested to do to give the inner pot a good cleaning and to remove any lingering odors or remnants of the factory! Turns out it was pretty simple and straightforward!

I cleaned the gizzards as I normally would, mixed some chicken broth and some spices we enjoy, and prepared for the breading and cooking! What a shocker!  Before the pressure cooker, I would cook the gizzards for as much as 90 minutes in an attempt to tenderize them!  With the pressure cooker, I cooked two pounds of gizzards for only 38 minutes!  Everything after that, the breading, etc. was pretty much the same as I had always done!

WOW! What a wonderful surprise!  After cooking them, soaking them in buttermilk to continue the tenderizing process, breading and then frying them in a deep fryer, WOW is all I can say! They even smelled better than ANY I had ever prepared before! That alone suggested to me that I had finally gotten it right! Even my wife thought they smelled really good and she had NEVER wanted any gizzards! But the smell of these had her over there at the basket of gizzards "testing" one, then another and then about a half dozen more! That night was the very first night she ever joined me for a dinner of fried chicken gizzards! And THAT is making a really strong statement as to the quality I had finally achieved!

So, if you are struggling with a recipe, don't give up! Keep researching, testing, asking, reading and you will almost certainly finally succeed! And, when you do, you will be so happy and be so proud of yourself for sticking with it! That also happened to me with a lemon pie that my mom, long since passed, made for me as a child. I can still see the pie, when I close my eyes, but I had no idea how to prepare it and when I asked others about it, no one, even my sister, had any idea what I was describing! But I continued to research and read and one day, possibly as a fluke, I found something very similar to what I was looking for!  With a bit of experimentation I was able to replicate my mom's pie! I cannot tell you how happy that made me, reliving those moments of sharing desert with my mom! And now, whenever I get the urge, I no longer wish for it, I actually create and enjoy it!

Hope you enjoyed my little (or maybe a bit long-winded!) adventure with gizzards!

Please let me know what you think, if you have any ideas or suggestions or if you have any questions! If I don't have an answer for you, I'll sure try to point you in the right direction!