Tuesday, June 2, 2009

How to Cook Chicken

By Arf Ahmed

There are many ways in which chicken can be cooked due to its nature of being extremely flexible. All the chicken cooking methods aid in exposing all individual flavors out of the chicken. Many people may find that the recipes for the cooking of chicken are a lot and also vary differently. There may be other methods that may not be approved of and they cannot all be mentioned. Because the chicken has low fat, it is an easy type of food for preparation.

Keep the chicken refrigerated to maintain its temperature in the range of 40C and 600C. It is kept cool because the bacteria in meat replicates faster in high temperatures. Put the chicken in water that has salt in the ratio of 3 tablespoons for four glasses of water. The chicken should remain in the water for about an hour and longer if it happens to be frozen. In this way, the chicken will be tender and juicy and will be able to cook faster.

Close this chicken in different ways to be able to prevent it from drying up. The chicken can be covered by brushing a thick layer of marinade sauce or a thin one of cooking oil. Consequently, a foil bag can be used for covering this chicken so that it may be grilled. To ensure even cooking, pound the breast and thighs of the chicken so that they may be of the same size.

The heat should then be adjusted according to the method of cooking. If one is using the dry heat method, this include the roasting, baking, deep frying, sauting, and grilling, high heat should be used and the cooking should take very little time, e.g. 8-10 minutes grilling chicken breasts. The moist heat methods, steaming, poaching, slow cooking, and baking in parchment, should use low heat and should be cooked for a long period of time, e.g. 15 minutes for poaching chicken breasts.

Checking the chicken to establish that it is completely cooked is very important. Chicken differs from steak which may be prepared either rare or medium rare and should be cooked completely. To establish that it is done, pierce the thick part in the chicken to know if it is around 73.80C. It should not also be overcooked as it will then be dry. This chicken should be left to rest for the redistribution of juices. Before it is well done, it should be left for about 5 to 10 minutes for the juice redistribution process to finalize.

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