chicken breast water content: massive diffeerences

[greensoup]

lazy me, i always bake my chicken breast with nothing added. sometimes i see tons of water after baking and this last batch i saw almost NONE. didn't think anything of it.

then i ate it. omg stringy rubber deluxe. usually i could just break the breast apart wiith a spoon but this one was VERY resilient. had to use tons of force to just break the fibers to get a small chunk to eat (knife = another thing to wash and another hand to use, fk it)

i think i had 2.7-3.0lb from the package of raw chicken breast.

after eating all of it, it was about 1200g weighed after cooking. 1200/454= 2.64lb

seems like this was almost all breast low water, mostly meat. bang for buck.


now question is why does breast vary so much in water content? do companies inject them with water?
has anyone else experienced this> interesting observation imo

[mentalflex]

Check the back of the package, many companies inject the chicken with a water/sodium solution to keep the plump and moist.

Was this the case with you chicken? What brand was it? What brand do you normally buy?

[greensoup]

this was an albertson's brand i think. get it from the grocery store albertson's. i just check my grocery ads and see whatever is under 2$/lb that wk and go there :P

what do they say when they inject? "Water added!"?

[mentalflex]

this was an albertson's brand i think. get it from the grocery store albertson's. i just check my grocery ads and see whatever is under 2$/lb that wk and go there :P

what do they say when they inject? "Water added!"?

No I'll depend on the brand but it is usually like a broth/sodium mix. I've seen it on some Tyson's products... If you are interested, look up "plumping chicken" but here is some info

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jan/04/opinion/la-ed-chicken4-2010jan04

http://notinmyfood.org/posts/2839-what-are-they-pumping-into-your-chicken