Temperature for baking chicken

[jennyema]

i think a good,accurate oven thermometer & the resting time for the meat are the most important factors here.whatever the dial says all ovens vary & it also depends on whether its fan assisted or convection.also depends on whether it's straight from the fridge or room temperature.i always allow meat to come up to room temp before cooking.
i roast whole chicken @ 440f(fan),20 mins/pound,rest for 15 mins/pound.skin is always browned & the meat moist.
but that's just me & my oven!

I use very high heat, too. 450.

Foolproof and delectable.

Kafka's Herb-Roasted Chicken | The Paupered Chef

 

[CharlieD]

Do not forget that the time will also depend on how close to each other pieces of chicken are. You can bake a chicken in a full size tray for an hour, you pack the same chicken and same temp into a small tray and it will come out uncook after the same time. Also it is important to proparly preheat your oven, that will too make a difference in baking time.

 

[Greg Who Cooks]

That's a good point Charlie. Things depend on more than temperature. I roast chicken pieces by covering a cookie sheet with aluminum foil, then place a small wire rack on top, and the chicken pieces on that. The wire rack allows juices to drain off instead of being absorbed by the chicken, but it also allows hot oven air to circulate underneath the chicken pieces, and prevents the pieces from being burned by sticking to the greasy pan. I cook whole chickens by a similar method (different rack, foil covered casserole dish.

I hope everybody on the forum knows to preheat their oven to a steady-state cooking temperature before inserting chicken. Use a independent oven temperature meter ($5 at most stores) to not only know when your oven has reached cooking temperature, but IMO they are more reliable than many oven thermostatic controls.

Some ovens have an indicator they have reached set temperature. Combined with accurate calibration this would be a good oven to have.

 

[Bacardi1]

My oven "beeps" when it reaches the set temperature. In addition, I test it occasionally using an oven thermometer & it's always been 25 degrees hotter. I know it; husband knows it; so since we're the only ones who use it, we've just left it that way & simply adjust the temp accordingly.

 

[GLC]

In a conventional oven, there is no single oven temperature. The typical gas oven has the burner at the bottom. That creates a continuous variation in heat from bottom to top. You can visualize it as three zones, each different by 25F (14C or 1 "gas mark" in the UK), with the hottest at the bottom. If you then break up the pattern by inserting large barriers, like baking sheets, the distribution becomes more complex. Even the three zone view is simplistic and by no means reflects the actual temperature distribution in an empty oven.

Electric ovens may have more distributed heating elements and more complex heat distributions.

And the heat input is controlled according to the temperature at the oven's thermocouple, usually high on the back wall. If the vessels and sheets in the oven divert the flow of heat with regard to the thermocouple, the relationship between the heat at any point and the amount of heat delivered to the burner will change. It seems reasonable that the temperature in a working oven might vary 50F to 100F among oven positions. And of course we are always aware of the front to back difference.

If temperature was really so critical that 25F made a real difference, we would be in trouble. Fortunately that's not enough difference to be fatal. But if we're already wrong about the temperature at the food position by 25F-50F and we further change it by the way we load the oven, we could be very wrong, enough to make a difference. And maybe even the creator or tester of the recipe was wrongly believing in the oven temperature setting. If everything happens to be off in a combination of ways that all shift the actual temperature in the same direction, it would explain a perplexing failure in the recipe.

It's a good exercise for serious cooks to experiment with their ovens, checking the temperature top, bottom, and middle, front and back, and with baking sheets an large vessels in the oven.

 

[Gudtyms]

Try roasting at a higher temp to sear the skin, then dropping your temp to finish cooking. This will lock in you juices and you end result will be better!

 

[Greg Who Cooks]

In a conventional oven, there is no single oven temperature. The typical gas oven has ...

Indeed! And that's why there's convection ovens, which have fans to equalize the heat better. By minimizing hot spots and cold spots food can be cooked more evenly and it also saves energy because food with no cold spots cooks in a shorter amount of time.

Try roasting at a higher temp to sear the skin, then dropping your temp to finish cooking. This will lock in you juices and you end result will be better!

