Roasted Chicken Breast

Ingredients

• boneless skinless chicken breast(s)
• 1/4 stick butter
• seasoning

Method

Brine the chicken first — twenty to forty minutes in a saturated salt bath. The salt dissolves muscle proteins (brining), allowing them to trap water during cooking. This is what keeps the breast from drying out at higher temperatures. Rinse and pat thoroughly dry; moisture on the surface will steam rather than roast, and you need the roasting heat to strike bare flesh for colour and flavour development.

Heat the oven to 230°C. Use an oven-safe pan — cast iron or stainless steel, not glass — because it radiates heat and encourages browning on the underside. Brush the dried breast with melted butter on all surfaces. Season with pepper first (it'll blacken slightly if salted too early), then salt just before it goes in. The salt draws surface moisture initially, but in the ten minutes before roasting begins, it dissolves back into the meat and aids browning through the Maillard reaction.

Position a probe-thermometer in the thickest part of the smallest breast; this is your insurance against overcooking the thinner sections. Roast until the probe reads 68°C. At this point the muscle fibres have set firm, but the meat is still genuinely moist — the carryover cooking during rest will push the core to 72–74°C, which is well above the food safety threshold of 63°C for poultry yet below the point where the proteins squeeze out all their retained water. Remove the pan and drape foil loosely over the top without sealing it; this slows heat loss during the ten-minute resting-meat window without trapping steam that would soften the skin. Let it sit undisturbed. The proteins continue to denature and the residual heat distributes evenly throughout the thickness.

Serve immediately after rest. The meat should yield slightly to the fork but not collapse, with an even pale-gold exterior and flesh that's opaque white throughout with no grey bands.