Cooked chicken real tough

[Aaron B]

I took the advice given in this thread on cooking old birds and tried another one. I had a year and a half old rooster I cooked. I butchered the bird and let it sit in a brine solution for three days. Afterwards, I cooked it in a crock pot. It was great. I now know this is how I will be cooking future old birds. I also tried the three day resting period for my young birds before putting them on the grill, and they were great too.

 

[Phoenixxx]

I don't know how old my rooster was, but I rested him for several days then put him in salt water for another day. I slow roasted him (in an inch of water) for about 4 hrs, I think, on 230F. He was still a bit tough, i was NOT happy. I just so happened to get sick around that time so I decided to make him into homemade chicken soup. (I literally live on chicken soup when I'm sick!) WOW, was he ever delicious then! And after the first hour of boiling, the meat just melted in the mouth!

So yeah, if your old bird doesn't turn out on your first try, put it in the soup pot before giving up!

 

[Stokley]

Thank you all so much for your advice. I've been culling my Roos as of 12 weeks and they have been very tough and chewy even in soups. After reading your posts we did the brine thing overnight then the crock pot on low for 8 hours. The difference was incredible. Since these birds have only been 12-19 weeks old do you think I need to do all three 1. Rest, 2. Brine 3. Crock Pot? I'd like to be able to grill or soup a couple of them.

 

[SunnySkies]

Thank you all so much for your advice. I've been culling my Roos as of 12 weeks and they have been very tough and chewy even in soups. After reading your posts we did the brine thing overnight then the crock pot on low for 8 hours. The difference was incredible. Since these birds have only been 12-19 weeks old do you think I need to do all three 1. Rest, 2. Brine 3. Crock Pot? I'd like to be able to grill or soup a couple of them.

You won't be able to grill a 12 week old DP bird, no matter how long you brine it. They just don't have the genetics to make a tender, juicy table bird suitable for grilling or roasting. If you want to grill or fry or roast, you will pretty much have to raise a few meat birds (CX, FR or the Belgian Malines whenever they are available in the US). Don't waste your time trying to grill a cull rooster. Just keep brining and crockpotting them.

Resting helps all meat.

Brining is pretty much all you can do. Then low, slow, moist cooking for DP birds. Sorry.

You could crockpot a rooster, pull the meat then add to an uncooked soup and boil it some more. That might help.

 

[Stokley]

Great thanks. Please excuse my ignorance but what does "DP bird" mean?

One more question - if you are going to freeze a bird, I've read you should rest it first but do you brine it before you freeze or after or does it matter?

 

[RoostersCrow HensDeliver!]

Great thanks. Please excuse my ignorance but what does "DP bird" mean?

One more question - if you are going to freeze a bird, I've read you should rest it first but do you brine it before you freeze or after or does it matter?

DP stands for Dual Purpose.
It is best to rest the birds before freezing but I haven't done this with some CornishX carcasses and just let them sit in the fridge to thaw for a few days and they were fine. I ALWAYS rest DP meat before freezing though.

 

[Stokley]

Thanks - how about the brine do you do that before or after freezing?

 

[RoostersCrow HensDeliver!]

I don't brine mine, never had a problem with flavor or anything being tough.

 

[kynewbchickie]

Thanks - how about the brine do you do that before or after freezing?

I always brine mine after the cull/processing - it pulls the excess blood out of the tissues that didn't completely drain out during the slaughter (even with a kill cone you still have some areas of the bird's anatomy that allows for pooling to occur, like the wings for example). Hope this helps!