Go to the Recipe: Whole Poached Chicken
Nice recipe. Is the trussing purely cosmetical? And if you're not carving at the table, and serving it in pieces, wouldn't it be better to cut the bird into pieces before cooking, and reduce the amount of stock, either boil in reduced stock/demi glace for a concentrated result or just add an amount which yields enough sauce after cooking, without reducing.
Hi Jørgen — In this recipe the trussing only helps hold the bird in a shape during cooking that we think looks appealing if the whole bird is presented on a platter with the garnish of vegetables.As with most recipes, there are often several ways to get to a particular result. Your approach would absolutely work. Our idea for this recipe was to offer a simple poached chicken dish that could be adapted and finished in a few different ways depending on how you wanted to serve the meal.By the way, if you prepare a poached chicken dish in the way you propose, we'd love to know how it comes out on our forum.
Why no options for crisping up the skin?
We wanted to do something a bit different, but if you want crisp skin, you might try a cryo-roasting technique. Take the whole bird when it's been cooked and is hot and put it into your freezer for 20 minutes (yes, I know this sounds weird) and, in the meantime, heat your oven up to the highest setting (use a forced convection if you can). Take the chicken and put it straight into the super-hot oven until the skin is crisp (4 to 6 minutes would be about right). This should give you crisp skin without overcooking too much of the interior.
Very nice. My freezer is a -4 F right now. Will that affect it?
Oh, and what about doing a whole duck? Eh?
The colder the better.
If one were to scale the recipe to use Cornish Game hens, would one keep the timing the same or due to to their size scale the time based on their thickness?
Yes, the cooking time could be shortened significantly. Depending on the size of the bird, two to three hours should be plenty.
Hi chris, I love the plate you guys use for presentation of the chicken dish ( portion ) where can I buy them, many thanks.
CB2
Hi, what size is this large vacuum bag used for this recipe? Thanks.
Hi guys, I work in a Hotel in Switzerland, and right at the Moment we put a " Perigord Truffe Poulet de Bresse en cocotte" in two courses, prepared your Style on the menu. We have great results preparing a few birds in advance, shocking them in ice water and reheat them Sous vide. My questian is how long can we keep them. We have the Information something pasteurized at 65°C keeps 3 weeks at 2°C in the fridge without a dangerous amount of bacterias. Whats your professional answer? Really Important beacause we don't sell the Poulet everyday. Thank you, best Regards
Stefan — Unfortunately, I have no idea what the legal rules are in Switzerland. From a food safety perspective, the maximum holding time should really be governed by the refrigeration temperature. Personally, I would have no trouble with cooked at 65 °C (and held at that temperature long enough to pasteurize) and then held at 2 °C for 3 weeks. But the holding time is subject to local laws, so you would need to check with the health department. Sorry I can't give you a better answer.
Thanks for the quick answer, I really appreciate this. In a few weeks we will get a visit from an authorized Food inspector, then giving him a whole bird in SV bag for laboratory. I will respond. Regards Stefan
Is it necessary to chill the stock completely before adding it to the bag?
No it is not completely necessary. Although it does make it much easier to seal the bag when it is cooled. The reason being that the warm chicken stock will boil much more readily than cold, increasing your chances of making a mess in your chamber sealer.
What an interesting method. I think this would be a fantastic way to make hainanese chicken!
This is a great family recipe! Did it today. Only 2 adults, 2 toddlers, so I used a combination of mushroom and vegetable stocks to use in the soup in an effort to break up the courses a little. I also brined and blanched the chicken prior to poaching. The recipe is even easier than the roasted recipe as you don't need to keep an eye on a timer/temp. Also finished using @Chris' suggestion by putting it in the freezer for ~20min before putting it under the broiler (forgot to coat with oil though-oops). Regardless, turned out great!
