Ideas for cooking 9 month old hen?

[aart]

I hit the upper limit on one of my birds earlier this week. Tried pan frying a 4.5# live weight pullet whose age I mistook for somewhat younger than it was. Great flavor. Technically, it was moist. But it was closer to moist, well flavored beef jerky (minus the fat) than toothsome, well flavored chicken...

Lets just say, I'm going to be much more careful of my fryers in the future!

How old and what breed?
Did you rest cleaned carcass?

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Oops.

If you didn't bread it you can salvage any left-overs in the stock pot.

I did actually. We ate it, the bones, plus the carcass of two others, made chicken broth. We added onion, garlic, the last of the bumper ginger crop from 2021, and some wontons, a bit of soy, some bok choy, carrots, scallion from the garden...

It was a LOT Better than the fried chicken.

 

[CNJ]

Cold ginger chicken, soy sauce chicken, chicken adobo or soup. YouTube has them all......
I used this soy sauce chicken recipe, but cooked my chicken in a pressure cooker. When the pressure switched on the timer, I turned off the electric pressure cooker and waited for the pressure to go down before opening and then I flipped the chicken over, and did the same thing. My chicken was cooked by the second time. It takes a while for the pressure to recede, so the chicken was being cooked each time I turned off the unit. I used corn starch to thicken the sauce. Also, I didn't fry anything, I just threw everything in the pressure cooker.

 

[Ridgerunner]

What is the average weight of the birds you are cooking?

I don't have a clue. I've never bothered to weigh them because that is not important to me. There are only two of us and I can get two meals out of a small pullet. If I cook a large cockerel that just means I have chicken for a lunch or two. I'm not going to change anything because of weight.

 

[Morrigan]

All very helpful. My pullet dressed out at little over 3 lbs, so it looks like and where around the 2+ hour range would be good.

 

[3KillerBs]

Chewy, but not so chewy that we didn't enjoy eating it.

I'm old enough to remember chicken that you had to chew.

I don't like the mushy texture of super-tender meat.

 

[3KillerBs]

We added onion, garlic, the last of the bumper ginger crop from 2021, and some wontons, a bit of soy, some bok choy, carrots, scallion from the garden

I'd have loved to join you for dinner!

 

[Morrigan]

I had a similar thing happen. We saved the wings off of some 1+ year old culls that we were turning into sausage. Somehow, instead of the wings going into the "for stock" bag, then went into the "for eating" section of the freezer. A couple months ago we decided to grill up some wings for dinner. Talk about rubber chicken! When I checked the date on the wing bag against my farm notes I recognized my mistake. We powered thru that night as best as we could and then made stock with the rest.

 

[STACEYH]

Pan fried, chicken and dumplings, grilled and baked.

 

[aart]

Anyone very cooked a hen at this age?

I have... and older.
I rest in fridge for 3-4 days, then pressure cook.
Use the meat in various iterations, and then stock of course.
Curious why cook a 9mo pullet?


@Ridgerunner knows how to slow cook.