What the Pluck?

Lockdown is the perfect time to find the answers to those burning questions that challenge us all, and I believe there is an obligation to share that knowledge with others who might be curiosity-challenged.

So, today’s sharing relates to chicken.

Specifically, rotisserie chickens at the grocery store.

Without a doubt, these things are useful.  I have yet to find a recipe that calls for poached chicken breast or baked chicken or any other iteration of cooked chicken that can’t be done with the convenience of meat gleaned from the carcass of the grocery store’s ready-made fare.

These time-savers run about $7.99 at our local grocery store (assuming you don’t come in at the last minute before they snag them off the warmer when they’ve marked them down).

Recently, I noticed through the magic of online grocery shopping that the food store also offers pulled chicken, already stripped from the bones and save the 20 minutes it takes to do it yourself (not including cleanup time and the general ick factor of ripping apart the chicken).

And it’s $7.99 a pound!

So, what’s the catch?  How does this work?

The thing is that you don’t get a pound of meat off of the whole chicken, right?  It’s got to cost a lot more to have them do the cleanup for you.

So today, having time on my hands and a rotisserie chicken in the fridge that is destined to become tonight’s supper I cleaned a chicken.

My last chicken, as it turns out.

I will not say that I strip off every conceivable shred of protein from the bones of the chicken, but I’d bet that I strip it as close as most anyone without OCD is going to.

Then, having my handy-dandy scale available, I put the pulled chicken in a quart Ziplock bag and weighed it.

14.5 ounces.  A mere 1.5 ounces less than a pound.  A difference so minor that the average cook working with a recipe that calls for 1 lb. of chicken will say, “close enough” and proceed without giving it another thought.

Assuming one’s time is worth minimum wage, that means the cost of getting the pre-stripped chicken versus doing it myself is $2.41.

So now you can make your own decision.  Is it cost-effective to strip your own, or will you, too, be clicking for that 1-pound package of pulled chicken?

(Photo for attention.  This is not typical of the chickens used by the grocery store.)