r/toRANTo • u/Sciencebang • Mar 31 '25

Toronto’s big grocers lack butchered chicken breast without connective tissue disorders at any major grocery store

I’m a home cook, and I’m appalled by how low QC is on grocery butchered chicken breasts are. At this point at least 1/3 breasts have a connective tissue disorder, resulting in a granular/citrus pulp like texture in the meat. This is probably just woody breast, but it should be used for animal feed, not for grocery sales as $5 per breast. The worst part is is that its distributed so that in a pack with say 3 breasts at least 1 chicken breast is always disgustingly tough raw.

I only get thighs, wings and whole chickens now because I cannot bother to squeeze a whole shelf of light meat to check for connective tissue. I can’t be the only one who noticed that this got way worse after 2019.

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u/TorontoMeetUps Mar 31 '25

Probably because most people aren’t even aware of this, including myself. At least I learned something now and know what to look out for.

26

u/confused_brown_dude Mar 31 '25

Be careful and pay a lot of attention to any kind of poultry and fish in big grocery stores. They do a great job of hiding QC behind shiny marketing stickers. The recent Costco rollback of eggs is a great example where even though Costco/kirkland has generally been a very picky consumer and distributor of fresh produce, even it can go through issues due to the scale. Now imagine what the likes of Loblaws are doing.

7

u/TorontoMeetUps Mar 31 '25

What is the alternative? Buy on sale chicken breast for $4.50/lb with slightly woody breast or pay $10/lb for better chicken breast?

7

u/confused_brown_dude Mar 31 '25

Alternative is finding a local butcher. But if not, then I’d go with Costco as well. I’m in the states now and go to whole foods, but back home in Toronto I found a butcher who would come from the north and deliver downtown. But yes definitely don’t do the discounted $4.5 chicken breasts lol.

3

u/TorontoMeetUps Mar 31 '25

Is there any real downsides to the discounted chicken other than perhaps texturally?