Welcome to I Love to Cook

Cooking is something I have always enjoyed. I learned to cook at the apron strings of my mother and grandmother. The experience of cooking brings me both pleasure and peace of mind.







Thursday, November 4, 2010

Buying boneless/skinless vs do it your self deboning/skinning

I normally buy the boneless/skinless breast of chicken.  The other day I thought why am I paying so much for someone else to prep the chicken.  I bought a large package of breast and proceeded to skin and debone.  Surprisingly it was a breeze.  First I just pulled the skin off the meat.  Then I took a knife and started following the bone and quickly had the boneless/skinless breat in hand.  I do have a good deboning knife and that did make the job easy but any good thin blade (recommend at least 6"+ long) will do.

To add to the advantage of self prepping I took the bones which still had some meat and the skin, placed them in a pot with water & an onion.  I boiled everything slowly for a couple of hours.  We needed to get some other things done so I separated the broth from the bones and skin, placed the broth in a sealed container in the refrigerator, and let it stand for a couple of days.  When I came back to the stock the fat had separated and was easily removed from the lid and the top of the stock.  This stock was great, it did need seasoning - alot of salt but it was more flavorful than any recently purchased chicken broth, even my favorite Wolfgang Puck.

NOTE: Cleaning poultry requires good cleaning practices.  A quick and easy way to disinfect is to mix a few capfuls of bleach in warm water and have it ready.  After all the prep is complete wash the cutting board, knife, and general area with soap and hot water.  Then rinse/wipe with the bleach solution & follow with a clean water wipe/rinse.  Quick, easy, and no salmonella!  Chef John showed me how they kept a warm sink of bleach and water so they could quickly dis-infect their knives and utensils as they went along.

1 comment:

  1. I think I will start doing this, thanks for the tip. I will let you know how it goes!

    ReplyDelete