8 mistakes you're making when grilling chicken

Do your teeth get a workout when you bite into a chicken breast' If you have to gnaw on a breast to get some meat off, there's a good chance your skills at the grill need a tune-up. Chicken is known as one of the most challenging meats to grill. Get it right, and you have a juicy, easy-to-eat breast. But if you char it for too long, you end up with a dry, cardboard-like bird that's better left outside. Just in time for grilling season, INSIDER talked with two chefs to find out the most common reasons you're grilling your chicken wrong and how you can get the perfect piece of meat next time. You're using too high of heat.Thoroughly cooking chicken on the grill does require some heat. But if you're cranking it up too high, you might be ruining your dinner. Courtney Rada, the host of Carnivorous on Genius Kitchen, told INSIDER that you don't need to keep your grill super hot. "If you're using a gas grill, medium-high is an ideal temperature (about 350 degrees)," she said. Don't forget the temperature drops each time you open the lid. And if you're using charcoal to cook wings, Rada said to consider pushing the coals to one side so the chicken cooks on indirect heat. That way you have direct heat on one side for searing and indirect heat on the other for lower and slower cooking. You let the heat escape.Each time you take the lid off the grill, the temperature drops. That's why Claudia Sidoti, head chef for HelloFresh, recommended covering the grill while the chicken is cooking to create an oven-like experience and prevent precious heat from escaping. You ditch the thermometer.If your meat thermometer is collecting dust in the back of your silverware drawer, you might want to dig it out. Both Rada and Sidoti said not using a thermometer is a big mistake. "A meat thermometer is really the only reliable method for determining when meat is done, and there are even meat thermometers that list the actual poultry and temperature on the dial itself to really help guide you on your grill journey," said Rada. Sidoti recommended using a meat thermometer to make sure your chicken has reached a safe internal temperature of 165F. She said to insert the thermometer into the thickest part of the meat to get the most accurate reading and make sure it's not touching the bone. See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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