Quote:
Two reasons:
1) The Colored Range Broilers are unparalleled in quality and flavor. I've built them up and explained the Poulet Rouge scheme to my customers, and they now WANT those birds. They tell their friends about them. Chicken day at the market is a stampeed to get my birds.
2) The carcass shape of my homebred broilers is simply wrong. They look better than any heavy breed; but still, they look 'funny' to anyone used to buying grocery store meat or broilers. The keel still protrudes, the breast is thin, the thighs smaller, etc. They look like a broiler put on a forced march.
Part of selling farm raised meats to customers is getting them over the 'weirdness' of knowing the producer since we've removed the anonymity they are used to. Meat comes in styrofoam, not an animals. So, if I were to put my homebred broilers out there, it would be off the 'weird' scale and it would turn too many people off. They'd think we sold 'creepy' meat.
Now, I do breed broilers every year for myself. We're having one today as a matter of fact. But, it's just for our own use and we like comparing the differences between teh difference crosses as they reach our plate. We have our processor leave the legs on our birds, so we can tell them apart from the Colored Range Broilers which have the shanks removed. This way we don't accidentally sell one we shouldn't.
And, to make the point, I don't tell the processor which chickens are the Colored Range Broilers versus our homegrown broilers. He just knows by looking at them once the feathers are gone.
