Resting time before butchering?

[Charlene]

I know you should rest your chicken a few days after processing, but can I butcher it into pieces (breast, legs, etc) frist or do I have to wait past the resting time for that? Not sure how much room I have in the fridge, and I've got 10 birds to process!

 

[iowagrandpa]

I have never rested chicken, just butcher eat freeze whatever.

 

[NevadaRon]

Howdy iowagrandpa and

!

 

[Germaine_11.20]

Yes you can cut them up if you want. I let mine age in the fridge for 2 to 3 days to let the natural enzymes in the chicken tenderize the chicken before freezing.

Same with rabbit.

 

[ChickenPotPie]

I just read an article about small scale chicken farming to industrial chicken farming. The author was very thorough about everything. She is an agricultural specialist. She said to get a tender bird - chicken only needs to age 4 hrs before cooking. An over night or multi-day stay in the fridge is not needed but over night aging is convenient you've got to agree. Below is the link the the article. Go to "Aging" for a very good explanation as to why aging is important but need not be long for chicken.

http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/poultryprocess.html

 

[Germaine_11.20]

That is an excellent article, thank you very much!

 

[NevadaRon]

ChickenPotPie I thought that article was fantastic! That whole site is very interesting. Thanks for posting it!