The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Scott H]

You brine before you smoke poultry, for moisture, I believe. I will brine the Thanksgiving turkey. Just enough salt to let a raw egg float, garlic and spices.

I used to hunt pheasant a lot. Wished I'd heard of brining back then. Did use the Mushroom soup and also made my Mom's sweet and sour sauce recipe, Wild pheasant is a lot like cardboard.

 

[LMS]

Newbie-to-be lurker here, but I just bought a "yard bird" (as DH calls it) from a neighbor and she recommends using an oven bag and roasting the bird at low temp for a long time (like 250 degrees for 5 hours). The oven bag apparently keeps it from drying out. I'm not an oven-bag type, so I brined the chicken for a couple of hours and roasted it at 325 for 3 hours. It was delicious, but still tough, so I'm going to try again with the lower temp/longer roasting and see how that goes.

 

[Scott H]

Yes, bags retain moisture also but low and slow cooking tenderizes.

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

Newbie-to-be lurker here, but I just bought a "yard bird" (as DH calls it) from a neighbor and she recommends using an oven bag and roasting the bird at low temp for a long time (like 250 degrees for 5 hours). The oven bag apparently keeps it from drying out. I'm not an oven-bag type, so I brined the chicken for a couple of hours and roasted it at 325 for 3 hours. It was delicious, but still tough, so I'm going to try again with the lower temp/longer roasting and see how that goes.

I find my cockerels are nicer if I don't cook them the day they are processed. Resting in the refrigerator works.

 

[aoxa]

I'm so glad I checked with y'all. I would have baked it. I'll throw it in a crockpot and try for chicken and dumplings so I don't cover the flavor up with curry and everything.

Now, if you don't have meaties, and you have young roosters to butcher, how young do you have to do it to make them worth baking?

Depends on your tastes. I figure anything over 14 weeks will be tough if baked since I did my first at 16 weeks and they were all tough.

I use my meat kings for baking and my cockerels/old layers for slow cooking (or soup).

I rotisserie my meaties as well

Speaking of meaties.. I told you my one was laying that is 19 weeks. I tried to take some pictures of her for you all to see, but it was snowing so they are all inside. I did get a really crappy picture of my molting frizzle mating her.


He couldn't finish LOL
She is too big and he is too small. He's a tad bigger than a silkie, and he stood on her afterwards for a good 2 minutes just chilling. We call it pillow talk

 

[aoxa]

Del, that is why I'm not incubating her eggs HAH! Imagine the hilarity that would be their chicks

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

huh - so you are expecting the meat to be tough and stringy?   and here I was thinking of those pictures of the roasted chickens that everyone keeps posting.   
Leslie, love the curry spice mix mashed with salt - you would mix curry and fennel, mashed into the salt?  then mix with butter and rub?

I know Delisha seems to brine her birds alot, wonder if that is for the tough 20 week old roosters?

but if baking it is out, then crockpot might work.  there is an old southern recipe called country captain that is basically stewing the bird with curry, raisins, rice....so maybe that in a crockpot.

thanks!  

Yeah ... I mash all the spices with the chunky salt and then mix with butter to coat the bird then roast at like 325 for about an hour+ on a two level roasting pan ... I do quarter the bird, skin side up. It is SOOOOOOO good. The thighs and drumsticks usually disappear fast. But I like to pull the meat apart and cut up bits of the skin to mix into the rice. Don't forget the pan drippings.

Smoked salt is great for giving a richer, more authentic flavor to oven roasted birds. And a purest type person can MAKE salt and smoke it ...

I've oven roasted a skinny older cockerel before and it wasn't as tough as some people said it would be. Resting the bird in the fridge is nicer than not resting the bird. A day or so with a fresh bird ... don't know about a frozen one.

You might notice the tendons more. A bird that runs around has sounder legs than a commercial broiler. But broiler breeds are the big fat ones ...

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

Newbie-to-be lurker here, but I just bought a "yard bird" (as DH calls it) from a neighbor and she recommends using an oven bag and roasting the bird at low temp for a long time (like 250 degrees for 5 hours). The oven bag apparently keeps it from drying out. I'm not an oven-bag type, so I brined the chicken for a couple of hours and roasted it at 325 for 3 hours. It was delicious, but still tough, so I'm going to try again with the lower temp/longer roasting and see how that goes.

There is a science to the lower temperature thing ... It prevents the connective tissue from binding so it tenderizes tougher meats. The temps have to stay pretty low ...

 

[aaggjg]

Del, that is why I'm not incubating her eggs HAH! Imagine the hilarity that would be their chicks 

AOXA that is exactly why you should incubate!!! We need to see what that cross looks like!!!!

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

He couldn't finish LOL She is too big and he is too small. He's a tad bigger than a silkie, and he stood on her afterwards for a good 2 minutes just chilling. We call it pillow talk

I reminds me of Ruffles, the bantam Cochin thing in the fluffy pants stalking the dust bath area for mates. He can only catch one when she's down and her roo isn't looking ... but I bet he could catch a meaty. He doesn't know enough to scoot back, so mates with the shoulders instead if the vents ... we had another bantam that had that figured out ... But he was a troublemaker so he is no longer with us.