chicken breast

The lean, mild-flavored meat from the chicken's breast; cooks quickly and dries out easily if overcooked, since it has very little fat to buffer against heat. Bone-in, skin-on breasts cook more slowly and stay juicier than boneless, skinless ones, which are more convenient but far less forgiving of a few extra minutes on the heat.

Buying guidance

Choose packages that are cold and tightly sealed with little excess liquid pooling inside, a sign of poor storage or a package nearing its date. For a juicier result with more margin for error, bone-in, skin-on breasts are more forgiving than boneless, skinless cutlets, which go from done to dry within a couple of minutes.

Substitutions

Boneless, skinless chicken thighs -- use about the same weight; more forgiving of overcooking and noticeably juicier, with a slightly richer flavor.
Bone-in, skin-on chicken breast -- juicier and more flavorful than boneless, but needs a longer cooking time.
Turkey breast cutlets -- similarly lean and mild; cooks a little faster since it's usually sliced thinner.

Tips & common mistakes

Breasts are naturally thicker at one end than the other, so pounding them to an even thickness before cooking keeps the thin end from drying out while the thick end catches up -- without that step, one end is often overdone by the time the other is safely cooked through. Being so low in fat, it also benefits more from a brief salt or brine beforehand than fattier cuts do, since there's little fat to buffer against moisture loss.

Storage

Being thin with more surface exposed, boneless skinless breast tends to be the fastest of the common chicken cuts to lose quality, so treat its short refrigerator window as a firm limit rather than a rough guide. Frozen, it's also more prone to visible freezer burn than fattier cuts, since there's less fat to buffer moisture loss.

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