Chicken – Stir Frying Chicken, Correct Amount for 1 Pan

chickenequipmentfryingstir-fry

Goal

Cook small strips of chicken for a stir fry, to be added to vegetables and rice later on.

Background

The grocery store likes to sell packs of chicken breast that have about 2 pounds of chicken, consisting of 3 medium sized breasts (some of the weight is probably water). I prefer to use all of this chicken at once, and I like cooking roughly this amount because I want to avoid cooking frequently. I have a stainless steel and a nonstick pan, both with diameters of about 10 inches at the bottom (on the inside).

Whenever I cut this quantity of chicken into pieces that look like the right size for a stir fry, they will more than cover the bottom of the pan. The result is that there is a layer of boiling/bubbling water the entire time during the cooking process. Nonetheless, the chicken eventually cooks, and I remove it when the inside of some of the larger pieces is 165 according to a thermometer. Then I remove the meat and cook the vegetables separately, adding the meat back at the end.

Question

My question has two parts. First, although taste is subjective, is it generally considered better to avoid the situation described above. If so, what is the best way to do this? Or does it not really matter?

I imagine that I could buy a larger pan, but I can only increase the size by a little before my electric stove will no longer heat the entire pan. Also, I could buy less chicken, but then I would have to spend more time cooking. I suppose that I could also use multiple pans to cook at the same time. I think that because of how popular these packages of chicken are at the grocery store, someone must know how to cook all of this chicken at once!

Best Answer

Cook the meat in batches, 2, 3 batches so that the pan will stay at an appropriate temperature.

When you add too much ingredients, meat, vegetables..., in a pan, the temperature will drop and instead of pan frying you will be pan boiling.

I would do the following :

  • Cut and marinate the meat.
  • Cut all your vegetables.
  • Portion the meat to have 2, 3 batches (or more or less depending on the quantity
  • Cook the meat; put cooked meat in a bowl.
  • Cook the vegetables.
  • Add meat back to the pan to finish the dish.