Ultimate Harvest of 2018

July 5, 2018

September 22, 2018

Okay, so we are four days past the ultimate harvest of the year. I have had a chance to think about the importance of growing and processing our own birds and to do a little research of the method that we have seen over and over again on YouTube from other homesteaders (which I still do not claim to be).

When first mentioning that we are growing meat chickens the first thing that people ask after we say that this is a DIY project is, " Are you going to cut their heads off?"

Now I understand that's how many people see home chicken processing. I know that my mom did that, but I think...I'm not positive, but I am almost sure that she cut the head and then placed the chicken in a big metal drum while it was slowly dying it's awful and inhumane death.

The method that we went with is called Halal or can also be considered Kosher. Which in the simplest terms means that the kill is done quickly with a slit of the jugular and left to bleed out. From my research this is the Muslim tradition. If done correctly, there shouldn't be need for a second cut, but sometimes that happens. Like when I decide it's time for me to get one kill in and there are only three chickens left. All afternoon I was thinking how I should probably do at least one kill...and I kept meaning to, but was distracted with other tasks to hopefully make clean-up a little easier. In the end, clean up was the hardest...but I digress...I tried and Tom had to make another cut. While I did do one last year - sort of. This was easier, but still not enough for the bleed out to happen very quickly. I should have known better as they chicken was looking at me as if to ask what he or she had done to me to deserve a not so swift bleed out. Oh well, I'll have other opportunities at future processing times.

Three of the Rangers in Restraining Cones

After lots of google searches we decided that the birds would benefit from resting in the fridge overnight. This was to allow the rigor to leave the body. We let the birds sit overnight in the refrigerator and then placed them in a tub to brine the following day. Several people online had said that the brine would help make the chicken tender. Tom thought we should try half brined and half not, but in the end it was just easier to brine all of them.

On Monday it was time to drain and rinse and let the chicken dry...

Before bagging the birds we had to take the Poultry kit back to the Clark Conservation District and get our deposit money back :) The gentleman who helped us pointed out the "ring" around the top of the scalder and surmised that maybe we were not informed to be on the look out for that and to make sure that it was totally cleaned. Notes for next time - clean, clean and then clean some more. To be honest, the plucker was the most difficult to clean as the feathers got stuck underneath the rubber fingers. They did NOT want to come out very easily. There really is no way to avoid that unless we want to hand pluck. I will gladly spend the time getting the feathers out of the bazillion plucker fingers.

Once we returned we went ahead and started the process to bag the chickens. Oh My Goodness...I think that the shrink wrap bags is like the best thing EVER! Slide a chicken in the bag, place the tube in the cavity and get a zip tie on. Then a very short dip in boiling water and there is your perfectly bagged chicken!

This is just an overview of the weekend process. Would we do anything different? Sure...there is always room for improvement.

First, knives...a variety of sharp knives would have been better. Processing day came up pretty fast and we knew that the knife selection would be limited. In the end it worked out, but I suggested a trip to Good Will yesterday to see if we could find anything that would work. Luckily we found a set of kitchen knives (forged knives) that included a small clever and some shears for $6.99 (plus tax). That was an excellent find! Those will be easy to hone using the steel  or a bench grinder (if needed).

The other thing that we would do is place the scalder in the garage to protect it from the wind. At some point the pilot light went out because of the wind and the water temp dropped about 15 degrees cooler than it should have been. Tom figured out that the pilot light is not easy to see. Nothing a blow torch can't fix.

We will need to rethink the chill chest for after the birds have been eviscerated and ready to go into the refrigerator. Maybe an old refrigerator or a giant cooler. There is time, BUT now I'll be checking out craigslist for all sorts of stuff in the months to come.

The whole operation could be moved onto the lawn or maybe even directly in front of the garage. That way, when we are spraying stuff down or even emptying water out of things it will go into the lawn. That is something that we will explore next year.

Also, we might let the birds go one more week before processing them. That means more food for them, but that would also mean that the 3 pound birds that we had might weigh a little more.

While we are on the subject of weight - we ended up with 56 pounds of chicken from 15 birds - that averages out to 3.7 pounds per bird. I think that's a pretty awesome harvest at 11 weeks old.

Yep, I'm pretty excited about this chicken processing experience. I am ready to do this again...

Next Spring.

Farm Life Baby!