Simply Chicken Breast Fillets, Frozen, Skinless & Boneless

These Simply chicken breast fillets were recommended to me, so I bought a packet.  They are Class A frozen skinless and boneless chicken breast fillets. The pack weighs 1Kg and costs £3.33.  This bag came from Lidl, but I notice Aldi also do a similar bag at the same price.

Update: I noticed in April 2018 that these bags of frozen chicken breasts are now £3.50! That’s a 5.12% price increase.  £3.50/Kg.

I’d usually not buy such a product in a bag where I can’t see inside it, but as these were recommended I took a chance 🙂 Now I’ve opened the bag and had a look, they look all right to me!

Usually I buy a £2.49 chicken breast joint, but I was looking for chicken breasts that would enable me to cook smaller amounts if I wished to do so.  The larger chicken breast joints weigh 560 grams, so, potentially these bags of frozen chicken are cheaper and more flexible.

Skinless & Boneless Chicken:

That’s what I like, I’m “funny” about bones and skin when it comes to meat!  I’d rather go without meat than have to deal with skin and bones 🙂

Class A with Added Water:

Unfortunately, some products do add water to bulk out the weight.  This Lidl product is Class A chicken, which sounds good (no idea what that really means, of course, but it does sound better than, say, Class B would!).  The bag informs me that this is 82% chicken.  With 820 grams of chicken in this 1Kg bag, that changes the £/Kg from £3.33/Kg as on the shelf price tag to £4.06/Kg of actual chicken breast.

How Many Portions?

Each bag will be variable, but this bag contained five chicken breasts of varying sizes, the largest one weighing 250 grams. That would mean that the four others must weigh about 185-190 each grams.  I’m assured that this is how most of the bags are, containing one “larger” chicken breast fillet and four smaller ones. The final cooked weight will be less than this amount as frozen chicken weighs more than cooked chicken.

So we’ll see how these go, I’ll use that large portion first to make an orange chicken in the slow cooker.  So, until then …. at least I’ve got round to buying these!  I might use one breast per recipe in the future, or I might use two, but a bag of five breasts is more flexible than a single chicken breast joint.

Price Per Chicken Breast Fillet:

With a pack price of £3.33, the price per chicken breast fillet works out at 83p for the largest one and 62p for each of the four smaller pieces.

To Oven Cook Frozen Chicken Breasts:

I won’t be cooking these chicken breasts in the oven, but the official cooking instructions say to:

• Preheat the oven to 190°C/Fan 170°C /Gas Mark 5.  Place the fillets in a roasting tin and cook in the centre of the oven for 45-50 minutes.
• If you’ve defrosted them already, then to cook from chilled is the same as above, but cook for 35-40 minutes.

The usual instructions apply for chicken, which is to ensure the chicken fillets are piping hot, cooked throughout, juices run clear and no pink colour remains before serving.

The bag says these frozen chicken breasts are “not suitable for microwave cooking”, but that’s just because many products don’t tell you how to do it!  I expect to microwave some of these chicken breast fillets at some stage.