Are roosters appx. 13-14 weeks okay in flavor to eat?

[Parront]

Those feet added to the carcass in a crockpot overnight make a stock that can be sliced once it's cold! I loved having that as an ingredient for all those recipes that want chicken broth or chicken bullion.

I count the feet as part of the bird, and a reason to raise my own is to have ALL of the bird. So, I guess my estimation of ~2 pounds for a cockerel might be on the high side for the people who do not use all the parts. Like the birds we are discussing here, picked usable meat might be a lot less. A whole bird split open and the back/neck removed per person. You pick and eat the bird outside at the picnic table with corn on the cob and clean up with a hose! Watermelon for desert, Arkansas delight!

 

[Mosey2003]

I have found that the feet on my dual purpose birds are MUCH easier to skin than when I did Cornish Cross. I can only assume that a little more age made the skin thicker, thus easier to peel off. I tried to blanche and skin the CX feet and it just didn't go well at all and I ended up scrapping them. I, too, like them in stock.

 

[3KillerBs]

I count the feet as part of the bird, and a reason to raise my own is to have ALL of the bird. So, I guess my estimation of ~2 pounds for a cockerel might be on the high side for the people who do not use all the parts. Like the birds we are discussing here, picked usable meat might be a lot less. A whole bird split open and the back/neck removed per person. You pick and eat the bird outside at the picnic table with corn on the cob and clean up with a hose! Watermelon for desert, Arkansas delight!

I have picked so many chicken carcasses in a lifetime of frugality and using all the meat that can be used that my coworkers in the deli^ are astonished at how fast I can reduce one of those little rotisserie chickens to a pile of meat -- and get more meat off them than others too.

I even save carcasses in the freezer until I have enough for the stockpot or the crockpot.

When I had the in-town flock I didn't worry about being quite *that* thorough, though, because I would give them the picked over bones with the unwanted giblets so that they could finish cleaning up. The ultimate recycling!

^Lowes Foods has the Chicken Kitchen attached to the deli and we use yesterday's rotisserie chickens for the rotisserie chicken salad, the chicken quesadillas, the BBQ chicken pizza, the picked chicken sold cold, the chicken soup (pre-COVID on the salad bar), etc.

 

[Parront]

I have picked so many chicken carcasses in a lifetime of frugality and using all the meat that can be used that my coworkers in the deli^ are astonished at how fast I can reduce one of those little rotisserie chickens to a pile of meat -- and get more meat off them than others too.

I even save carcasses in the freezer until I have enough for the stockpot or the crockpot.

When I had the in-town flock I didn't worry about being quite *that* thorough, though, because I would give them the picked over bones with the unwanted giblets so that they could finish cleaning up. The ultimate recycling!

^Lowes Foods has the Chicken Kitchen attached to the deli and we use yesterday's rotisserie chickens for the rotisserie chicken salad, the chicken quesadillas, the BBQ chicken pizza, the picked chicken sold cold, the chicken soup (pre-COVID on the salad bar), etc.

Pretty sure Costco uses the unsold rotisserie chicken like that, too. After the BBQ, not much left at my house. We even ate the necks when I was a kid, left on and BBQ with the backs. My husband will not sit and pick and eat that slow! My Grandmother's family were the chicken raising people, they had an "egg farm" in Yuba City, CA in the 40's. Little leghorn roosters were eaten.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

oh, and since you question marked.

"mirepoix". Its French, because of course it is. Two parts Onion, one part Carrot, one part Celery, cooked slowly in a fat (butter, typically) until softened, used as a base in much cooking. See also Sofrito/Sofritto. The "Trinity" of Cajun fame is the same concept, with local ingredients - onion, celery, green peppers (Louisiana isn't well suited to growing carrots) keeping the same 2:1:1 ratio.

I may not know much about birds, but I'm fond of god cooking.

 

[K0k0shka]

I recently ate two at around 10 weeks old (started crowing). They were delicious! One made a pressure cooker soup, and the other a sous vide roast. Everything but the breast was tender and very flavorful. The breast... Well, I don’t like the breast on any kind of bird, so I’m biased.

 

[Mosey2003]

That's plenty young, they'll be fine.

 

[Parront]

In my signature, there is an article with pressure cooker fried chicken I like for a bird ~16 weeks old.

 

[Kakaruk]

Ok, so I slaughtered the three roosters yesterday...... what an ordeal! I hadn't slaughtered a chicken in about 15 years and I remember why. I didn't pluck the feathers but just took the whole skin off. Anyway, the girls are very happy and content now, with no boys around!

I've got the 3 in a brine overnight and we've decided to make chicken enchiladas. I'll let you know how it comes out. The actual meat weight so far I have not determined but it seems like each bird is around 2 pounds or less.

Oh, question: the livers, hearts, and gizzard I'm going to use for flavor in cooking. I'll probably eat the livers, they are so good. What about the yellow membrane inside the gizzards? Do I need to peel that off before I saute? Or is it okay to saute them with the yellow membrane?

 

[Ridgerunner]

I remove the yellow membrane.