Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast

Juicy, tender, and flavorful are all things we want from a steadfast and reliable chicken breast. As you may have found out, achieving all three is not always easy. Maybe it's tender enough, but there's no flavor. Or it's perfectly seasoned but firm and dry. No one likes that! Let me help you learn some well-tested cooking techniques to get the best oven Baked Thin Sliced Chicken Breast possible!

It's way too easy to overcook a chicken breast, and it's not always easy to season it thoroughly. I use a few simple techniques to get juicy, tender, and flavorful thin-sliced chicken breasts. The first trick is brining the bird. This does double duty for flavor and moisture! I also bake chicken breasts at a low temperature instead of roasting since thin chicken breasts can easily be overcooked.

Scroll further down to learn how I make super moist and flavorful chicken breast using a few (very easy) professional cooking techniques.

Read on for all the loving details on how to make Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast.

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• Featured Ingredients
• Tools for the job
• How to Make Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast
• Hot Tip!
• Variations of Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast
• Storage of baked thin sliced chicken breast
• FAQ
• Food safety
• Winner winner chicken dinner
• Jazzing up your chicken, more recipes
• Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast
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Tools for the job

• Cutting board and sharp knife (paid link) (paid links)
• Measuring cups/spoons and a measuring pitcher
• Dish for brining - glass, stainless-steel, or ceramic
• Lined sheet pan or baking dish
• Tongs
• Meat thermometer - read below for my suggested option!

How to Make Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast

This is a 3 step process:

1. Make the brine
2. Slice and brine the chicken
3. Bake the chicken.

Make the wet brine

A simple wet brine is made up of water and salt—nothing else. And it's magical. When you soak the breast for 45 minutes in the wet brine, the salt penetrates all the muscle fibers, so each bite has great flavor. Brining also prevents moisture loss, so your final dish will also be extremely juicy!

To safely brine your chicken, you'll want to make sure the brine liquid is cold, but to dissolve the salt, you'll need to start with hot water. This is what I do to save time:

• Fill a 1-quart pitcher with 1 cup of hot tap water and the correct measurement of salt (see below) and stir until the salt has dissolved.
• Next, add 1 cup of ice and stir until the ice has dissolved.
• Then, add the final two cups of cold tap water to the quart and stir to combine. At this point, the brine should be cold. (The idea here is to keep the chicken in safe temperature zones until it's time to bake.)
• Pour the brine into a glass, ceramic, or stainless steel container and refrigerate while preparing the chicken.
  
  I prefer using wide and flat dishes, like a glass casserole dish, as opposed to a tall-sided bowl where all the slices are stacked on top of each other. This way, I can spread each piece out while keeping it submerged in the liquid.

Preparing the chicken breast

• Make the brine and set it in the refrigerator while preparing the chicken.
• Preheat the oven to 325°F.
• Trim the chicken: Lay the chicken breast on the cutting board with the plump end away from you. Lay your hand over the breast and press to steady it.
• Insert the knife's edge midway down from the top and gently saw through the middle horizontally. This will yield two cutlets of equal length with slightly thinner ends.
• HINT: It's easier to slice chicken horizontally if it is slightly frozen; firmer on the inside than the outside.
• OPTION: If the final look isn't as important, for example, a chicken breast that will be diced after cooking, you can get the most even bake by slicing it into thirds. Start by slicing it in half and dividing the thicker and thinner ends. Then, slice the thicker end (only) horizontally.
• Add the raw chicken to the brine and refrigerate for at least 45 minutes but no more than 6 hours for boneless chicken.

Baking the sliced chicken breasts

• Lay the thinly sliced chicken on a parchment-lined sheet pan or baking dish and bake for 13-15 minutes at 325°F. I've been using these Nordicware sheet pans and nothing sticks to them, with or without parchment. Very easy clean-up! (paid links)
• OPTION: Dry-baked chicken breasts can look gray, which is a little unappetizing. If you would like, you can coat them with a few drops of oil along with a tiny sprinkle of a colorful neutral seasoning like paprika.
• When they reach 160°F, remove the baked chicken cutlets from the oven and let them rest on the pan for 5 minutes before using them.

Temp the chicken to know when it's done!

Relying on the color of the chicken will almost always lead you down the path of a dry, stringy bird. Here are some facts about the temperature of cooked chicken:

• Cooked chicken must reach an internal temperature of 165°F to kill off all bacteria safely, but anything above that may yield tough, dry meat when you're cooking chicken breast.
• Cooked foods will continue to cook once they're removed from the heat (carryover cooking), so it is recommended that they be pulled from the heat before they reach the targeted temperature.
• Smaller-sized foods will have lower amounts of carryover heat. With carryover cooking, you can bring a whole chicken roast to 155-157°F to safely reach 165°F, but a breast cutlet should be cooked to at least 160°F before removing it from the oven.
  (Bone-in dark meat pieces have more leeway and can actually be cooked to 170-185°F without overcooking.)
• A quick-read digital thermometer is helpful for not only getting an accurate reading but also a quick one. You can just temp the chicken right in the oven, and you'll lose very little heat.
• Check the temperature using this darling lollipop style thermometer by Thermoworks. It reads the temp in 2-3 seconds and comes in a ton of colors! Thermoworks makes many types of thermometers, consistently high quality and accuracy. (paid link)

Variations of Baked Thin-Sliced Chicken Breast

• Flavorful brine - Instead of using a simple salt and water brine, add aromatics like celery, onion, bay leaf, and peppercorns and boil the brine for a few minutes. Once it has cooled, you can add the chicken breast and let it marinate for 45 minutes, creating a great depth of flavor for your final dish.
• Season after brining - After removing the chicken from the brine, sprinkle it with some of your favorite dry seasonings like garlic powder, cumin, Italian herbs, dry oregano, etc. ½ teaspoon of any one of these is enough for any trimmed version of two chicken breasts. (i.e., two breasts trimmed into four thin-sliced cutlets.)

Storage of baked thin sliced chicken breast

• If raw chicken breasts are not in a vacuum-sealed bag, they should be cooked or frozen (for up to 9 months) within a few days of purchase. Otherwise, check the dates on the packaging.
• Brined chicken should be cooked or frozen within a day of coming out of the brine.
• Baked chicken breasts will last a few days in the refrigerator or up to 3 months in the freezer if they are wrapped and sealed tightly.

FAQ

Winner winner chicken dinner

Looking for more chicken recipes? Try these:

Jazzing up your chicken, more recipes

Here are some complimentary recipes to try with baked chicken breast:

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