Gus's chicken is always at its best in its first 10 or so minutes out of the fryer, so powerfully good that the Tennessee original is considered by some to be the best fried chicken in the world. Many have tried to reverse-engineer Gus's process. Most of them, who call for a buttermilk marinade and a quick dredge in flour, have failed — it clearly sits a spell in some kind of highly seasoned slurry. (The Fried Chicken Blog posits that the batter is made wholly with cornstarch instead of flour, which as anyone who has experimented with Chinese fried chicken can attest, would explain some of the Gus's characteristics.) Gus's fried chicken is not particularly useful as picnic chicken — you have to go to the source.