--How to account for carryover cooking.

Make chicken breast flat and even

The uneven shape of boneless, skinless chicken breasts makes them tricky to grill, but by just spending a few minutes pounding the thicker end thinner, you'll both reduce cooking time and end up with evenly cooked meat.

Brine before grilling to prevent dry, rubbery chicken

Brining is simply submerging the chicken in a salt-water solution before grilling. This prevents the chicken from overcooking on the grill and also helps it get great grill marks, as the increased surface moisture and sugars brown quickly. Brining also keeps the interior of the chicken breasts juicy while grilling. It's one of the easiest ways to ensure success, but it does require extra time so plan accordingly.

As little as 30 minutes of brining helps the chicken breast, but you can brine chicken breasts in a mild brine for eight to 12 hours.

The magic of a marinade-brine hybrid

This recipe calls for a quick mixture of honey, vinegar and spices to be added to the brine and used as a glaze. This sort of hybrid marinade-brine adds flavor and color to the breast before grilling, and glazing them before serving makes them finger-licking good.

Get familiar with direct and indirect grilling

Direct heat will get you great grill marks over a fast flame, while indirect will bring your meat to temperature. Direct heat means to cook the food directly over the heat source (whether charcoal, gas, or wood), while indirect cooking refers to cooking adjacent to the heat source. A combination of direct heat for prominent grill marks followed by indirect heat to cook the chicken to the correct temperature without drying it out makes for pretty, juicy chicken breasts.

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