Leg meat, on the other hand, must be cooked to at least 170☏ (77☌).Despite government warnings to cook chicken to an unthinkable 165☏ (74☌), in reality, once you cook breast meat above 150☏ or so, its muscle fibers are almost completely collapsed. Congratulations! Your chicken is now officially cardboard. As these fibers are heated, they begin to shrink, squeezing that juice out. Looked at under a microscope, it's essentially a bundle of straw-like fibers filled with juice. Above 150☏ (66☌), breast meat dries out.
