Look! Chicken is ready - the creepy meats are nice and fat!
We are working our way thru this batch and have some of them chilling in the fridge. We did two batches last week and did six more today. Mostly there are just hens left as we choose our "volunteers" based on size. Today's volunteers were just over 9 weeks old. Last week's were on track with the expected growth rate, but we were happy to have some larger birds.
Yep, thats my boot for scale. I wear about a 7.5 for reference.
Look what a difference this last several weeks has made. So far they all seem to be OK but when I part them up I'll see if there are any with the icky green muscle disease.
My pal, AL, is growing creepy meats out for the first time so I wanted her to see how much they can grow in a couple weeks. Also to remind her that here are my best tips for dressing chickens (warning! it has graphic details - but no pictures) - this link is about rooster day but it also applies to creepy meats.
A couple things struck us again today. So I thought I'd pass them along. The first, is that the creepy meats, unlike the older roosters, are really really easy to disjoint. Like... creepy easy... its kinda weird how easily they can be taken apart. My other pal FF, reminded me that its because they are so young - so we weren't so icked out. We kept thinking about this because the easily-parted-up thing is one of the chief reasons that meats are so darn creepy.
We also found a few with the weird leg thing but not as bad as our first volunteers last week. We had a couple that had trouble even walking. The fast grown causes structural problems and sometimes their legs can break just trying to hold up their own weight! Another reason why they are creepy.
We also had a couple with broken wings after the..um.. that is.. the "dispatching" part of the day. I'd heard about this from folks who dress chickens for sale. We hadn't experienced this before so it was kind of surprising.
Otherwise, everything went very smoothly. We skinned rather than plucked because we got such a late start and were in a hurry. As it was we ran out of daylight so we'll work on the rest of the meats next week. Until then I'm coming up with lots of ways to fry up this creepy meat in a pan.
And that is the creepy meat update. Happy Tuesday everyone!
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10 comments:
We are having creepy thighs for supper tonight........YUM! And The Youngun and I are having creepy breasts for lunch...YUM! We always skin them.........too much trouble to pluck. Then I just double dip them in egg, milk/ flour and fry them in lard. Crispy delicious fried sicken!
Those creepy birds of yours are looking great. We had to butcher a couple of our old hens the other day because they decided it would be a great time to start molting...it was -8°the day I turned them into soup meat. The good news is that there is now plenty of room on the top pirch for the rest of them. Happy Tuesday!
Great info! Thanks! Sure wish we could get you to FLorida for at least the first batch! lol
Note to self... Creepy meaties are ready when size of bird matches my size 10 boot. LOL OFG!!
Agh! They're huge! And almost every tidbit about them is, indeed, creepy. Do you notice any difference in terms of smarts? A friend of mine just got a domestic turkey and a wild turkey, and she noticed that the domestic was sort of insane and not the brightest creature.
GW - one of the old timers just told me about this egg, milk, flour thing! and in lard... wow... a gal after my own heart for sure. whooot!
Great work Mr H! We need to work on some of our older hens. The church ladies have told me the older ones (chickens not church ladies) make the best broth. You'll have a terrific stew for sure. Don't forget to give the extra weird bits from your stock making to the cats!
L - you are gonna do great! really.. just trust the way of things and dont freak yourself out. our pal, BBH, will tell you she "chickened" out but then when she saw it done.. she totally knew she could get 'er done.
Tanks if you got a "size 10 creepy meat" I'd come to to help you! ha!
LBSS - they are dumber than posts. Wow! we had some BBW turks and altho they had funny ways and were kinda charming... our Bourbon Reds ran circles around them - literally and figuratively! The creepy meats just aren't very "chicken-y." One of the reasons I love my hens so much is because they are so industrious..not so with these. Delicious, but not very "up and at 'em."
We did 11 of those creep birds a couple weeks ago & a dozen 3 months before. They are some fast growing birds that is for shore we learned after the first batch Don't let them get over 70 days old before culling them.1 bird was almost 8 lbs dressed out. Will wait until spring to do more. They shore are good eating we get 2 meals out of 1 bird at our house.
Hi OFG, try seasoning your chicken pieces with salt and tumeric powder (if using fresh tumeric pound them till fine) for twenty minutes before shallow frying
You said it, Charlotte, the food value is amazing.. if you can get past the "creepy" part. And they are pretty easy to grow out.
;-)
Sounds great, Grandpa! Tumeric it is.. and I think I even have some.
Hello! Typically I am one of those very naughty ghostreaders but I wanted to comment and tell you not only how much you make me laugh and motivate me to do more with my tiny 1.25 acre plot, but also to share something I found with you. Apparently these are slightly-less-creepy meats:
http://www.freedomrangerhatchery.com
they are typically butchered between 9 and 11 weeks at approx 5-6 lbs LIVE weight. I'm ordering 25 this spring to see how they taste. According to my calculations it's only a few cents more for a slightly slower growing and what I imagine to be a much less creepy chicken. Thought I'd share my find.
Toodles!
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