How to Buy Fresh and Delicious Native Chicken
To have a delicious boiled chicken dish, the first important step is to choose the chicken.
Native chickens that have been slaughtered usually have small and firm bodies, narrow breasts, and deep yellow skin in the breast area. Meanwhile, super egg chickens have either pale white or yellow skin throughout their bodies.
Usually, if you have time, you should choose to buy the chicken and cook it at home so that the meat will be more fragrant, delicious, and sweet. But if you don’t have the opportunity, the following steps will help you differentiate between native chickens and super egg chickens.
For pre-slaughtered chickens
The skin of native chickens should be pale yellow and only have a deep yellow color in certain areas such as the breast, wings, and back. Pre-slaughtered native chickens usually have small and firm bodies with narrow breasts. Super egg chickens are very similar to native chickens, so it is important to differentiate between them.
The skin of native chickens should be pale yellow and only have a deep yellow color in certain areas such as the breast, wings, and back, while super egg chickens have either completely white or yellow skin (which may be due to the use of harmful coloring agents). To determine whether the chicken has been dyed or not, observe the chicken’s skin. If the skin is yellow and the layer of fat inside is white, then the chicken has been dyed with chemicals.
The skin of native chickens should be thin, smooth, and highly elastic. Choose chicken meat that looks fresh, without any foul or antibiotic odor. There should be no bruises or blood clots on the skin. To buy delicious chicken, avoid choosing dark-colored chickens as they have already died before being cooked.
In addition, to avoid buying water-injected chicken, pay attention and use your hands to press the suspected areas where water might have been injected (mainly the thighs and back) to check. If it feels soft, slippery, or deformed, it is best to avoid it and not buy it. Injected water in chickens is often mixed with additives (according to some shop owners).
Live chickens
You should choose cocks with bright red combs, and their eyes should be alert. The chickens should look healthy and agile. The rooster’s comb should be bright red, and its eyes should be alert, not dull. The feathers should be shiny and close to the body. The beak should be sharp, and there should be no liquid flowing from it. The legs should be straight and slender, and the skin and claws should be evenly yellow and shiny.
When examining the feathers, you should see that the chicken’s skin is thin, soft, and shiny. There should be some large yellow streaks under the breast and wings. Through the skin, you can see the meat and blood vessels in the armpit and under the wings because there is no fat in the skin.
Note: Avoid buying chickens with pale or bruised combs, droopy posture, watery beak, stiff tail, dull eyes, sagging wings, tired appearance, and the head always drooping down. The skin of these chickens is usually wrinkled, the body is thin, the breastbone is exposed, the feathers are rough, the legs are cold and dry, the anus is pale or red, there is water leakage or sticky feces around it. These are signs of diseased chickens.
Choosing a chicken boiling pot
The next secret to preparing delicious, non-cracked, and shiny-boiled chicken is to choose a pot with a deep bottom that is proportionate to the chicken. Typically, if the chicken weighs 1.5kg – 1.8kg, you should choose a pot with a diameter of 28cm, which is just right. If the pot is too small, the chicken meat will not cook evenly, and if the pot is too big, the chicken will shrink during the cooking process.
The steps to cook delicious, crispy, non-cracked boiled chicken
After the chicken is plucked, cleaned, and kept whole, rub salt on it and wash it thoroughly inside and out. Then, place it in a strainer to drain the water.
Take 3 cleaned stalks of green onions, and you can keep the roots if you want, wash them, and then tie them together neatly.
Put the chicken in the pot, pour in water until it reaches the rim of the pot, then add green onions, crushed ginger, and half a teaspoon of salt to the chicken boiling pot.
When boiling the chicken, it is important to put the chicken in cold water so that the meat cooks evenly from the outside to the inside. If you wait until the water is boiling to put the chicken in, not only will the meat not cook evenly, but the chicken skin will also crack, making the chicken less attractive.
Once the water in the chicken boiling pot is boiling, reduce the heat to low because if the heat is too high, the thigh meat will shrink, making the boiled chicken look unappetizing. After boiling the chicken for 5 minutes, turn down the heat to the lowest setting and let it cook for another 5 minutes, then turn off the stove. Note that during this cooking stage, do not cover the pot.
After about 10 minutes, turn off the heat and cover the pot for another 20 minutes to ensure that the chicken is evenly cooked. The duration may vary depending on the size of the chicken, so adjust the cooking time accordingly. If the chicken is too large, boil it on the stove for an additional 5 – 20 minutes. If the chicken is small, reduce the cooking time by 5 minutes.
To check if the chicken is cooked, simply use a chopstick to pierce through the chicken meat. If the chopstick goes through easily and the juices are clear, the chicken is cooked.
After the allotted cooking time, remove the chicken from the pot and place it in a large bowl. Add ice cubes and wait for the chicken to cool completely, then remove it and let it drain. This method will help the chicken meat become firm and tender, while also giving it a fresh and appetizing appearance.
Source: Xe và Thể thao
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