Why I Undercook My Poultry

The title is partially clickbait: I only undercook the white meat. Because dark meat is full of fat and connective tissue, it needs to be very well cooked to get a nice texture. White meat doesn't have that, so it's very prone to drying out if you overcook it. I'm sure everybody knows what it's like to eat a chicken breast that's dry and stringy, which is just an awful experience. The problem is that people get very scared around chicken, so they cook it for a ridiculous amount of time instead of using a meat thermometer to make sure the chicken reached a safe temperature. Officially, the safe internal temperature for chicken is 165 F, which is what most recipes tell you to aim for. The problem is that even this is slightly overcooking the chicken, leading to a meal that's not bad but kind of just meh. Believe it or not, this is by design. The government's goal is to find a foolproof temperature to recommend to people, not to help people actually make tasty chicken. That means they can and do recommend cooking temperatures that are higher than required to make sure nobody messes up, at the cost of us actually enjoying dinner. Also, unless you're cooking your chicken with sous vide, the outside of your chicken will be hotter than the inside, so the chicken will be hotter than the recommended internal temperature when you actually eat.

According to studies posted by the Food Safety And Inspection Service of USDA, poultry instantly achieves a 7-log10 relative reduction in Salmonella for all levels of fat when the meat reaches an internal temperature of 163 F. Since chicken breasts are lean, you can get an instant 7-log10 relative reduction with 162 F. The thing is, why do you want an instant reduction? Cooking to a lower temperature and maintaining it gives you the exact same safety without compromising on quality. Is it really a big deal to pull your chicken out at 160 F (a full 5 degrees below the recommended amount of time) and wait 17 seconds at the absolute most? What about at 155 F and waiting a single minute? Unless you eat your meat straight out of the oven, you're probably already waiting that long. Besides, you're supposed to rest your meat for at least 10 minutes to let the juices redistribute. Like I said before, the outside of the chicken is hotter than the inside, so the internal temperature won't drop while it rests on your counter. You can easily "undercook" your poultry by a full 20 degrees as long as you patiently rest your meat (although if you try this with a smaller chicken, you should tent the meat to keep it from cooling off too fast and constantly check the temperature to make sure it doesn't fall until you know the meat is safe). For literally 0 risk, I get chicken breasts that are so juicy and tender, you'd almost want to cry thinking about all the dry and stringy chicken breasts you used to be content with.