| 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 |
| 1 | 103 | 205 | 308 | 410 |
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The amount of moisture loss has implication on serving size, too. A roasted
chicken, that lost a third of its weight as moisture is more concentrated meat than
a juicier fried chicken that lost quarter of its weight. Thus, a four-ounce serving of
the two are not the same size servings. You give more meat in a serving of the
roasted chicken than in fried chicken.
Rubber chicken
What about the famous rubber chicken, the staple at large banquets? Could it be a
different poultry species altogether? Are only large hotels and banquet halls allowed to purchase
these birds from special rubber chicken farms? Actually, you can make rubber chicken yourself
at home for a fraction of the cost. Follow these steps carefully, as those banquet halls do.
Buy a regular frozen broiler and bring it home. Instead of defrosting it in the refrigerator
over a day or two, place it in a large bowl and run cold water over it to defrost as fast as possible.
This guarantees the most moisture loss. Then roast it, whether whole or in serving-size pieces, in
a hot oven. Continue to cook beyond the well-done stage until the internal temperature measures
at least 175°F (80°C). Remove from the oven and let sit on the counter for 40 to 50 minutes until
lukewarm. Then serve. For extra dryness, you can return the already-overcooked chicken to the
oven for 20 minutes to reheat it just before putting it on the table. I guarantee the result will
resemble rubber.
Hotels and caterers in large banquet halls regularly produce rubber chicken. No matter
how large the kitchen in these facilities, it is not large enough to allow 200 or 300 birds to defrost
slowly for days under refrigeration, which is the ideal way to do it. The uncertain timing of
banquet speakers makes it impossible to serve the food right out of the oven the first time. They
cannot risk the speaker quitting early and having the guests sitting around talking to each other
waiting for the next course, so food service folks are forced to have it ready long before they can
serve it. Most red meats hold well under such conditions, but not chicken and seafood. Next time
you are in charge of the banquet food, choose something in a sauce. It may not be as elegant but
it holds much better.
Moist cooking
The second major method of cooking poultry is in liquid. Obviously, when cooking in
simmering liquid the temperature of the poultry cannot rise above the boiling point of water.
These are slow-cooking techniques that can give just as intense flavors as dry cooking. The
drawback of moist cooking is that the important browning reaction, which produces that fabulous
roasting aroma and flavor, is missing.
But there is a solution. To remedy the problem, most moist cooking recipes instruct you
to brown the chicken in fat first, then add the liquid and continue to slowly stew or braise. These
recipes combine the advantages of dry and moist cooking, producing great flavor and tender
meat. But this takes extra work. Some cooks skip the meat-browning part, not realizing that what
they save in time, they lose in flavor.
I conducted a series of controlled kitchen tests to determine whether browning chicken is
worth the time and effort it takes. I prepared the same stew-style recipe in two batches, browning
the chicken in the first and not browning it in the second. Otherwise ingredients and cooking
techniques were identical (even adding the same amount of extra oil to the unbrowned chicken
play © erdosh 83
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