HOW TO CUT UP A CHICKEN

To isolate the dark meat in one piece, as for French Four-Spice Chicken, begin by laying the chicken on your cutting board, breast-side up, ankles pointed toward you. Splay the legs open and cut the skin between the legs and the body of the bird, exposing the rib cage. Switch to poultry or sharp kitchen shears.

Cut at the bottom of the breast meat, moving toward the back of the bird, cutting through the thin rib bones, and do the same on the other side. Pull the entire breast backward, and then flip the bird over and press down on it. With your knife, cut up and around the top of the breast, cutting through the shoulder joint on either side, freeing the entire breast on its bone. Now you will have two large pieces: the white meat (breast) and the dark meat (wings, back and drumsticks).

To remove the breast meat for Brown Butter Chicken Breasts, set the entire breast on your board, skin-side up. Make an incision on either side of the breastbone, keeping close to the bone and gradually cutting deeper, gently pulling the breast meat back as you go. Keep slicing and pulling until you have freed the meat from the breast plate. Save the breast plate for stock.

To cut the chicken into smaller pieces for another dish, simply detach the wings at their joints and detach the thighs at the joint that meets the back of the chicken, making sure to cut high around the joint to remove the oysters hiding in the small of the chicken's back. Then separate the thighs from the drumsticks by cutting through the joint between them. Follow the directions above for Brown Butter Chicken Breasts to remove the chicken breast meat from the bone, for a total of 8 pieces.