Flavoring meat birds

[SandraMort]

I was talking to Cris from Cripple Creek yesterday and he was talking about flavoring. He said that feeding the birds something for the last week or two would affect the flavor of the bird. He mentioned sage for chickens or oranges for ducks. Wow. Are there any places with further info on it?

 

[al6517]

That does work for other type livestock but other than using corn for fat and flavor I tend to think it may be a stretch for chickens. plus sage I don't think will hold in the meat especialy after only a week. the meat of a chicken is grained differently than other animals, close/tight/very linear. hey but anything is worth a try.

AL

 

[SandraMort]

Will a chicken eat hot peppers? I know that in wild bird food, they put hot peppers in to keep the squirrels away. I could totally get into spicy chickens, maybe a smoked pepper like a chipotle.

 

[SandraMort]

Come to think of it, it doesn't sound cost effective.

 

[Miltonchix]

Pineapple chunks for sweet-n-sour?

I've given my chicken jalapenos and they loved 'em.

 

[spook]

This is an interesting topic as just recently I heard of a doctor at my local hospital gives his Turkeys , each one, a bottle of wine 24 hours before he kills them. He and his dad are from Equidor and the claim is that it marinades the meat. I just assumed that it relaxed the turkeys for that 24 hours without creating stress prior to them being killed. Supposidly they force the turkey to take the whole bottle of wine.
I have no idea, I'd personally rather drink the wine while I eat the turkey! lol...but I don't drink...hmmm, perhaps it is a good idea, I don't mind the wine flavor, just no alcohol!

What is your thoughts on that?
My meat birds are 6 weeks and I've started to give them some scratch in with their food, put some weight on them. I'd like to bring them up to 8 weeks. I do not feed 24 hours a day, no night light. I wonder if I should?

(Miltonchix- I do love your idea of pineapple chunks!!! Dunno about the hot peppers! Yick! Deer or most types of game animals taste like what they have been eating, ie. an apple orchard deer is sweet and mellow flavor, liver is tastey too. A (Maine) ceder swamp deer will taste gamey, strong meat, also the liver can be dangerous to eat if you was to eat a lot of it. From the acorns- cianide(?) and the granite produces a form of radiation and a man that DH knew ate Liver frequently and he would actually set the gauger counter off even after a vacation coming into work at the Navel base!!!. I don't think its in the amounts the normal person eats, but like that family, people just gave him their deer livers, aparently eating a whole lot!) Sorry for the long babble.

 

[greyfields]

I've heard this theory. I think it's an old wives' tale, though.

Food is broken down into small constituent parts and becomes building blocks for muscle (meat). It's not like the food directly comes in contact with the muscle matter.

 

[dancingbear]

Quote:
Wouldn't forcing a bird to drink a whole bottle of wine create stress? Anytime you force a critter to consume something they don't want, they're gonna fight it. Now if they like it, and you just give it to them in place of water, that's different. I can see where a relaxed bird might be more tender. I doubt that it would marinate to meat, though. It would be digested and metabolized, it doesn't just soak through the body.

About the peppers, I was watching something on mythbusters, about sharks, actually, and found out that the capsacin (the thing that makes them hot) only affects mammalian species. Birds don't feel the burn. It also doesn't make the meat spicy. It's a great dietary supplement, though, a lot of people mix cayenne pepper with the feed to ward off illnesses. Cayenne (and other hot peppers) are natural antibiotics. I use cayenne capsules when I get a cold or flu, helps me get over it a lot faster.

 

[menageriemama]

Guess if I were gonna go, I would like a nice bottle of red too...

 

[spook]

I understand what you mean about forcing liquid down the throat of any critter...not my idea of treatment either, but it is interesting that this "works" for these guys. Who knows.
This was brought up in another topic about color feeding with Canary's feathers. A fellow breeder was discussing using cyanne pappers to help redden the colors of a canary to bring them to a brighter color. This is common and I always thought it was a bit to rough on their stomachs, but like I was told, it will not harm them. And like a yellow canary, if you fed it 'red' it will only deepen its color where a red factor canary it will brighten it. Chickens do not do this or we would have green chickens from all the grass they eat! lol.