Chicken breast is a healthy dietary meat, which is recommended for those who seek a healthy lifestyle, and those who hope to get rid of a few extra pounds.
However, the breast is often too dry and stiff. How to avoid it? Most cooks advise you to follow a few rules, the first of which is to use the correct marinade for chicken breasts.
General principles of cooking marinade for chicken breasts
It is undesirable to add mayonnaise and other mixtures containing vinegar. If the marinade for chicken breast skewers contains a lot of acid, then the meat will get a sharp taste and be harsh. In general, do not make the mixture too acidic, regardless of what you decided to add: vinegar, juice of some citrus or kefir.
Too generous to pickle marinade for chicken breasts in the oven is also not worth it. Salt contributes to the fact that the meat quickly loses its juice and becomes “rubber”. It is better to add salt near the end of the marinating process, 10 to 15 minutes before baking.
If you want to get a juicy and soft dish, buy a chilled, not frozen chicken meat, and the one that was frozen-thawed several times, no marinade for chicken breast shashlik will save! Not to mention the fact that such meat can easily be poisoned. So take the product only in a trusted store.
Using the marinade for chicken breasts, you can bake a whole chicken in the oven, only you have to marinate it much longer, it is best to leave it overnight. But bake chicken, so it turned out not dry, but juicy, better in the sleeve. If you like the crust, then you can notch (be careful not to burn yourself!) The sleeve and make the temperature higher.
Various spices are put in the marinade for chicken breasts. This, of course, depends on taste, but the generally accepted seasonings include the following:
- Curry;
- Pepper;
- Garlic;
- Mint;
- Sage;
- Ginger;
- Coriander;
- Basil;
- Thyme.
You can use ready-made mixtures or make your own. And you can cook a marinade for chicken breast shish kebab or baked dish, limiting yourself to something one. For example, an interesting taste is given by a thyme dish, quite often a “solo” appears and curry (although it may be wrong in this case to speak about solo, because curry is a mixture of spices). But with spices it is important not to overdo it, otherwise the marinade for chicken breasts in the oven will beat the taste of the bird itself!
Marinating breast should be from an hour to two, longer hold it does not make sense.
Faster, it will marinate at room temperature, but if this “room temperature” is too high, it is better to put a bowl of chicken in the refrigerator.
Make sure that the chicken breast marinade completely covers the meat. If this is not the case, you should periodically take out a bowl and mix the contents, ensuring that the chicken is completely smeared with marinade.
Recipe 1. Marinade for kefir chicken breast skewers
Ingredients
- Garlic - 2 cloves (3 if small)
- Lemon - about a third of a small citrus
- Kefir 1% fat - quarter liter
- Onion - half a small bulb
- Thyme, mint, slightly black pepper
- Mustard - Tablespoon
- Salt - to taste; add one hour after the start of pickling chicken
Preparation Method
- Peel and chop the garlic, squeeze the juice from a third of the lemon. Onions are also peeled and very finely chopped. Mix the kefir with garlic and onion with a whisk, then carefully mix in the lemon juice, and after it the mustard and black pepper. If you use fresh greens, it should be chopped as small as possible, you can even chop it with a blender. If dry - rub it between your fingers. Then add chopped greens to the marinade.
- Put the chicken breast in the marinade and keep it for about an hour, now and then turning. Then add salt, mix again and marinate the chicken for another 15 minutes.
- To bake in a sleeve or to make shish kebab.
Recipe 2. Marinade for chicken breast in the oven with honey
Ingredients
- Honey - 4 tablespoons
- Dry spicy greens (thyme, basil, rosemary, etc.) - 1 tablespoon
- Soy sauce - 2 spoons
- Olive or corn oil - 5-6 spoons
- Black pepper - to taste
- Salt in this marinade for chicken breast is not necessary to add - salinity will add soy sauce
Preparation Method
- Melt the honey in a water bath (put a container of honey in a saucepan with water, and the gas - on the gas; warm up, stirring the honey continuously).
- Mix the liquid honey with soy sauce, then add the vegetable oil and mix well. Add dry herbs and pepper.
- Marinate the breast in this composition for about an hour, and then bake it in the sleeve. It's nice to add new potatoes and pour all the remains of the marinade - you will get a delicious dish in a somewhat oriental style.
Recipe 3. Marinade for Chicken Breast “Dry”
This option marinade for chicken breast is suitable especially for those who love the taste of the chicken itself, and not spices.
Ingredients
- Salt - spoon
- Sugar - spoon
- Vegetable oil - 2 spoons
Preparation Method
Mix salt and sugar with butter and rub the chicken breast with the mixture. Place under a small load and hold for about an hour, and then bake in the sleeve.
Recipe 4. Marinade for Spicy Chicken Breast Kebab
Ingredients
- Vegetable oil (it is better to take olive oil) - 2 spoons
- Lemon - 1/2 small
- Sugar - 2 large spoons
- Garlic - 4-6 teeth of average size
- Ginger - a piece about three cm long
- Soy sauce - 2-3 spoons
- Lime - a slice (you can use lime juice - a full teaspoon)
- Black Pepper
- If it seems to you that the sauce is not salty enough, add a little salt.
