Maybe this is better in Cafe Society. It happens when warming pieces of chicken with bones in, e.g. breasts, thighs, but also with off the bone chicken - boneless breasts, for example. It seems there must be pockets of air or moisture that’s turning to steam, but why just chicken? I confess I’ve never tried to reheat a piece of steak in the microwave, so I don’t know if I’d notice the same thing. Has anyone else experienced this? And what is the cause?
Chicken is typically prepared whole or in sections, but minimally processed either way. Muscle fibers can be very tightly packed. Water turning to steam within the muscle doesn’t necessarily have a clear path to the open air, so it may have to force one. Thus, it pops.
Hmmm. I didn’t realize that muscle has water in it. That would also explain how when cooking a bunch of thighs in a crockpot there’s a lot of liquid that appears after several hours. Live (long enough) and learn.
Chicken also has a lot of oil in it. I have always thought it was just the oil reacting with water.
Any cooked animal parts will do that. Beef, pork, etc. Ground meat not so much.
They may also be plumped up with a saltwater solution. But there’s usually 2-3% water in them as is (as I see in the packaging of various brands.)
Here is an article from the USDA about naturally-occurring water/moisture in raw meat and poultry.
The amount of naturally occurring water, or moisture, present in meat and poultry may surprise consumers (see chart). An eye of round roast is 73% water before cooking. The same roast after roasting contains 65% water. A whole broiler-fryer contains 66% water before cooking and 60% afterwards. Leaner meat and poultry contain more protein and less fat. Since water is a component of protein (but not fat), a leaner cut will contain slightly more water on a per weight basis.
Most chunks of beef or pork are cut against the grain of the muscles, so there’s an easy path for moisture-turning-to-steam to escape. If you have something that isn’t, like a big ham, it’ll pop, too.
Nice find. Most informative. Thanks.