Butchering: Story of a Noob

[Lammie]

I can remember my dad dressing out deer carcasses, and hogs, and I know there are some of you that will even butcher your own cattle. I admire that.

Anyone try to butcher their own chickens?

I ordered a straight run of chicks several years ago. Naturally, you get about half roosters. (I order sexed chicks now.) Anyway, I had been selling my excess roosters to the Mexicans at the plant where my husband works and I always had enthusiastic customers.

One time I got the brilliant idea. I was going to butcher those young roosters myself for th e freezer. I research, I read. I think I am ready. Steve and I go out and get 5 young roosters. (Almost full grown Barred Rocks). We put the heads in the cone, we slit, we bleed, so far so good.

Now comes the plucking of the feathers. In all my reading, I don't recall the part about dipping the chicken in scalding water to loosen the feathers.

Plucking a chicken sucks. Did you know they poop after they are dead? I should know this. Everything relaxes and it just comes out.

So we are covered in poop and blood with feathers stuck to us, plucking away. I look at Steve, he looks at me. Then we simultaniously throw the chickens in the trash can.

Screw that! Whole chickens are cheap at the store! Everyone in my family had a laugh at my expense.

I might try again in the future, and do the scalding. I was also wondering about guts, but never got the chance to deal with that part.

That's my hobby farmer story. If you have similar noob experience, feel free to post.

 

[The Bachelor]

We always skin em. Usually, we'll do 50 a year and cut the breasts legs wings etc off and leave the carcass with the guts intact and throw it away. Just lose the back meat then (which isn't much). Towards the end of the butchering, my wife usually dresses out 5-10 whole chickens taking out guts and all.

The first year was a little weird, now its just old hat.... same with rabbits.....

 

[fit2btied]

I agree with Bachelor, skinning is the way to go, even though the skin is one of my favorite parts. I always tell my wife that's where all the vitamins are, right under the skin!

 

[rkm]

Makes you think when you order a McChicken sandwich from Micky Dees!

 

[rockridgecattle]

Did it once and I'm not sure if i will do it again. Though I get the notion to raise chickens for butcher now and again. Then my husband reminds me how much I enjoyed it the first time.
Crazy story of butchering:
We do butcher our own cows.
This story is both crazy and sad:
Once upon a time...yeah right this is farming!
We had a cow calve out a calf. The calf did not seem right. Treated and treated to no avail. Took it to the vet and had a whole in the heart. Well, that is not the end of the story.
We took care of the calf the .22 cent way.
The cow on the other hand that was an expereince.
She had jumped the pannel a time before. We had pulled the calf out of the pen to treat. She was not impressed. She could see the calf and everything, but that was not enough. Fixed that pannel. Any how the calf, Hersy, ws dead and we had some twins we were botttle feeding. Cadbury the cow we thought could take a twin. I named her and the calf because we were treating the calf, and the cow would let me free stand milk her with no problems. Very gentle, for a BA.
Any how, on went Ozzie the twin. She let it suck in the mat pen, but it was late at night and we did not want to chance the cow killing Ozzie so we put them both next to each other in the barn, in two different pens.
Next morning, we went out. My husband saw the cow laying down and thought all was fine. I went into the barn and she did not get up. That was unusual because she new i had grain. So i checked on her. Sure enough broke her leg trying to jump the pannel looking for her calf. I thought i could splinter the leg, huband went to call the vet i worked on the leg. Did not work well. Husband came back and said the vet said cows don't mend from broken legs. Can butcher if the temperature is low enough. I should point out she had calves 3-4 weeks earlier.
So I took the temp many times to be sure.
We butchered. My husband was upset because the twin thing was his idea. Perfectly good cow, queit, all you want from a cow, raised nice calves. It happens to the best.
My husband had a hard time taking care if the deed. He does not usually, but he knew i really like the cow. In the frustation of it all, his knfe was dull and could not bleed the cow quick enough, he was frustrated, and upset and things just weren't going right. I grabbed the knife and well need i spell the rest?
We did not need the meat cause we just butchered cows in the fall. What were 2 people going to do with all that meat? How do you find people to buy in cattle country? So we donated the meat to the local bible camp. We took the cacass to a local farm butcher guy and he took care of it for us.
It was a rough day.

