- Dec 28, 2010
- 37
- 1
- 22
A friend gave us two CornishX's that they purchased for a 4-H project. The wing bands had fallen off and therefore weren't eligible to be shown so he gave them to me. They were about 10 weeks old. This was my first time processing completely on my own - I've helped my husband do a pig and some goats, but I've only been the assistant - never the one doing the actual processing. My 9 year old twin girls were also on hand to help and they were actually a huge help as they'd processed some chickens with some friends of ours in the past.
My husband held the heads and spun the chickens to kill them. It worked ok, but I think it bruised the meat a bit. One also ended up with a broken wing and I think it might have happened during the spinning. Next time I plan to simply cut the jugular myself. I also thought I would use orange traffic cones to bleed them out, but the birds were too fat and didn't fit in the cones. I think I'll either purchase stainless cones or cut the bottoms off the orange traffic cones I have for next time. I was surprised how little blood there was in a chicken. I ended up using zip ties to string them in the trees to bleed.
I used a turkey fryer setup to do the scalding. My chicken book says broilers need 135º water for 30 seconds. This didn't do anything to loosen the feathers. I found that 150º water for about 30 seconds was the right temp and time. My kids were helping me pluck so it was a bit of a free for all. I think next time I will contain the excitement and make them work systematically up the bird so that we can be sure that we get all the feathers out. I realized about 1/2 through the first bird that I needed a bar high table. My back was killing me after bending over to do the plucking. I ended up sitting down for the second bird.
The first bird I processed I decided to leave whole and the second I cut up into parts. I should have done this the other way around as I found opening up the cavity fully was really informative and would have helped with making sure we got all the innerds out properly. My twins were disappointed that we weren't able to ID any eggs or testicles. They really wanted to see if our guess of one cockerel and one pullet was correct.
The whole chicken and the chicken parts are all sitting in my fridge resting. I've read a lot about resting of meat, but have a question...I remember my grandma killing and cooking a bird the same day. What's different? Can we eat chicken tonight?
We aren't huge white meat chicken eaters so I can't imagine raising CornishXs, but I can see why people like them. If I did all that work for 8oz. of meat I might think twice. As it is, each dressed out about 6lbs. It was a fairly simple process and aside from plucking it took longer to setup, boil water and tear down than it did to process them. It wasn't nearly as stinky as I expected. I look forward to processing some dual purpose birds at some point to get a basis for comparison.
I'm not interested in a whiz bang plucker, but I can see investing in some nubby gloves to help. I'm a bit worried that we might be picking a pin feather or two out of our teeth when we eat the chicken.
Anyway, it all went well. I'm looking forward to eating our birds!
My husband held the heads and spun the chickens to kill them. It worked ok, but I think it bruised the meat a bit. One also ended up with a broken wing and I think it might have happened during the spinning. Next time I plan to simply cut the jugular myself. I also thought I would use orange traffic cones to bleed them out, but the birds were too fat and didn't fit in the cones. I think I'll either purchase stainless cones or cut the bottoms off the orange traffic cones I have for next time. I was surprised how little blood there was in a chicken. I ended up using zip ties to string them in the trees to bleed.
I used a turkey fryer setup to do the scalding. My chicken book says broilers need 135º water for 30 seconds. This didn't do anything to loosen the feathers. I found that 150º water for about 30 seconds was the right temp and time. My kids were helping me pluck so it was a bit of a free for all. I think next time I will contain the excitement and make them work systematically up the bird so that we can be sure that we get all the feathers out. I realized about 1/2 through the first bird that I needed a bar high table. My back was killing me after bending over to do the plucking. I ended up sitting down for the second bird.
The first bird I processed I decided to leave whole and the second I cut up into parts. I should have done this the other way around as I found opening up the cavity fully was really informative and would have helped with making sure we got all the innerds out properly. My twins were disappointed that we weren't able to ID any eggs or testicles. They really wanted to see if our guess of one cockerel and one pullet was correct.
The whole chicken and the chicken parts are all sitting in my fridge resting. I've read a lot about resting of meat, but have a question...I remember my grandma killing and cooking a bird the same day. What's different? Can we eat chicken tonight?
We aren't huge white meat chicken eaters so I can't imagine raising CornishXs, but I can see why people like them. If I did all that work for 8oz. of meat I might think twice. As it is, each dressed out about 6lbs. It was a fairly simple process and aside from plucking it took longer to setup, boil water and tear down than it did to process them. It wasn't nearly as stinky as I expected. I look forward to processing some dual purpose birds at some point to get a basis for comparison.
I'm not interested in a whiz bang plucker, but I can see investing in some nubby gloves to help. I'm a bit worried that we might be picking a pin feather or two out of our teeth when we eat the chicken.
Anyway, it all went well. I'm looking forward to eating our birds!
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