Speaking strictly with regards to safety and pasteurizing. I was under the impression that there are size limitations on what can be sous vide (per Douglas Baldwin) because the center of the ingredient (fish/chicken/meat) is held in the danger zone for too long. Does the liquid help avoid this issue? Or can you Sous Vide a while bird with just aromatics?
The hair on the chicken is clearly visible- a common problems I have with whole kitchens, wings, legs etc. Any idea how to remove the tiny hairs quickly?
Use a blow torch to quickly burn away the hair.
So as an example taken from USDA research, achieving a state where food is safe to eat will depend on the time held at a given temperature to achieve bacterial lethality. This is a chart outlining temperature held at a variety of times that achieve salmonella lethality. According to the research, seems like we can achieve can get a safe bird as long as we cook it long enough...
**Please note these specific times won't exactly apply for our Sous Vide techniques because our Sous Vide water bath times will vary quite greatly depending of the size of meat we are working with (since it may take longer to just get the internal temp to desired temp).
Warning PDF from the USDA: Time Temperature Tables for Cooking Ready to Eat Poultry Products
My favorite method of cooking a whole chicken is a Ballotine de Poulet the way the great Jacques Pepin taught it. Can anyone recommend sous-vide cooking times/temps for a whole chicken that has been de-boned, stuffed and rolled? Thank you in advance!
do you have a recipe using this technique to make cantonese soy sauce chicken?
Hi, if I were to poach the whole chicken without the stock in the bag would it still be delicious and cooked properly? Maybe just adding like some butter? Or is the stock really needed?
Does anyone know where I can but those stack-able sieves that they're using to strain the stock in this video?
I live in the UK, but I guess I'm looking to see if they go by a specific name.
Straining large quantities of stock always ends up being a nightmare for me using my usual chinois.
Kind regards,
John
They're called test sieves in a lab, and generally called Tamis in cuisine. If you're looking to get one, the consensus seems to be that a # 60 mesh is optimal for most uses. Finer than that is mostly used for liquids.
hello - I was hoping to try the poach chicken in bag recipe but can't find ziplock bags big enough - what would you suggest I use?
thanks very much in advance
jamie
I just made this today. It was delicious! I do think, however, that there was not enough sides in the bag. Next time I'll add more of all the vegetables. The broth turned out great even though I substituted rather cheap buillon cubes. I used my blowtorch to try to crisp up the skin before serving it family style. It looked delicious, but the skin didn't crisp. Didn't matter too much, though.
Do any of you know if there's anything I can do to avoid the unpleasant red color of the meat close to the bones?
Hello guys! Can you please tell me the vacuum sealer used for this chicken? or suggestions on chamber vacuum sealers? I'm looking to buy one for various purposes, I have in mind a table top sealer. Thank you!!
Onething i wanna share from my experience, there shall be a big blood vessel in the leg, inside thigh and you will often experience it bleeding as you bite even after 6 hrs of sous vide cooking. If you don't mind it, that's fine but i found it very unpleasant for myself and others. Just for my PERSONAL recommandation, make a deep cut from inner side of thigh all the way to the bone. Make sure the cut is deep and long enough or make the cut before you sous vide it and wash out the blood with milk or any liquid you prefer.
Sorry my English might be poor but wish you got my point.
My recommandation is, because of chamber style vacuum sealer is very expensive. they start from like two thousand dollors at least and I'm not sure if two thousand dollar sealer is worthed for homecooks.
The method introduced following link is more than enough if you have a thick zip-lock style PE(HDPE, LDPE, or just PE) bags.
http://www.chefsteps.com/activities/simple-sous-vide-packaging
If you clip it on the side of your tank, it can endure days just fine (make sure you DON'T seal the bag completely). The condition I tested is 4 days under 65 celsius.
No, you can't do that. It is the stock that cooks the chicken. Without the stock there would be air in the bag which would not transfer the heat to the chicken in the manner that the stock does. Unless, you use 3 lbs of butter (already melted before sealing the bag).