 

[bward]

Back to chickens. It took me over 2 hours to kill pluck and clean a chicken the first time.( with my Joy of Cooking book telling me 'how to') I cooked it that night and it was awful.
The worst part was taking one piece of icky inard out at a time.

Then I had some neighbours with know come come and show me how its done and we got about 30 of them done in about an hour. :roll:

 

[dun]

Back to chickens. It took me over 2 hours to kill pluck and clean a chicken the first time.( with my Joy of Cooking book telling me 'how to') I cooked it that night and it was awful.
The worst part was taking one piece of icky inard out at a time.

Then I had some neighbours with know come come and show me how its done and we got about 30 of them done in about an hour. :roll:

Back in my squirt days it was my job to kill and draw the chickens for sunday dinner. That pretty much broke me from eaing chicken. When I see chicken even now I still smell the innards.

 

[millstreaminn]

I raised 50 of these "basketball" looking meat chickens last year. Never again. I plucked and boned one, skinned and boned 5 more, then just skinned and kept the legs and breasts on 5 more and gave the rest of the birds away... :roll:

 

[Lammie]

Broilers? Yeah, you can just about watch them put on weight right in front of your eyes!

 

[The Bachelor]

I raised 50 of these "basketball" looking meat chickens last year. Never again.

Thats what we raise. Gotta be one of the ugliest animals on the face of the earth, but they get as big in four weeks as the RIR's do in eight. Once I get past the looks (and the fact they'll have a heart attack on you if they have to run for three seconds in a row), they taste all right... and saving four weeks worth of feed costs always makes me happy...

 

[R.T.]

When I was a kid we raised fryers. Several thousand per
batch. We were under contract to raise and sell a certain
number of birds. All birds over were ours to keep and dress.
There were sometimes more than 100 to dress. We did the wring neck chop off head and chase method. Dad used two or three hot water dip pots and the open flame to singe the small pin feathers. The extra pots were used in order to end up with a clean bird to pluck.

 

[Lammie]

I guess I need to be with someone and watch it being done. I am a visual learner. Wonder how to go about that? I can see me posting an ad in the paper.

Wanted: Someone who butchers their own chickens so I can watch.

Sounds like some perversion. :shock:

 

[rkm]

Lammie, You could go to Cuba, I hear Fidel Castro is very good at butchering his own chickens. :lol: :lol:

 

[cfpinz]

I love to watch them run around after you cut their heads off. I know. I'm weird.

cfpinz

 

[dun]

I love to watch them run around after you cut their heads off. I know. I'm weird.

cfpinz

A basic understatement

 

[Lammie]

I read where you weren't supposed to let them do that because it makes the meat taste different. Like, the blood gets into their lungs, something like that. I used gallon milk jugs. I cut them in half, stuffed the little heads in the tops and let them hang and bleed out.

Everyone I know, though, has a "chicken with its head cut off" story.

 

[CUZ]

. . .
Everyone I know, though, has a "chicken with its head cut off" story.

Mine is a hand me down story. Great uncle who lived with his sister and BIL was still about half soused one morning when he went to chop the chicken's head off. Well he missed, but didn't realize it and let the chicken go to run around. In his foggy state he couldn't wrap his mind around how that chicken could get away from him. They had a different chicken for dinner that day.

Cuz

 

[Dave]

I raised 25 of those basketball birds a couple years ago. Just the year before there was a guy who would custom kill and dress them. So I was trying to get in touch with him. The chicken kept growing while I am trying to run this guy down. One morning I went out to the pen and there is a dead one. Laying on his back with both feet in the air. I had heard that if they get too big they will have heart attacks. So I decide to butcher them myself the next day. Well I get everything ready and go out to the pen and there are three more dead, laying on their backs with their feet in the air. I guess I put off doing it too long while I was trying to find that other guy. Those birds dressed over 7 pounds. More like a small turkey. Living alone every time I would cook one it would take me a week to get it ate.

 

[Gate Opener]

I love to watch them run around after you cut their heads off. I know. I'm weird.

cfpinz

Ewwwwwwww!

 

[MikeC]

Anybody ever dressed an EMU? That's quite an experience! :lol:

Those neckbones will feed a family of 12 with some leftover. :shock: