Good Food for Cheap Bastards, part 3.1

Today’s Topic: Frozen Chicken Breasts

Okay this post turned out to be super long, so I cut it up into three sections. Enjoy!

Frozen chicken, delicious. These are the 10-for-$7.99 bag of chicky popsicles that you can find at any Wal-mart (or Sam’s Club if you happen to be so lucky.) In order to prepare for future nights of chickeny goodness, let’s check through a short list:

The Chicken

Do you have chicken breasts?

Don’t laugh! This is an important first step. The Wal-mart division sells huge bags of frozen, boneless-skinless chicken breasts for about $8. Where they find that many chickens sans bones and skin, I’ll never know but as long as you have freezer space this is the best deal around. A second option is the local grocery store, which will sell cheap boneless thighs or whole chickens that you can clean up and freeze in portions.

How many people are you feeding?

I like to cook and I like to cook for crowds of people. However flexible you may be with having guests over, you’re still going to need to know how much food to cook. In my opinion, it’s always better to overestimate than underestimate. Leftovers are delicious and nobody wants to be the one person eating Ramen for dinner.

Boys or girls?

This is again important in order to estimate the amount of chicken to cook. Most boys will eat a chicken breast by themselves. Most women will eat about half of one. Obviously, you’d scale the amounts based on the people you’re actually feeding but I’ve found this to be an excellent rule of thumb.

Are they thawed?

No? NO? You mean you didn’t know you wanted to cook chicken tonight when you were home yesterday? Shame, shame! Actually, it’s cool bro. To hurriedly thaw chicken (as long as I have a couple hours to spare,) I place the chicken breasts in a bowl of warm water and check on them periodically. Technically, you’re only supposed to use cold running water to thaw anything if you’re following health codes but hell, I’m not a restaurant and I need my food sooner, dammit!

Coming Soon:  Part 3.2, The Marinade