Recently I wrote about how much it takes to tinker with modern chicken in order to cook something worthy out of it.
Chicken is now, more often than not, a real challenge to the home cook. It is very rare to find a bird raised in "uncultured conditions", pecking at worms and grains, walking on the grass and therefore walking up textured, harsh meat and little fat.
Now the meat of chickens is soft, creeping from cooking, almost no texture, and there are quite a lot of fatty "continents". The only bad thing is that their fat is hard, and often has a strange, not inherent in chicken, aroma.
Because of this, picking chicken spices is a headache. For example, when mixed with dill, this fat gives an unpleasant stench when cooked. Well, in general, it is reasonable for him to use bright, saturated spices - but you can't! It is impossible, because the meat is very soft, easily picking up extraneous tastes and aromas, and by adding rosemary, you may not feel the taste of chicken (which is already minimized).
And some objected to this - they say, it's not true, they say, now our chickens have simply reached the level of "imported" ones - they became soft and tender, but were blue and tough.
Eh, no, gentlemen ...
Our chickens, like imported ones, have mutated. Well, or evolved under the wise scientific guidance of man. Now, it turns out, the broiler chicken reaches its marketable weight (far from small), in 48 days, and before - such breeds still remain, they are abroad, for example, called "slowly growing" in 81 day.
At the same time, the body of "new" chickens - modern broilers - converts feed into muscle and fat more efficiently than the body of "past generations" chickens, so that Growing 1 pound of meat on this chicken requires 7 percent less feed. (From WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FASTER- AND SLOWER-GROWING CHICKEN? at foodservice.chickencheck).
By the way, here is a comparison by weight over the years. Not a Russian picture, but, in general, it reflects world trends - the chick should grow quickly and a lot.
And something tells me - when the metabolism and the main indicators of the body change, in order to produce such results, it also affects the taste. And very, very strong.
At least I (and many others) notice it.