🍗 Boiled chicken breast
Boiled chicken is plain chicken breast gently simmered in salted water with a bay leaf until just cooked through. The meat comes out soft, juicy and mild, ready to slice for salads, rice bowls or sandwiches, or to shred into soups. The cooking water becomes a light broth that can be kept for later.
Diets
Allergens
None of the 14 major allergens in a typical recipe.
What it is made of
Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 chicken breasts (about 400 g), skinless
- 1.5 litres water
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 bay leaves
- 5 black peppercorns (optional)
Method
- Put the chicken in a pot, cover with cold water and add the salt, bay leaves and peppercorns.
- Bring slowly to a gentle simmer, skim off any foam and cook on low heat for 12–15 minutes, without a rolling boil.
- Turn off the heat and leave the chicken in the hot water for 5 minutes; the centre should reach 74 °C.
- Lift out, rest for 5 minutes, then slice or shred. Keep the broth for soup or rice.
How to make it lighter
- Simmering, not boiling hard, keeps the breast juicy without any added fat.
- Weigh the cooked meat for logging: chicken loses about a quarter of its weight as it cooks.
- Add flavour with lemon, garlic, herbs or chilli instead of oily dressings — 1 tbsp oil ≈ 120 kcal.
History
Poaching chicken in water is one of the oldest and simplest ways of cooking poultry and is found in home kitchens all over the world, from Chinese white-cut chicken to the poached chicken of French and Middle Eastern home cooking.
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Values are estimates per 100 g for a typical recipe; home and restaurant versions vary. Diets and allergens are worked out from the ingredients of a typical recipe — always check with whoever cooked the dish. Not medical advice. Nutrition data: Me Nutrition dish database v13. How we count →