Soups, salads, casseroles, sandwiches, gà luộc chặt, potpies. They all call for boiled chicken, and boiling a chicken properly is the trick to churn out extremely scrumptious and flavourful chicken preparations. One would think, "How big a deal could that be? I mean, we are just boiling the chicken and that's all." But there are some things that you do need to pay attention to, like: How long do you boil chicken? Do you boil the chicken as a whole or chunk it up and then boil it? What else could you add to the chicken while boiling it so that you can enhance the flavours a little bit? All these little details work towards giving you a perfectly boiled chicken, or leaving you with an atrocious piece of fibrous, tasteless chicken that looks anemic. So, let us learn how to boil chicken properly, shall we? Boiled Whole Chicken As I said before, a greater number of chicken recipes will ask you to pre-boil the chicken before you actually start with the recipe itself. But, very few people know that you can actually boil an entire chicken faster than pieced chicken. You can always go about cutting it later on. So, let us see how you can go about doing this. You will need the following ingredients.

• Whole chicken, 3 lb
• Carrots, 3 (not peeled, chunked)
• Celery stalks, 2 (cut into bite-sized pieces)
• Bay leaves, 2
• Onion, 1 (large, not peeled, cut into halves)
• Peppercorns, 1 tbsp. (whole)
• Salt, 2 tsp.
• Dried parsley flakes, 1 tsp.
• Water, enough to cover the chicken

Procedure In a large Dutch oven, place the whole chicken and throw in the carrots, celery, onion, peppercorns and salt. Add enough water so that the entire chicken is immersed and then cover. Heat on high. Once the water starts to boil, lower the heat so that a steady simmer sets in. Let the chicken boil for 1½ hours. Check at this juncture and if you see that the flesh is separating out of the bones, it is ready. Let the chicken stay in the broth and cool down completely before you shred or cube it. You can then use it to make either chicken salad or any chicken soup recipe. Boiled Chicken Breast You can make 8 cups of chicken and 8 cups of broth with,

• Chicken breasts, 6 (4 lb, bone-in)
• Carrots, 2 (chunked or cut into strips)
• Celery ribs with tops, 2 (cut into bite-sized pieces)
• Onion, 1 (small, halved)
• Bay leaf, 1
• Garlic clove, 1
• Water, 2 qt
• Salt, 2 tsp.
• Pepper, 1 tsp.

Procedure Again, place the chicken in the Dutch oven and throw in all the other ingredients. Pour in the water, cover and bring the chicken to a boil over high heat. Once it's boiling, lower the flame and let it steadily simmer for 40 minutes straight. Remove from flame and when the chicken has cooled considerably in the broth itself, skin and bone it. Dice, shred or slice the boiled boneless chicken as per your need. You can store this meat in the fridge for up to 3 months in Ziploc pouches. Boiled chicken is a perfect meat substitute for any kind of meat. A lot of chefs around the world believe that poaching chicken is a much better option than boiling it. This is simply because of the fact that when you poach it, the result is juicier, more aromatic and definitely more nutritious. How is poaching different from boiling? Well, poaching entails you to place the chicken in water that has reached a boiling temperature and then has been removed from the heat. The chicken then gets cooked gradually and optimally in the residual heat of the poaching liquid. Since the meat is never subject to direct heating from the stove in this process, the proteins do not shrink too fast and the inherent moisture is not subsequently force-squeezed out of the chicken (as is the case with rapidly boiling chicken). There are two things that need to be kept in mind,

• The poaching liquid should just be enough to cover all the pieces. Not more. Not less. Just enough for you to immerse everything in it. A skillet or a shallow pan is, therefore, ideal for poaching.
• Even though chicken thighs, wings or an entire chicken can be poached, it is best to opt for boneless and skinless chicken breasts because of their high-protein and low-fat content.

Let us see two ways in which we can achieve this. You can also play around with the herbs you add to the poaching liquid in order to derive a more flavourful chicken. Here's how. Now, let us see some recipes in which you need to use boiled chicken. So, there you go. Various ways to have perfect boiled chicken to make the most delightful dishes. Remember, if a dish asks you to boil a chicken for less than 20 minutes, it means that you have to parboil chicken and not boil it completely. Read recipe instructions carefully in order to understand what you must do, for a lot depends on the boiling chicken part - not only the flavour, as you might think, but also the texture and look of the dish. Cooking is an art and to do full justice to it, one has to cater to all the facets of it.