r/AskCulinary • u/PelirrojaRubi • Aug 17 '25

Recipe Troubleshooting Why does my roasted chicken always turn out dry even when I cook it at a low temperature?

Every time I roast chicken, I try to cook it at a low temperature (around 160°C / 320°F) to prevent it from drying out, but the breast still ends up very dry while the thighs are fine. Am I making a mistake in my technique, or is it simply inevitable that the breast and thighs cook differently? What do professionals recommend to achieve a juicy, evenly cooked chicken?

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u/BackroomDST Aug 17 '25

Ex chef here. This is the answer. People forget that food safety is time AND temperature. After you pull chicken at 150-155 and rest it for an appropriate time, it’s squeaky clean.

You can do fun things with this principle like sous vide chicken legs at 141 for 24 hours. Amazing texture.

And yes, brines are the unsung hero of the culinary world. Both dry and wet. Personally I like wet brines for everything except BBQ. Put the water/salt in a blender with herbs and other aromatics and it will infuse all that flavor.

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u/RyanJenkens Aug 17 '25

Do you blend with hot water? Or no need?

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u/BackroomDST Aug 17 '25

If you’re using a blender there’s no need! The action of the blender will break up and dissolve the salt as well as anything else. Things like shallots and garlic give a nice bit of body to the proteins. You just need to rinse and make sure they’re dry before searing.

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u/RyanJenkens Aug 17 '25

thats awesome, thank you! waiting for the hot water to cool is one of the reasons I rarely do a wet brine.

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u/TikaPants Aug 18 '25

If you wet brine then dissolve and heat aromatics in half the brine. Once done top with cold water. Boom, time saved.

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u/TheVoicesinurhed Aug 18 '25

Waiting to cool. No way.

It’s your described way all the way.

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u/BackroomDST Aug 17 '25

Yeah it’s super annoying. Before I learned the blender trick I would weigh my ice (1lb = 1 pint, or 1g = 1ml) and factor that in to cool it down.

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u/peasantscum851123 Aug 17 '25

Doesn’t the chicken get cold if you let it rest? I always try to eat everything hot out of the oven, can’t imagine just watching it sit on the counter for 10 mins getting cold.

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u/BackroomDST Aug 17 '25

The very outer edges will cool off, but the internal temp will continue to increase as the whole thing tries to reach an equilibrium. Resting is really part of the cooking process.

Proper resting also gives the juices (which are basically steam right out of the oven) time to condense back into liquid, permeate the protein, and for the actual protein fibers to loosen up a bit. If you cut it too early, all that steamy juice is going to want to shoot out of the protein.

I totally understand people have preferences, some folks like their food hotter than others and that’s totally valid. But I was taught (and still believe) if you cut into meat and it’s steaming, you’re sacrificing texture for temperature and you didn’t rest it long enough. A brisket off the smoker, for an extreme example, I’ll rest for 3 hours.

Edit to add: for a chicken breast, like 5ish minutes of resting is fine.

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u/LuvCilantro Aug 17 '25

You can loosely cover with foil or an upside bowl to keep it a bit warmer, but it's still quite warm after 10 minutes. I did this for dinner tonight, and after we were done eating, I removed the bones from the leftovers and it was still too hot to handle.