Chicken breasts *seem* like they should be easy, but they're more common and popular than they are easy. They are also flavorless, in my opinion, and difficult to cook because of the lack of fat, which makes them easy to burn and dry out.
I say this as someone who cooked in restaurants and cooks a lot at home.
Get yourself a whole chicken, and roast it. Follow the Cooks Illustrated method for roasting a whole chicken. I have found none better. Here's my short version:
* Get a good, pasture fed chicken (none of that "vegetarian fed" chicken crap, they're supposed to eat bugs and grubs and the chicken tastes better when it did).
* Preheat over to 450 F.
* Remove any chicken innards, rinse, pat dry with paper towel. Cut a few slits on the back of the bird.
* Mix 1 tablespoon salt, 1 teaspoon baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon black pepper. Rub this all over the chicken.
* Put chicken on its breast and roast on a rack in a roasting pan for 25 minutes. (Don't have a rack? Ball up four balls of foil and set the chicken on these.)
* Flip the chicken (so it's breast-side up). Roast until temperature hits 135, about 20 minutes.
* Crank the heat to 500 degrees F. Cook until chicken is 160 degrees, another 10-15 minutes.
* Rest, eat, and use remainder meat (there isn't any left in our house though) and innards to make stock, as a previous poster mentioned. If you don't have a lot of freezer space for stock, reduce it down to be really strong and store it in ice cube trays. Pop a stock cube out for making rice, chili, anything that calls for broth, etc. When I don't feel well I put a stock cube in a mug, add boiling water and a little salt, and drink it.