Preparation
- Remove the zest from half a lemon, then squeeze the juice. Garlic skip through the press. Ginger peel and chop finely (but it is better not to rub on the terke).
- Mix lemon and lime juice with soy sauce and vegetable oil, put ginger and garlic, mix, add pepper and, if it is necessary, salt. Place the scaled lemon zest.
- Place the chicken breast in the marinade for an hour and a half, and then cook it in any way.
Recipe 5. Marinade for chicken breast in the oven with sour cream
Ingredients
- Sour cream - half a cup (better to take 20% fat)
- Mustard (you can take the usual, Russian, and you can prefer some exquisite softer) - a spoon with a top tea
- Dry paprika powder - a teaspoon
- Garlic - 3-4 cloves
- Curry - about one and a half teaspoons
- Lime or lemon juice - about a teaspoon
- Spicy herbs any, to your taste, you can Italian or Provencal mix - half a teaspoon
Preparation Method
- Peel the garlic and pass through the garlic press.
- In a sour cream, mix in all the citrus juice, then continue stirring with a whisk, put garlic, curry and paprika, top up, lightly rubbing herbs between your fingers.
- Spread this marinade on the breast or pieces of chicken breast and keep it for about an hour and a half, making sure that the chicken is covered with the sauce on all sides, if necessary, turn it side by side.
Recipe 6. Marinade for Pineapple Chicken Breast
Ingredients
- Mustard cereal - 1 spoon
- Common mustard - 1 spoon
- Half-banks (400 g) of canned pineapples
- Sour cream 15 - 20% - 3 spoons
- Pepper Mix - half teaspoon
- Onion - half a small bulb
- Salt - from half to a whole teaspoon
- Apple Cider Vinegar - 1 Spoon
Preparation Method
- Peel and chop the onion with a knife; You can also chop the onion with a grater or a combine, a blender and the like.
- Pineapples and syrup to put in the bowl of the blender, then chop into a liquid puree. You can, however, leave the pieces larger, but not quite mashed.
- Mix in a bowl with a blender or whisk sour cream with pineapple puree and mustard. Then add the onion and pepper mixture, mix well again. And only at the end add salt and vinegar (you can do without it).
- Chicken breast marinated in pineapple marinade, it makes sense to continue to cook with pineapples, for example, you can bake the breast with pineapple slices and cheese.
Recipe 7. Marinade for chicken breast in the oven “Horseradish”
In fact, this is a funny name. Marinade is very tasty, it's just horseradish. It is better to take a piece of horseradish root, but if this is not possible, the usual horseradish in a jar will do; the simplest is best, without beets or cream. However, you can use them.
Ingredients
- Horseradish - a slice of a centimeter root in 3 - 4 (or 2-3 spoons of ready horseradish from a jar)
- Sour cream 20% - half a glass
- Tomato paste - 1 spoon
- Parsley (fresh; if not, you can take dried)
- Salt - a teaspoon
Preparation Method
- If you are using fresh horseradish root, it must be washed and cleaned, then grated or chopped using any suitable kitchen device.
- Finely chop fresh parsley, and chop dried parsley, you can crush it in a mortar.
- Mix sour cream (you can take more fatty, but less fatty is already undesirable) with horseradish, freshly grated or from a jar, add parsley and tomato, and later salt.
- Marinate chicken breast in this composition for about two hours.
Recipe 8. Marinade for chicken breast shish kebab with white wine
One of the most exquisite and delicious marinades for chicken. Ingredients
- Orange - 1 piece
- Lemon - half of the average
- Honey - 2 - 3 tablespoons
- Ginger - a piece of about 3 cm
- White table wine - 3/4 cup
- Greens (dill, thyme, basil and the like fresh) - a small bunch
Preparation Method
- Orange wash extremely diligently, with a brush. Remove the zest from it and cut with a pair of millimeters using kitchen scissors.
- Slice lemon into thin slices.
- Melt the honey in a water bath so that it becomes completely liquid.
- Wash the ginger under running water, peel and chop into small plates.
- Squeeze the juice out of the orange.
- Rinse the greens thoroughly, first dropping it in water and then under running water. Chop as small as possible.
- Honey put in orange juice and mix thoroughly until smooth. Add white wine. Again, mix everything well and even beat a little.
- Now you can add solid ingredients - pieces of zest and lemon, greens.
- Mix the marinade again and dip the chicken breast in it. Leave to marinate for at least an hour and a half.
Marinade for Chicken Breasts: Tricks and Tips
- Sometimes it is difficult to cut enough finely garlic, especially young. To simplify your task, crush the clove by pushing it flat with a knife.
- It is advisable to add fat to any marinade. Corn oil is best, but you can use any other sour cream, heavy cream and so on.
- If there is no sleeve, you can bake the chicken breast in a sauce or in the form covered with foil.
