Lately we seem to be getting tough chicken breasts. They tend to be larger and give an audible sound like sawing when cutting it raw. You can physically feel the muscle fibers are hard and the meat when cooked is so tough that it is nearly unchewable. And the taste is off.
Anyone else experience this? Anyone know what causes it?
It seems to happen at random for us. I have a vague notion that it’s correlated to the colour of the (skinned) breast when raw (beige-pink is tender, darker pink is tough), but I haven’t tested it systematically. And I have no idea of the underlying cause.
I’ve noticed that too. The grayer and larger it is, the more likely it is tough. We switched brands because with Red Bird it seems to be about 25% of the breasts.
That is what the boneless chicken breast was like the last time I bought some at walmart.
Never had the same problem from my other local grocers (Hannaford and Market Basket).
We tried soaking in water with baking soda. Sometimes it works, that makes me thing the relative tenderness of the chicken varies.
Not that OP was asking for a fix, but I wonder if brining would help. It’s supposed to both break down the tissues a little bit, and retain moisture during cooking better than no brining.
I haven’t noticed this problem, as a consumer of food in our house, but I’m not the cook, so I don’t know what may have been done to disguise or improve any toughness before the chicken breast got onto my fork.
I’ve definitely had this problem buying overly large chicken breasts on sale at one of my local grocery stores. Not branded. Against my better judgement, I’ve two or three times bought these cuts, always gray and, as you describe, just looking and feeling tough, and no matter how I prepare it (brine:, or cut into strips treated with baking soda for stir fry), they turn out awful and I give it to the dog, who doesn’t seem to mind. I’m 100% sure it’s the raw material and not the cook.
They’re called “woody breasts.” I got one in an order of take-out chicken a couple of years ago. The tough part was about the size and texture of a hockey puck. I gave it to my dog and found it barfed up on the floor shortly thereafter.
Fascinating link. That’s interesting, because it also says it’s a pretty new problem, within the last decade. That aligns with when I’ve been noticing it.
I’ve noticed it, too. It seems to mostly be the bigger chicken breasts that are so tough - and dry, too. So I try to buy whole chickens, picking out the smallest ones in the butcher case, and cut them up myself. The breasts are small, but they’re always tender and juicy. Some fancier brands sell what you can see are smaller breasts, and those are also a good choice. But they’re spendier.
I think the bigger ones come off of what would technically be a “roasting chicken”, i.e., a more mature bird.
I agree about buying a whole chicken and getting better pieces because they’re smaller. It helped when I figured out how to cut it up using a modified splatchcock method of removing the backbone first.
And what’s the deal with raw chicken breasts getting bigger while at the same time their cooked rotisserie chickens keep getting smaller (while the prices keep going up)?
When you’re selling per pound, vs per unit, gigantic breasts (which are further pumped up with saline for most “store” brands) lets you sell more $$$ worth especially since the smallest packs are normally 2+ breasts. And don’t get me started with the ‘value’ packs of 4-6 'zilla-chicken breasts.
Per unit? The cheapest, smallest, least well grown bird will do.
It’s all about the money.
And yeah, I’ve been seeing the “woody” chicken breasts ever more frequently at my local Kroger. In general, my chances to get one in decreasing order: Store Brand Chicken, Store Brand Organic/Natural Chicken, Red-Bird chicken - Perdue Chicken are tied as least likely.
It just makes me more likely to buy boneless thighs, although that tends to be more likely (especially the store brands) to have missed bits of gristle / bone from the trimmed thighs. So I always take an extra bit of time with them to manually check.
We went through a run of getting these in 2020. It was really awful, but supply lines were so messed up we were just grateful to have chicken. It got to the point that I just marinated all the chicken I cooked, without exception.
We also had one that was green when I cut into it. It’s called Green Muscle Disease, a very interesting, but also heartbreaking, result of overbreeding for large breasts.
We haven’t run into any quality problems for several months though, knock wood.