Cooking Chicken

Posted by Tom in Cooking Chicken | 0 comments

Cooking Chicken is one of the easiest meats to handle, cook and plan given its versatility and wide range of uses which can be used in today’s cooking environment.

Chickens just like other cuts of meat vary significantly depending on the diet and housing conditions of the animal. Battery housed chickens for example fed on a diet of dried pellet food do not provide the flavour and succulence that a free range reared animal would. However, price is a large factor and the increased rearing costs of free range chickens makes for a larger cost to the customer.

Given chicken can be marinated and flavoured in many, many ways battery chickens are still a popular option to many consumers whom find themselves unwilling or unable to upgrade to the free range chickens.

The main chicken cuts are legs, thighs, breasts and wings and can be easily grilled, fried and roasted. One common issue with cooking chicken is knowing when it is cooked. To take the guess work out of judging when the inside of the bird is cooked is to invest in a Silicone Meat Thermometer 2″ Dial which will effectively tell you how hot a certain part of the chicken is and when comparing this a temperature chart you can know when the meat is fully cooked – costing no more than a couple of chickens these are great investments.

If you do not have a meat thermometer, then calculate the cooking time of a whole chicken based upon the weight of the bird and take into account whether you are stuffing the bird – stuffing will reduce the ability of the heat to enter the cavity of the carcass and therefore prolongs cooking times. My personal opinion is to never stuff a bird but cook the stuffing mixture separately (alongside the bird in the same dish for example) given the risk of under cooking chicken should not be underestimated.

One of the most versatile of meats poultry is a great healthy fast food and really simple to prepare, cooking chicken should be something everyone can do without much trouble. Take a look around our cooking chicken section to find many recipes and methods around cooking chicken whether you prefer to roast or boil whole birds, or frying skinless chicken breasts we have a simple yet tasty recipe to cover all your chicken needs!