Yes, you're right. You may have seen this video of hainan chicken sou vide by now. Sous Vide Hainan Chicken Remix with Top Chef Winner Mei Lin!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ywq0rqB9yg
Hardly managed to fit it all in a gallon ziplock, but finally did. While very good taste-wise, the chicken had a raw look to it which the kids were not too keen on. They only had 2 servings each because of it
I think that next time I'll use chicken pieces instead of the whole bird, mainly for cosmetic purposes.
i notice that you put slits in the sous vide bag in the vacuum machine, before closing the lid and vacuum sealing. why did you do that and where precisely did you make the slits, won't all the liquid come out?
You have to look at how the slits are positioned in relation to the rest of the set up. the slits are there so the vacuum chamber will affect the contents of the bag, because, if you look, you'll see the opening of the bag (where he dumped everything into) is physically outside of the vacuum sealer. as for won't it all come out: no, it won't, again, look at how he put it in the vacuum chamber.
hello can you answer me Weight of whole chicken please
Hi Tsai! Chef Nick recommends a 4-5 pound chicken for this recipe.
Can you cook the chicken in a different liquid? like buttermilk?
can you poach in a different liquid? specifically, in buttermilk?
There's a recipe for chicken roulade on chefsteps
https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/chicken-roulade
I think the time and temp for that recipe will work.
How would you adjust the cooking time if you were doing just a leg (or two)?
You can prob use this to make Hainan chicken rice as well
You could turn on the broiler and brown it for serving.
I am trying to make Khao Man Gai, the Thai version of Hainanese chicken & rice. I will definitely try this method next time.
I make Hainan Chicken rice this way by putting it in a sous vide bath at 62C for 8 hours, and then immediately dropping it into an ice bath for at least 15 minutes. You can put some ginger and spring onions in the bag, but where I live they sell whole chickens in a plastic vacuum bag and I just throw the unopened bag in the bath -- the flavor added by the ginger and spring onion is too subtle to make it worth repackaging.
The only negative of Hainan Chicken Rice in this way is that you don't get cooking broth to cook your rice, as you would if you poached the chicken in a pot. However all that flavor stays in the chicken, and if you are like me you have lots of stock on hand to cook your rice anyway. The recipe for the rice is simple by the way . . . toast the cleaned rice with crushed garlic clove in a pan with chicken fat (1 clove garlic for each cup of rice), and cook in rice cooker with chicken stock, some salt, and pandan leaves.
Maggie
Poached the chicken using the receipe above and.............DELICIOUSNESS enter our mouths! Oh my this was soooooo good. I brought the joule for the climate in Tucson, AZ and the KITCHEN stayed cool, I'm in heaven floating to a great cooking summmer.
Any luck with the Khao Man Gai? I would love to hear the details.
Walmart.
I made this last night and found that 6 hours of cooking made the breast meat mushy while the leg meat was fine. If I were to do this again I would cut the chicken up and remove the breast meat earlier. Although, I would imagine that cut up chicken would take less time to cook in any case.
Can I ask ? Is it really safe to cook using " plastic " ?? can anyone explain it to me ?
If you aren't serving this soup-style, you have a LONG time between reducing and serving, which means everything will be cold. Seems like the last thing you would want to do with this wonderfully tender chicken is to dry it out in an oven keeping it warm.... thoughts?
@RSP You don't need to reduce the entire amount of stock, and the chicken will remain warm for some time. You could always rebag it and put it back in the bath.
@Arif see this post in the forum: https://www.chefsteps.com/forum/posts/safety-of-plastics-used-in-sous-vide-cooking-2
Links in the replies
I could watch Jacques all day. We have made this several times with different stuffings and is always well received. https://www.google.com/search?q=jacques+pepin+chicken+ballotine&oq=jaques+pepin+ballon&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0.11480j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#kpvalbx\=_KD_EXoDiHNGxtQax4qW4Cw75
