We all love roasted chicken. Prepared that way, chicken is juicy and delicious and is perfect comfort food. But, roasting the whole chicken can also be time-consuming, which is a big problem if you don’t have enough time. So today I’m sharing a simple step by step guide on how to butterfly a chicken. This is going to help you cook the chicken in half the time.
“Butterflying” is a simple technique of removing the backbone of the chicken using your kitchen shears. This technique is as simple as 1-2-3, as you’ll see in a few seconds. When I learned how to butterfly a chicken my whole cooking experience became a lot different.
When butterflied, chicken gets cooked a lot faster than usual. That means that you will have it done in less than an hour. So the dinner is done in almost no time!
To do this you don’t need any special equipment. I’m always using my Ikea Legitim cutting board, that is BPA free, and Berghoff poultry scissors. My mom taught me that it’s always better to use a plastic board for handling chicken meat because after use it can be tossed in the dishwasher to be cleaned and sanitized.
Also, if you don’t have scissors/shears you can use a very sharp knife instead. The knife must be sharp so that you can prevent it from slipping and cutting yourself.
If you would also like to know how to cut up a whole chicken into 6 or 8 pieces, you can read about that in this post >> How To Cut Up A Chicken | Step by Step Guide
And here is an easy step by step guide…
1. Get your poultry shears
Place the whole chicken on a cutting board, breast-side down, legs facing you.
Grab your poultry shears to cut out the backbone. If you don’t have the shears, you can use very sharp meat knife. The knife has to be very sharp so it won’t slip and get you cut.
2. Cut out the chicken backbone
Hold the chicken tail with one hand and cut with shears on one side of the backbone, all the way to the neck. Then go to the other side of the backbone and repeat the cutting process, until the backbone is removed. You can use the backbone to make a delicious chicken stock.
3. Flatten the chicken
Now turn the chicken’s front side to you and cut the collarbone in half. Turn the chicken breast-side up, and press in between breasts firmly with your hand, to flatten the chicken. When you hear the cracking sound, you’re done.
4. And that’s it! You’re done!
You can fold the wing tips behind so they don’t burn while roasting/grilling, and that’s it!
You have successfully “butterflied” the whole chicken!
If you have any questions let me know in the comments below. I would be glad to help you.
Chicken recipes you might like:
- Whole Roasted Chicken with Sage and Potatoes
- Perfectly Cooked Lemon and Garlic Chicken Roast
- Roasted Chicken Mediterranean Style
- One-Skillet Curry Chicken Thighs and Potatoes
- One Skillet Ginger & Turmeric Chicken Thighs With Rice
Anchy
Yields 1 butterflied chicken
An easy step-by-step guide on how to butterfly a whole chicken, so it will cook faster and more evenly.
5 minPrep Time
5 minTotal Time
Save RecipeIngredients
- 1 whole chicken
- Poultry scissors/shears
- Plastic cutting board (BPA Free if possible)
Directions
- Place the whole chicken on a cutting board, breasts side down, legs facing you.
- Grab your poultry shears and start cutting out the backbone. Hold the chicken tail with one hand and cut with shears on one side of the backbone, all the way to the neck.
- Now go to the other side of the backbone and repeat the cutting with shears, until the backbone is removed.
- Now turn the chicken’s front side to you and cut the collar bone in half.
- Turn the chicken breasts side up and press in between breasts firmly with your hand, to flatten the chicken. When you hear the crack sound, you’re done.
- You can fold the wing tips behind so they don’t burn while roasting/grilling, and that’s it!
- You have successfully “butterflied” the whole chicken!
Did you enjoy this post? I would like to hear what you think in the comments below. If you make it don’t forget to post it on Instagram and tag me @simply.anchy or use hashtag #simplyanchyrecipe, because I love to see all of your kitchen creations. Also be sure to follow me on Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook, so that you never miss any of my recipes and posts.
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