Defatting cooked chicken

Cafe Society
1

My local grocery store (A Jewel in Milwaukee) has the most wonderful deal. They sell the rotisserie chickens that are now common in most grocery stores. They’re about $6 each, fresh off the spike. The deal part is that once they’re a few hours old, they dramatically mark them down and put them on ice. The new, cold price is $1.29/lb for a fully cooked and seasoned whole chicken. I’ve bought a few now and none exceeded $3!.

The problem is that the chicken is cooked with the skin and fat intact. Getting the skin off isn’t too bad but the fat is everywhere on the thing. It melts into every nook and cranny during roasting and then ‘hardens’ into that slick goo that’s super hard to get out.

I thought of maybe pulling the skin off and putting the whole thing in a glass baking pan and putting it in the oven at a somewhat low temp and spooning out the fat as it melts off. Does this seem like it would work? How hot should I set the oven for? I don’t want to re-cook (dry out) the bird so I’m guessing there’s some time-to-heat ratio I need to hit. Any guesses on where to start? The chickens are generally about 2 lbs and the package says that “less than 2% oil added as a cooking aid” so its mostly the bird’s own fat. It would be nice to do this a piece or two at a time but I think it would work better as a whole bird.

Thanks in advance!
I’ve got chicken salad waiting,
jngl

2

Dang, I love those chickens.

I wouldn’t reheat it. Seems like if it got hot enough to re-melt the fat, it’ll be dry.

I’d just remove the fat you can see – maybe even by rinsing it under hot water.

Better yet – can you just cut out other fat, from something else?

Those chickens are so good. I’ve never had one sit around long enough to get cold, so I haven’t had the problem. And they’re only $4 here. :slight_smile:

Sorry not to be more help.

3

You could always poach it, so that the fat rises to the top, and then cool it and skim it off. Bonus: you get broth, too, as well as the meat for salad, and nothing gets dried out.

4

poaching removes flavor though, i recommend carving up the bird and then boiling it in a pot of gravy and making open faced sandwiches. this is what i always do with left over chicken.