At 8 weeks old the meat birds, on average, had met our target weight for them of 6 pounds. A 6 pound bird yields a 4 pound carcass. These birds will grow more than double this weight, but this is the size that we think produces the tenderest, tastiest bird that is sized right for our family.
In this post we'll show you how we process the birds. "Process the birds" is a nice euphemism for slaughtering them. This post has blood & guts, so if that makes you queezy, check in with us on another day. This is reality, though. This is how meat gets to your table. Here goes:
Russ took a trip to Talladaga Motor Speedway for the weekend, so it was just Benjamin, Tricia, and I. We worked hard and got all 47 birds butchered. Benjamin is always the killer. He places the birds in upside down traffic cones. The rubber cones hold the birds tight. They are positioned over buckets to catch the blood. This goes into the garden. No need to buy Blood Meal. There is quite a dichotomy going on between the sweet smelling Confederate Jasmine blooming in the background and the 'not-so-sweet' task going on in the foreground.
Benjamin has a very sharp knife and he slits their throat. The chickens' hearts pump out all the blood and they "go to sleep." All the blood is removed from the carcass in this process. Not a pretty sight, but it is necessary. These aren't pets. They are food.
Once the birds' hearts stop beating and they are pronounced dead, Benjamin lays them on the ground next to the propane Crawfish Boiling pot that we use as a Scalder. I add some dishwashing liquid to the water to assist in cleaning the birds and allowing the feathers to come off easier in the next step. I dunk the chickens in the scalding water for about two minutes, up and down, up and down. When a tail feather or wing feather is able to be pulled out easy, they are ready for plucking.
One more thing. It is critically important to have a thermometer in your pot. You want to keep the water at a temperature of 145-148 degrees Fahrenheit. Any cooler and the birds won't scald and the feathers won't come out during plucking very easy. Any hotter and you cook the birds. You don't want to cook them now.
The next step is plucking. We made a Whiz Bang Chicken Plucker. It is electrically powered and has a washing machine motor that turns a plate on the bottom that spins the chicken quickly around, hitting rubber fingers that grab feathers during rotation and pull them off without damaging the bird. I spray the birds with water during plucking.
It doesn't take very long at all - maybe a minute and most all the feathers are removed. You don't want to spin the birds for much longer than that or you'll risk breaking the legs of the bird. You want to keep your chicken intact. Look how nice and clean the birds are when they emerge from the Whiz Bang Chicken Plucker!
I then cut off the feet and pull the heads off. Heads are pulled off versus cut off because cutting causes sharp bones that will cut your zip loc storage bags and increase the potential of freezer burn.
I begin lining the birds up on the table for Tricia. She is the eviscerator. That's a fancy way of saying she guts and dresses the chicken. To further prepare for that, I cut the oil gland off of each bird's tail. This gland is said to give an "off" flavor to the meat. Then I cut the bird's neck and loosen the crop and pull the windpipe out. Then I cut open a slit right above the vent to expose the entrails.
Tricia pulls the entrails out and cuts around the vent to remove. She cuts the gall bladder off of the liver, and removes the heart and gizzard. She pulls the lungs out of the backbone and tosses.
The liver, heart and gizzard are all separated out. They'll be cleaned and cut later and processed and frozen.
One final washing is done to remove any remaining blood and guts.
Once clean, the birds are submerged in a tub of cool water. This begins a cooling process, bringing the bird's body temperature down. It also serves a second purpose. Beneath the water, flies can't land on them. After a couple of hours, we pour out the water as it will be warm from the birds' body heat. We quickly replace with fresh cool water and then we add ice and allow the birds to chill for 8 hours. During this time the birds go through rigor mortis.
While we wait for the next step, we accumulate all the feathers, guts, and blood and bury them in the garden.
Tomorrow, we'll show you the process of cutting up the birds and storage. We may also go over the numbers to show the details like, total pounds of meat harvested, total expenses, cost per pound, how much feed each bird consumed, etc. It is always an interesting exercise. Spoiler Alert: If you think that it is cheaper to produce birds yourself, you would be wrong. It is much cheaper to buy them at the store. If you remember studying Economies of Scale in Economics class, Tyson certainly has that advantage in their favor. However, there are other reasons to do this rather than price. We may discuss those tomorrow.
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