Tough Chicken?

[Trixxee]

Hmmmm, this has happened to me twice now in recent weeks. After flattening out boneless chicken breasts and cooking (one time it was grilled, today, quickly sauteed), the chicken turned positively tough. Can pounding it cause that to happen? I have at least 10 more chicken breasts from this package from Costco and while I hate to get rid of them I hate to go through the trouble of cooking them and not being able to eat them.

Any thoughts?

[Roxanne 21]

You probably cooked them a bit too long????? If you have a thermometer---catch them as you are cooking to about 160 degrees---they are PERFECT every time! If you cook them too long they do become tough as nails!!! YUCK!!!! IMHO--pounding just makes them more even to get a better spread of the temp over the entire product for a better result.......don't give up!!!!

[cjs]

Trixxee, have you ever brined your chicken before cooking? If done correctly, the chicken will not be salty but wonderfully juicy and tender. I don't think I ever cook any Chix breasts that I buy in large qtys. w/out brining because they will be dry also IMO.

Sorry, I should have included the brine ratio. For every qt. of water, 1/4 cup kosher salt/2 T. Each: br.sugar & granulated sugar

'Pounding' will not cause toughness, but rather breaks down the fibers to aid in tenderness.

[Trixxee]

I haven't tried brining - never needed to! I've been buying the same Kirkland or Foster Farms brand of chicken for 15 years, cooking it the same few methods - probably 5000 chicken breasts in my life and this has just started happening.

It's weird I tell you. I wonder if Kirkland is processing their chicken differently somehow or using a different salt solution. Maybe I'll go back to Foster Farms and see what happens. I have always liked Kirkland because they are individually wrapped and not humungous. I do have some tenderloins in the freezer to use in the meantime.

Thanks for the tips girls!

[Cubangirl]

My family loves my Chicken Francesa recipe which I always make with Costco Chicken Breasts. I divide the breast in half horizontally and pound. The thing I do that may be different is that I soak the breasts in milk with a sprinkling of Penzey's Hungarian paprika for about 10 minutes before dredging in the Parmesan/parsley/breadcrumb mixture. They are always tender. I do this to other chicken dishes that are not going to be coated as well.

[Mare749]

Some good tips here. Like others, I sometimes use the frozen chicken breasts from Costco also. They are very convenient. But, we are finding that more often, we prefer to use fresh meat as much as possible. Guess we're getting picky in our old age.

[Trixxee]

We're going to do thighs tonight just to be safe. 99.9999999% of the chicken I've made has been fine - just weird that twice in two weeks it wasn't.