Another good idea. I do that all the time with roasts and turkeys, and I bet many others do too.

 

[CharlieD]

Try roasting at a higher temp to sear the skin, then dropping your temp to finish cooking. This will lock in you juices and you end result will be better!

Urban legend.

 

[Greg Who Cooks]

Roasting at a higher temperature affects how the chicken skin or roast "crust" turns out. Perhaps the sealing in the juices part is myth, I couldn't say.

 

[Andy M.]

Roasting at a higher temperature affects how the chicken skin or roast "crust" turns out. Perhaps the sealing in the juices part is myth, I couldn't say.

I think that's it.

 

[kitchengoddess8]

This is my go-to recipe for baked/roasted chicken: Crispy Baked Chicken Leg Quarters. It works equally well with bone-in breasts. I use whatever seasoning mix I feel like - dried herbs or herb blends, garlic powder, onion powder, seasoned salt, etc.

It's the salt in the soy sauce that helps the skin dry and crisp and seasons the meat like a brine would. It doesn't taste like soy sauce, though. Really delicious. I also use the thermometer probe that came with my oven to let me know when it's done. It usually takes about an hour, rather than an hour and 15 minutes. YMMV.

Thanks for the recipe. Unfortunately soy is a no-no for me health-wise, so I would need to find a substitute. Any ideas?

 

[Greg Who Cooks]

Thanks for the recipe. Unfortunately soy is a no-no for me health-wise, so I would need to find a substitute. Any ideas?

Say why soy is a problem and I'm sure there's a substitute. For example, is it soy protein? Is it the salt? (Different substitute depending on which it is.)

 

[Andy M.]

Is it the wheat?

 

[kitchengoddess8]

Say why soy is a problem and I'm sure there's a substitute. For example, is it soy protein? Is it the salt? (Different substitute depending on which it is.)

Yes, I'm on a medical diet that prohibits soy protein, gluten, and dairy.

 

[Andy M.]

Yes, I'm on a medical diet that prohibits soy protein, gluten, and dairy.

Thank pretty much rules out all soy sauces.

 

[kitchengoddess8]

Is it the wheat?

Can't have anything with gluten or soy, so it's both I guess.

 

[kitchengoddess8]

Thank pretty much rules out all soy sauces.

I know...what a bummer!

 

[GotGarlic]

That's a good point Charlie. Things depend on more than temperature. I roast chicken pieces by covering a cookie sheet with aluminum foil, then place a small wire rack on top, and the chicken pieces on that. The wire rack allows juices to drain off instead of being absorbed by the chicken, but it also allows hot oven air to circulate underneath the chicken pieces, and prevents the pieces from being burned by sticking to the greasy pan. I cook whole chickens by a similar method (different rack, foil covered casserole dish.

I've roasted chicken with and without the rack. The chicken fat is rendered and stays in the pan - it is not absorbed by the chicken. And it doesn't burn. So in my experience, the rack is just an extra item to clean and doesn't provide any benefit.

As for a substitute for soy sauce, fish sauce might work. I'm not very familiar with soy- and gluten-free diets, though, since it's not an issue for me.

 

[Greg Who Cooks]

Yes, I'm on a medical diet that prohibits soy protein, gluten, and dairy.

Gotcha!

Use Asian fish sauce. It's got saltiness, taste dimensions, no soy, no gluten, no dairy. (But you should check the ingredients just to make sure.)

I've roasted chicken with and without the rack. The chicken fat is rendered and stays in the pan - it is not absorbed by the chicken. And it doesn't burn. So in my experience, the rack is just an extra item to clean and doesn't provide any benefit.

As for a substitute for soy sauce, fish sauce might work. I'm not very familiar with soy- and gluten-free diets, though, since it's not an issue for me.

Whenever I roast chicken pieces without the rack they simmer in the grease and burn, and get all greasy.

And I too had fish sauce in mind when KG posted a problem with soy sauce, if it was the soy protein.

I use fish sauce (nam pla) a lot. It's like an Asian liquid seasoned salt. Very good in many applications including dipping sauces.

 

[kitchengoddess8]

What is in Asian fish sauce?