Poaching Chicken

[fidgiegirl]

@Rosemary, I believe it was you who said that you prefer to poach chicken if you are using it in a later recipe. I read a little on eHow but thought I'd see if anyone on the forums has tips/tricks about poaching. I would highly prefer to do it in the crockpot but am open to the stovetop, too! ;)

I feel we are saving money on chicken since I've started buying whole/part chickens with bones rather than always expensive boneless/skinless breasts. However, I don't have the art of managing the meat down yet :doh:

:thankyou:

[Rosemary]

I poach chicken on the stovetop, often just in plain water, but sometimes with herbs/spices added. Just cook at a low simmer.

[Tiam]

For poaching, as opposed to boiling or simmering something there is a simple method. If you are going to poach a whole bird the method is more minutes, but essentially a chicken is placed in a pan of cold water to cover. Heat the water till it simmers very low, not boiling, for 5 to 10 minutes for a whole chicken, or two to three minutes if just breasts, 3 to 5 minutes if leg and thighs. Then turn off the heat and cover and let sit for 1 hour for the whole, and 10 minutes for others. This makes a very tender, thoroughly cooked, juicy chicken as opposed to a dried out boiled or simmered bird. So direct cooking time is very short. You can add garlic, onions, herbs, whatever you like to the water, just don't boil or simmer it to death.

[kib]

One thought: a boneless, skinless breast is absolutely no waste at all. $4 a pound is It, you pay $4 you get a pound of edible meat. Your per-pound cost for a whole bird includes fat, skin, bones, gristle and sometimes the giblet package, so even if it's supposedly $1.29 a pound, you might wind up throwing half of it away. Still cheaper, but take into account the amount of work and whether you family will actually eat anything but the breasts and drumsticks! (Personally I buy whole birds too because while DH prefers breast meat, I like the dark meat and skin, cook giblets for the cats, and turn a chicken into roast chicken, stirfry, coldcut sandwiches, pan-grease and soup before it's said and done. To the dismay of gardeners everywhere, I even bury the stock strainings in my compost.)

Tiam, that's very interesting to me, I love the idea of only 10 minutes or less of direct cooking time! :+1:

[Tiam]

I never seem to be able to bone a chicken thoroughly. I always end up with bits of gristle and skin in the meat pile and then the dishes they are intended for get nasty bits in them. I always miss bits no matter how hard I work at it. I do make soup stocks from chicken carcasses and try and pull off bits of the meat in that process too. But I don't buy whole chickens that much because I don't make lots of 'casserole' type dishes using chopped chicken. I tend to use boneless breasts for stir fry, fried chicken, (I don't like to eat chicken off the bone) I don't like leg meat (drumsticks) either, so I tend not to get whole chickens. You can get boneless thigh meat which is good but you still have to look out for gristly bits to remove.

[Crystal]

For poaching, as opposed to boiling or simmering something there is a simple method. If you are going to poach a whole bird the method is more minutes, but essentially a chicken is placed in a pan of cold water to cover. Heat the water till it simmers very low, not boiling, for 5 to 10 minutes for a whole chicken, or two to three minutes if just breasts, 3 to 5 minutes if leg and thighs. Then turn off the heat and cover and let sit for 1 hour for the whole, and 10 minutes for others. This makes a very tender, thoroughly cooked, juicy chicken as opposed to a dried out boiled or simmered bird. So direct cooking time is very short. You can add garlic, onions, herbs, whatever you like to the water, just don't boil or simmer it to death.

I have a question about this method (sorry still posting as admin, pure laziness). I love the idea, but I'm a little concerned whether it gets to the proper temp to kill all the bacteria???

[Rosemary]

I had the same thought about the low cooking time/temp for the chicken. When I cook a whole chicken in the crockpot, it takes many hours (about 6-8, I think) to be cooked on the low setting, which is between 180-200F.

I don't find my poached chicken to be dry at all after cooking at a low simmer. On the contrary, I cook it this way because it is very moist and so adaptable to many recipes.

[Charity]

There is a great method that I learned watching The Frugal Gourmet years ago. It produces the most wonderfully moist and flavorful poached chicken imaginable. When I owned a gourmet shop and catering company we made all our chicken salad using this method and we could never keep it in the store. I don't know why it works but it really does.



In a large stock pot bring enough water to cover a whole chicken to a rapid boil.

When it's rapidly boiling plunge the whole chicken into the pot.

Leaving the burner on high, after a minute or so, take the whole chicken out and put it on a platter to rest. This closes all the pores in the skin of the chicken locking in moisture and flavor.

Bring the water back to a rapid boil and put the chicken back in the pot and put a tight lid on the pot.

After about three minutes turn the stove off leaving the chicken in the pot with the lid on.

Let it sit covered that way for about an hour and ten minutes.

Remove the chicken from the pot and let it cool completely before skinning and pulling the meat off the bones.

If you're ambitious, you can thow the bones back in the stock pot with roasted vegetables and herbs and make chicken stock out of the water you boiled the chicken in.

[pcooley]

I was looking under the "new posts" section of this new forum rather than under the specific "cooking and recipes" section, and I thought you meant the sneak out in the middle of the night with a cloth sack type of poaching. I guess I've read Danny, Champion of the World one too many times to my son. I was also thinking it would be nice if someone poached our rooster. He starts crowing around 4 am. He's our third rooster. I got rid of the other two because I'm always worried they're disturbing the neighbors, though the neighbors I've spoken to love our roosters. The first one I butchered and poached in your sense of the word, but my children were thoroughly horrified.

[shadowmoss]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who wondered why someone was going to the trouble of 'poaching' someone else's chicken when they aren't that expensive to just go buy.

[redfox]

Dang it if I didn't see this thread title and think of stealing chickens! Maybe I'm channeling my grandmother the rancher!

[Tiam]

I have a question about this method (sorry still posting as admin, pure laziness). I love the idea, but I'm a little concerned whether it gets to the proper temp to kill all the bacteria???


I guess it's pretty much the same as Charity's below. I skip a step, but it come out great with the bird perfectly cooked. I've never gotten ill from it, nor any of my family, it's always moist and juicy.

I'm sure Rosemary's is delicious also. It's just MY own personal experience is the that I like my method better of the two, having tried both. Charity's has even less cooking overall, and it is the original method and I promise you, you will not be disappointed. I think everyone who even thinks of trying it looks at it skeptically. All I can say is, It works.

[fidgiegirl]

Haha, didn't mean to create a confusing title!!

Going to try one of these today. Not sure which, but one! Will let you know how it goes.

[fidgiegirl]

I decided on the crock pot for this attempt. I put in a small packages of thighs and package of a whole cut up chicken. Covered with water, seasoned with half an onion, rosemary, bay leaf, sea salt and pepper. It is cooking right now. I plan to use the water for broth. Will let you know how it comes out!

[happystuff]

I usually cook my chickens simply at a low simmer for, basically, until I think it is done and I'm ready to deal with it again. :-) Am going to try these quick boil/let sit methods, though. Anything to help save on the electric stove use! Thanks.

Edited to add: A long time ago, when I was first foraging into batch cooking, I had read somewhere that when buying whole chickens, make sure you buy ones that are 4 pounds or larger. Apparently, doing so results in more usable meat than in bones and gristle after the cooking is done. Personally, when I buy and cook about a 5-6 pound chicken, there visually appears to be more meat than everything else!