10:51 pm
[Link] |
Chickenses will get eaten
- Catch
- Drop in cone
- Pith with knife point
- Bleed with blade
- Soak in scalding water
- Remove feathers
- Cut off feet
- Remove viscera [
 prettypammie can expand on this...I checked out] - Wash
- [Optional] Cut into parts
There...now you know how.  oddmix_wp' family and Pam, Q, and I converted 14 chickens into future meals. We got to take some home for our efforts. Q also got an extra-special bonus of some time with the kids while I drove Tonka the Tractor home and Pam went shopping. He has truly been a trooper about the broken wrist, and well-behaved [for a seven-year-old] in general. I'm sure he gets exhausted of the routine of barely seeing his parents all week and then seeing no one but his parents all weekend.
Our boarded horse, Tai, had reached his limit these last few weeks. He was clearly in pain, not keeping up with the "herd," despite his best efforts, and starting to have great difficulty getting back up when he went down or rolled. J & W decided it was time; Tai is now at rest. Succeeding him in boarding with us is Eddie the "Escape Artist" from my earlier post about Red and Eddie' excellent off-the-farm adventure. Needless to say, I will be taking extreme precautions around gates until we rotate them into Pasture 4 which does not require access to the driveway.
For those of you who voted or made suggestions in prettypammie's farm name poll, we have reached a decision: Tumble Rock Farm. Boarding space available.
Current Mood:  exanimate
Tags: agriculture, chickens, horses, q
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| | Cone? ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/4006831/508179) | | From: | happypete |
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| Date: | September 10th, 2007 11:22 am (UTC) |
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| | think of an elizabethan collar... | (Link) |
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you drop them in head-first...makes for better bleeding. ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/1865026/569522) | | | Re: think of an elizabethan collar... | (Link) |
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It makes them calm.
I think the funniest moment was when the kids were catching birds and Q went after the big white rooster. He was told "No, not that one! That's Captain Jack Sparrow!"
Because he thinks he's quite a man, and he's a big chicken...
-P ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/74057799/408754) | | From: | awfief |
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| Date: | September 10th, 2007 11:57 am (UTC) |
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| | | (Link) |
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that name rocks! Thanks. It seems to have stuck. This is easier to demonstrate than explain. I watched a few, then tried one. I was slow at it, but I didn't puncture gall bladder or intestine, which was good. Punctured crop, though.
Begin with bled out chicken with head & feet snipped off
Cut tissue around crop, trachea and remove. Try not to puncture crop (it contains grain the chicken has eaten)
Cut off neck (this is excessively phallic and cutting it off is a bit weird)
Open abdomen. Cut tissue around lower alimentary and anus. Remove intestines, kidneys, liver (be CAREFUL of the gall bladder!), gizzards, heart, testes. Scrape out lungs (they are against the back and sort of tucked into the ribs). Open gizzards, turn inside out to remove material, and peel off lining. Many people eat gizzards & other organs. They are also good to feed to pets. Can grind gizzards and neck and include in stuffing.
Chicken is ready for washing and disinfectant bath, after which it is bagged and refrigerated for a day to age a bit. After that you can freeze it. For roasters, leave carcass whole after disinfectant bath, for fryers, cut up and remove back. Chicken back is also good to feed to pets, as long as it is raw since it contains bones.
Not that anyone really wanted to know all that. It was certainly educational - I now know how to process my own poultry. However, it's pretty messy and labor intensive.
-P ![[User Picture]](https://l-userpic.livejournal.com/43530132/831547) | | | Re: Removing Viscera | (Link) |
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Yeah, go you! We did this for the first time last year - it was totally fascinating and it really is quite cool to be able to process your own food/poultry like that. Totally messy and labor intensive (and smelly, at times!) I took pics, of course ;) http://bobrow.net/kimberly/chickens/butchering/index.htm that's the lead-in page - the pics are an additional click away (for the squeamish) |
