By Leah Brickley for Food Network Kitchen
Whether you're focused on flavour, texture or food safety, it's important to know how long to cook chicken breasts. Here, we’ve laid out some rules about baking chicken breasts, including the differences in boneless and skinless chicken breasts versus bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts. We also included a few of our favourite chicken breast recipes that are anything but boring.
Types of Chicken Breasts
All chicken breasts aren’t created equal. How long you cook your chicken breast in the oven depends largely on its weight and whether it’s boneless, skinless or bone-in, skin-on. While the two types of chicken breasts are neighbours in the meat case, they couldn’t be further apart in flavour and appearance. Bone-in, skin-on might feel more intimidating to cook, but the fat rendered from the skin and the intact bones generally make for juicier, tastier baked chicken breast. Read on for how long to bake each variety to achieve the best results possible.
The Best Oven Temperature for Cooking Chicken
Many of Food Network Kitchen's baked chicken breast recipes call for a 180 degrees C oven. That's because chicken breast cooks through evenly and quickly at this temperature, making for tender, juicy results.
How Long to Cook Chicken Breast
If you’re following a specific recipe, then don’t deviate! Otherwise, follow this general formula:
Cook large, boneless, skinless chicken breasts for 20 to 30 minutes in a 180-degree-C oven.
Cook large, bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts for 35 to 40 minutes in a 180-degree-C oven.
How to Tell When Chicken Breast is Done Cooking
We’d be remiss not to mention instant read thermometers, probably your best tool to determine whether or not your chicken is done. Insert an instant read thermometer in the thickest part of the breast— you’re looking for a final temperature of 75 degrees C. If you don’t have an instant read thermometer, you can also cut into the thickest part of the chicken with a paring knife to make sure there’s no visible pink meat.
Do Baked Chicken Breasts Need to Rest?
After you’ve cooked your chicken breasts to doneness, make sure you rest them for at least 10 minutes before slicing to lock in juice and flavour.
How to Store Baked Chicken Breasts
After the chicken is done cooking, cool it completely and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to four days. Or transfer it to a resealable plastic bag, remove all of the air from the bag and freeze it for up to four months.
Recipes for Baked Chicken Breasts
Once you’ve mastered how long to cook chicken breasts, you can experiment with different types of dishes, flavours and more. Here are some baked chicken breast recipes to get you started.
Hasselback Chicken Cordon Bleu
Give chicken breasts the hasselback treatment, then slide in pieces of Canadian bacon and Swiss cheese for rich flavour.
Sometimes you can dress up chicken breasts after they’re done baking: fresh basil and a balsamic reduction are the finishing touches on this baked caprese chicken.
Tomato Butter Chicken with Roasted Tomatoes
Bring the tomato flavour to this delicious Indian-inspired dish made with browned then oven-cooked chicken, recipe courtesy of chef Mary Berg.
Chicken with Roasted Lemon and Rosemary Sauce
This zesty, herby dish packed with protein and taste can be dished up in just under an hour!
Hungry for more? Why not take a browse through our collection of chicken recipes for some dinner inspiration.
