Door Allise Jackson
Whether you're cooking at home, eating out at a fancy restaurant, or picking up something at the local drive-thru, chances are you've encountered tough, rubbery, or even chewy chicken at some point. Why does this happen and what can we do to prevent it?
Generally there are two ways to cook; dry heat or moist heat. Dry heat is more conventional through baking or grilling, while moist heat uses water or water-based cooking liquid through a slow cooker (Crockpot) or pressure cooker (InstantPot).
Although our frozen dishes are flexible enough for dry heat, the meals are primarily intended for slow cookers. This is so that the meat can be easily shredded and mixed with the sauce. Plus, the “set it and forget it” aspect of slow cooking is extremely convenient!
Slow cooking is ideal for certain cuts of meat that have a lot of connective tissue and can be tougher (beef, pork and chicken). The cooking process turns the connective tissue into a gelatin, making it easy to tear or "tender" the meat. Compared to beef and pork, chicken breast has little connective tissue; meaning that the cooking time required is not long enough to soften the connective tissue. In addition, chicken breast contains less fat and can become dry (tough or rubbery) if cooked for too long. Without moisture, the protein fibers in the chicken become elastic.
Each meal comes with a set of instructions to help you prepare the meals. That said, it is extremely important to understand your slow cooker because there are many variables (brand, size, age, etc.) that can affect the outcome of your meal.
Tips to prevent the chicken from overcooking:
1) Get to know your crock pot
If you haven't already, I encourage you to follow our Instagram page and check out our stories as we often try to teach you the best practices for preparing our meals. In most stories I mention that my Crockpot cooks hot, so I adjust the cooking time by 30-60 minutes depending on the meal.
It's worth taking the time to understand your slow cooker and adjust it as necessary. In an earlier post I give5 tips to get to know your Slow Cookerit would be worth reading.
2) Use the correct size Crockpot
Aside from accidentally overcooking meals, the most common cause of tough, rubbery, or overcooked chicken is customers using an oversized Crockpot.
All our meals come with a recommended slow cooker size. This is important to note because cooking in a larger or smaller shallow cooker than recommended can affect cooking results.
Compare this to baking brownies: if the recipes call for an 8" x 8" pan, but you only have a 9" x 12" pan, you will need to adjust the cooking time as the extra surface area will make the brownies cook much faster are then indicated.
The same goes for slow cookers. If the recipe calls for a 3-quart slow cooker but cooks in a 6-quart slow cooker, adjust the extra surface area or the meal may overcook.
3) Experiment with cooking times
I recommend that you pay close attention to cooking times and how meals are going throughout the month. Adjust meal to meal as necessary, and over time you will know exactly how long to cook a meal in your slow cooker.
4) Follow our social accounts for more cooking tips and tricks
Follow us on Instagram@bikubemeland Facebook onfacebook.com/beehivemealsto see our stories for more tips and tricks on preparing our meals. We often present different meals so that customers can see how it goes.
