soup pot chicken

[bobbi-j]

I took this photo this morning. 18 pints of broth and 3 vacuum freezer bags of cooked meat.

 

[bobbi-j]

Tell us more please.

It's a bit of an investment if you don't already have the equipment. You need a pressure canner, jars, rings and lids for the jars. My favorite resource for canning is the Ball Blue Book of Canning and Preserving. I bone out all of the meat, cut into smaller pieces, and then can it. The carcass can then be boiled for broth. If you want to PM me, I'd be happy to discuss it more with you.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

I love the taste of our chickens, but not the work. And the work involved in butchering your birds is significant. Add to that the fact that laying hens have teeny little body cavities that I find almost impossible to clean, and I don't do it. You might want to kill one at a time and butcher that one before killing another one, because then if you REALLY hate it you can stop, and also because it will take longer than you expect for the first few and this way you dont' have the carcasses sitting around too long.

I would pay a small amount for someone else to butcher mine, though. Say $3 or so.

 

[catterbug]

We have harvested meat birds before but we have never done layers so I am tinkering with the idea if it is worth it. I found someone who can do it for about $3 a bird which is what I was thinking since he can do it much faster than me and he supplies all his own bags etc. to place the meat in. When we have done the meat birds, we used a friends make shift supplies but this guy has all the fancy stuff. Not that I need the fancy stuff but it saves a lot of time. Plus plucking feathers is not my most favorite thing in the world.

 

[bobbi-j]

That sounds like a pretty good deal. We don't pick our layers, we skin them.

 

[WalkingOnSunshine]

That sounds like a pretty good deal. We don't pick our layers, we skin them.

I agree, skinning is easier than plucking by a long shot!

 

[Presidential]

I recently harvested my first chicken. Skinning was so much easier for me than plucking! I made a big pot of soup, so I didn't need the skin for my recipe, anyway. I was surprised how easy it was. I won't be nervous next time. Delicious!