How much salt does it take to add a significant amount of time to the shelf life of fresh chicken? Unsalted chicken thighs have about 80 mg of sodium per four ounces of meat. Many stores sell chicken “enhanced with up to 15 percent” of a broth which raises the sodium content to 280-320 mg of sodium per four ounces of meat. That’s enough extra for concern if one’s on a low sodium diet, but it’s nowhere near lunch meat values (one variety of Oscar Mayer bologna has 960 mg per four ounces). Is the amount in the “enhanced” chicken really enough to make a difference in refrigerated poultry?
Old thread about enhanced chicken
That thread doesn’t address the shelf life. A lot of people complain that it unnecessarily increases people’s salt intake. I don’t think manufacturers would do it if it shortened the shelf life, so any significant change would have to be to lengthen it. It also adds binders to keep what is mostly water from just draining out of the chicken.
It would have to lengthen the shelf life by at least 24 hours to make any real difference, and I don’t know if it has any effect at all. It’s already difficult enough to know how long to hold a chicken from the grocery, you have no idea how it was handled there, by the producer, or what temperature it’s been kept at in the time since the chicken met it’s demise. However, in general, brining extends the life of raw meat.
It’s not about shelf life, it’s about increasing weight and keeping the meat ‘juicy’ during cooking. It also improves the flavor of the finished product.
I once worked for a company that sold machines to meat packers. One such was designed to inject enzymes into the meat which had multiple advantages for the user (not for the consumer).
The enzymes added up to 10% to the weight and made stringy, tough meat tender and juicy.