I sliced up an onion, red bell pepper and a clove of garlic and added them to a medium high cast iron skillet with olive oil.
After a few minutes, I added 3 cubed chicken breasts and reduced heat to medium.
After about 5 minutes, the skillet was full of juice and the chicken had a rubbery texture.
Can I salvage this?
I added about a cup of water and reduced the heat to a high simmer. I also added a little onion soup mix.
My hope is that the chicken will become tender if I let it simmer long enough (30 minutes?). Or am I just wasting my time, or even making things worse?
Too hot, too fast. Your chicken proteins are tight little rubbery balls of angst, squeezing all the moisture (water, flavor) out of the chicken. You can try adding a little wine, but sadly, the chicken is toast. Your best bet at this point is to make the rest of the dish interesting enough that you don’t care that the chicken is overcooked.
There’s not enough collagen in chicken breast to render it tender with a long simmer, sorry.
If you have the gumption, you can fish out the chicken pieces, chop 'em into little bits, and throw 'em back into the pot (maybe drain some of the broth first) with some chili peppers, tomatoes, chili powder and cumin…make chili out of it. That’s what I do when I’m too poor and stubborn to toss ruined meat. It won’t make the chicken tender, but it will make you not notice it as much.
It actually came out ok. The chicken tastes really good, and I cubed them small enough that being rubbery isn’t so bad. Also, the cayenne pepper I added is burning my mouth so much that I’m finding it hard to discern texture :).
The rice is REALLY good! I added some of the fresh onion, pepper and garlic to it while it cooked. Yum!
Glad it worked out! I hate throwing food out, so if something doesn’t work I often eat it anyway with a scrunched up face. Luckily that hasn’t happened in a long time!
Next time, try the opposite order of what you put in the pan. The chicken takes longest to cook, so should be browned ahead of time, either in a different pan, or first in the same pan. I would sear it first, get some browning going in the olive oil with salt and pepper. Once the cubes have got some brown on, then lower heat to medium and add the garlic and veggies. If any liquids release, it’s ok, and just keep going until they cook off. As soon as they are, the dish is done.
Make sure the chicken you buy isn’t pumped up with extra liquid; a lot of it is. That makes it near impossible to brown them because they’re so waterlogged.
