Food safety for chicken

French Fries said:

AH. That explains it. You get your chicken in a wrapper, and the wrapper is probably full of chicken juices.

I get my chicken dry, enveloped in butcher paper.

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Yes the wrapper is always full of that bloody juice. When it comes to fish, beef, and pork, it's always the butcher. But every time I buy that $20 organic whole chicken from the butcher, it turns out dry. A few weeks I ago when I was shopping for groceries I asked why the cheap chicken in refrigerator case always turned out juicy, and the expensive chicken always turned out so dry the breasts are completely inedible. The answer was it was probably because the salt water solution used in cheap chicken may be acting like a brine.

I find the same issues with the cooked rotisserie chickens. Whole Foods organic rotisserie chicken is so dry it will make me choak.

That bloody juice is from the brining.

... the cavity has bits of gut tissue that I also find unappetizing.

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LOL! Get in there with your hand and some paper towel and clean it out.

SGSVirgil said:

Although the OP does not specify, I think the chicken that she wants to marinate are parts, not the whole bird.

Otherwise, I agree that washing a whole bird with the exception of rinsing the cavity is really not necessary.

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Go back and re-read the OP. She refers to the chicken as "it." She continues calling the chicken "it."

No parts.

Chefross said:

Go back and re-read the OP. She refers to the chicken as "it." She continues calling the chicken "it."

No parts.

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I think what she said could be interpreted both ways. Marinating an entire chicken in the way she describes really makes no sense. That is why I think she is actually talking about parts and not a whole bird. But, I freely admit the possibility that you could be right and she is talking about a whole bird. Either way, I never said she must definitely wash the chicken. I said "if [she] must wash it, a few seconds under cold water will do."

I hope Coffeequeen comes back to read this discussion although she's probably cooked the chicken in question by now.