How to Cook Chicken Breast in Oven 350

This is how to bake bone-in chicken breasts in oven 350 to moist fork tender meat. Use our dry rub recipe or barbecue sauce on the crispy skin. If you don’t want to Bake a Whole Chicken at 350 you can just make white meat juicy and tender on a sheet pan like this!

This is how long to cook chicken breast, bone-in so they are tender. It is simple and something you will add to your meal rotation for sure. Change it up with different seasonings or sauces at the end. Just one of the quick and easy chicken recipes on our site.

Bone in chicken breasts were used for this one, with skin on. This would work just as well for boneless but I would highly suggest having skin to add to the moisture. Most enjoy eating it too if you can get it nice and crispy. At a nice low temperature the meat will get super tender and not dry out.

At the end you can increase the temp high, turn to broil, or use our air fryer chicken breast instructions just for a few minutes. As far as the seasonings go that is up to you. I will of course add what we use below so you could follow that but swap out or in whatever you wish.

How Long to Cook Bone-In Chicken Breasts at 350

You’ll want to set aside around an hour to get this done. Of course there will be a slight variation because of how large or small each piece might be. Personally I always buy organic, free range poultry. There are several reasons for this beyond just that I don’t want antibiotics in my meat.

If you have never compared the two side by side there is a huge difference. First off there is a lot less fat with organic pieces (or when you are making a baked frozen whole chicken too). The size is smaller but there is a lot more edible meat on the bone. Those HUGE pieces at the store you see, aren’t normal. Smaller is more flavorful for sure.

Try it for yourself and decide for yourself but that is just my two cents. Medium size pieces are best, at a low temp, increasing to a higher temperature at the end to get a great texture on the outside. Period.

How Long to Bake Boneless Breasts

If you did use boneless skinless chicken breasts, how long to bake chicken will likely decrease to about 50 min. instead of 1 hour. You don’t want them to dry out, since there aren’t any bones it will likely bake faster. If you wanted to add some sauce at the end, brush on top during the last 10 minutes. That way it will bake on and almost caramelize to a thick layer.

Can you bake frozen chicken breasts?

The timing and temperature below in the recipe card is for fresh or thawed. If yours are still rock hard you would need to follow our How to Cook Frozen Chicken Breast in Oven post for that, but yes it is possible.

How to Season

There’s a great chicken wing dry rub that is great on breasts as well. That one has a bit of sugar in it so it is on the sweeter side. Decide for yourself. Just salt and pepper works great too if you just want simple, quick and easy. The key is you want really well seasoned chicken breasts to enjoy the skin at the end.

You are going to want three things for baking; aluminum foil, a cooling rack and baking sheet too. If you spray the rack with non stick spray it will be easier to clean. An Instant read thermometer is needed to check when done. You could also follow our Dutch oven chicken breast recipe with that cast iron pot.

How do you know when chicken breasts are done?

With poultry you need to make sure it is cooked all the way thru to the middle, in the thickest area. If you don’t have a thermometer the best way to test is to look at the juices, they should be completely clear. You can also cut into the middle, there shouldn’t be any pink translucent color left.

Be sure to watch your protein to make sure the skin doesn’t burn. Remove from the oven and let cool slightly before slicing and serving with a sauce or as is.

Ideal Bone In Chicken Breast Temp

By far 350 degrees Fahrenheit is the best oven temp to get this done perfectly. You want low and slow, kinda’ like our baked frozen chicken wings in oven recipe. Then once your meat has reached the safe internal 165 F internal temperature you can increase it just for a bit to crisp it up.

How do you make chicken skin crispy?

It’s actually quite easy. Personally since your oven is already on I probably wouldn’t transfer it somewhere else, you can just switch to broil for 2 minutes or so to crisp up super duper.

OR you can preheat air fryer to 400 F for a good 5 minutes to get it nice and hot. Once your meat has reached 160 (it will cook a bit longer in this machine too) you can transfer it into your Foodi, Cosori or other hot air machine brand. Make sure the skin is facing up and spray the top with some olive oil spray. You could sprinkle some seasonings on top, more, if you wanted too.

Close the basket and air fry chicken skin for about 3 minutes, depending on how golden brown you want it. Keep in mind that the meat will continue to cook too so you don’t want it in there for too too long. That is why I would take it out just a bit shy of the 165F.

You still want it to rest once done so you can pull out the drawer entirely and set aside in a safe place like on a stove grate or trivet on the countertop. Let sit for a good 10 minutes so the juices stay inside and don’t leak out on you.

How to save leftovers

You know how I hate wasting food. With this you can definitely incorporate it into a number of other recipes in days after it is done and saved properly. Allow to cool for 30 minutes, keep it moist in a freezer bag with all the air sucked out so it doesn’t dry out. It can stay in the fridge for up to 3 days safely.

What to make with leftovers

From there if you take the meat off you could make our spicy chicken noodle soup or make our easy Instant Pot chicken noodle soup for dinner the next day. Reheat as is in the microwave, in a bowl, covered, with just a bit of broth in the bottom so keep it juicy.