Bitty. Completely adorable. Not a loud meat rooster.
This morning we tackled half of our loud roosters and they are now resting comfortable in the downstairs beer fridge. Some people make the mistake of immediately putting the processed chickens into the freezer. Nope. Don't do that - let them rest for about a day. That way they can go thru the rigor process and be tender and delicious. This is an interesting poultry industry article that explains it.
Tomorrow I'll part up the chilled birds and then we'll go out and get rid of the rest of our rooster problem. Then there will but nothing but chicken dinner for everyone!
If you are keeping track these are the rooster from the first batch of fall meat chix we got back in September. They were about 10 weeks old. These dressed out to be a good size. I'll see if I can get a weight on them tomorrow when I'm parting them up.
Don't we have to butcher at 7 or 8 weeks? Friend, you don't have to do anything. Even tho we rushed these they are still "young" for us. If we had not outsmarted ourselves we might have waited another week.... but I have been hearing those roosters since we moved them over to the Turkey House.
And as we say around here, "When you start to crow - you got to go!" Directly into the pot that is.
Since we always process the largest and most aggressive birds first we think that it will be much quieter around here. And hopefully we'll have our entire rooster population sent to the freezer in the next couple of days.
Happy Friday everyone! Guess what is for dinner? (Tomorrow that is... let your birds chill!)
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6 comments:
Glad to hear your rooster problem is on the way to being solved.
Sounds like things will be quiet on the farm front soon.I still have not heard any crowing from mine. maybe because they are younger.
I think I am going to do 5 more tomorrow......the biggest ones of course. I think I will let the other 6 wait until the following Saturday so they can grow a little more.
I wonder if I should have let all of mine go the full ten weeks? I did 5 last week and they were only 7 1/2 weeks old but they could hardly walk. The rest don't seem as bad. But they did weigh in around 6 3/4 lbs. butchered. I thought that was pretty good for my first meaty birds.
I will be curious to see what some of the weights are on some of yours. I did pluck the first 5 so I know that will add quite a bit to the weight leaving the skin on.
I have to say I have been peeking in at the 5 chickens in the freezer and its nice knowing that they were raised here. I did let them rest for 24 hours like you said before freezing. I will probably try one sometime next week. We just put a side of beef in the freezer so been fixing that everyday. By that time will be ready for some chicken.
Take care
Coq au vin !
We are gradually getting our cockerels into the freezer as well, and it sure is nicer here without all that mayhem which too many cockerels get up to.
And you skin'em right?
you betcha, Dave!
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