This cooking skill shows you all you need to know about dissecting chicken.  Dissecting a chicken provides different cuts of chicken meat for use in great tasting chicken recipes and also chicken stock.

Step by step guide to dissecting chicken

1. To dissect a chicken, place the chicken onto the board you use for raw meat.  Save all the bones and pieces you cut off to make a chicken stock.
2. Pull out the chicken wings and cut through the first joint away from the chicken breast.
3. Using a sharp knife, cut through the skin between the legs and the breast of the chicken and pull the legs away from the chicken to the point where the top of the thighs meet the chicken’s body, where hopefully you will find a joint that you can cut through to remove the legs.
4. Cut through the joint between the drumstick and the chicken’s foot.
5. You should be able to pull the skin away from the flesh starting at the top of each thigh to the bottom of each drumstick.
6. Feel for the joint between the thighs and drumsticks and push the knife through it.  Now you should have two drumsticks and two thighs.
7. Place the thighs flat on the board and cut along the thigh bone.  Run your knife underneath the bone, cutting it away from the flesh.  You should now easily remove the thigh bone.
8. Carefully pull the skin away from the chicken breast.
9. Take a sharp knife and cut each side of the breast bone and follow the shape of the chicken carcass to cut off the two chicken breasts, finishing where the wings joined the chicken.  Again, cut through this joint.
10. Cut through the last wing joint just into each breast and you should have two boneless chicken breasts.
11. Check that you have removed the bones from your chicken pieces, as you may find a small piece of bone has escaped, which we don’t want.
12. Place the chicken pieces onto a clean dish, cover with cling film and store in the bottom of your fridge until required.
13. Scrub your board well and wash your hands and knifes, etc. thoroughly.

Great tasting chicken recipes