Plucked my first Chicken

[nortac]

I plucked my first chicken today. I've kept chickens for their eggs for years, but I've never processed a bird for eating. When I started my flock over this spring, after the last old bird went "Tango Uniform", I bought an assortment of 12 chicks. As luck would have it, half of them turned out to be roosters! That's at least 5 roosters too many for my purposes. So after the "coop-de-gras" (see what I did there?) I hung the headless rooster up to bleed out. I "blanched" the carcass in hot water to loosen the feathers for plucking. I've read that the water temp should only be about 165 degrees. I let the water get up to about 180-ish before I turned off the propane burner. I doused the bird for about 6 minutes. While very tedious and time consuming, the feathers came out easily for the most part, but the skin tore in several places when plucking the feathers. I don't know if the water temperature or the soaking time had anything to do with it. While I'm aware of the "rubber fingers" type of devices for plucking faster, but I don't plan on doing it enough to invest in something like that. Any one have any tips for low tech traditional plucking techniques?

 

[Eric_75]

I plucked my first chicken today. I've kept chickens for their eggs for years, but I've never processed a bird for eating. When I started my flock over this spring, after the last old bird went "Tango Uniform", I bought an assortment of 12 chicks. As luck would have it, half of them turned out to be roosters! That's at least 5 roosters too many for my purposes. So after the "coop-de-gras" (see what I did there?) I hung the headless rooster up to bleed out. I "blanched" the carcass in hot water to loosen the feathers for plucking. I've read that the water temp should only be about 165 degrees. I let the water get up to about 180-ish before I turned off the propane burner. I doused the bird for about 6 minutes. While very tedious and time consuming, the feathers came out easily for the most part, but the skin tore in several places when plucking the feathers. I don't know if the water temperature or the soaking time had anything to do with it. While I'm aware of the "rubber fingers" type of devices for plucking faster, but I don't plan on doing it enough to invest in something like that. Any one have any tips for low tech traditional plucking techniques?

@blethenstrom may have some advice for you on this one, sir.

 

[Old Hippie]

Well, don't decapitate them. Then they thrash around and spray blood all over. Cool if that's your thing, but I'm not there.

Generally we grab the unlucky bird, hang it up by its feet from a loop of binder twine, throw some straw down under it, and cut the jugulars. Hold the head. The bird will flap and that helps pump out the blood. Then dunk and swish it around to get the hot water down to the skin and hang it back up. Then you can use two hands to pluck. Some people like to take off the pin feathers that remain with a blowtorch.

Some also like the "killer cones" that trap the chicken's head and allow the blood to drain without getting it all over your hand. We've never used them.

Gut it, chill it, freeze it. Probably not a fryer, but for a roaster/stewer you'll have a good flavourful chicken! One of the ways we do that is to set the oven no higher than 170F, and put the chicken in a covered pot. Let it bake for 24 hours. Getting the meat over 180F makes it tough, this is higher than the food-safety lower limit (165F) and gives a very soft, almost buttery, meat and lovely broth.

O.H.

 

[blethenstrom]

@blethenstrom may have some advice for you on this one, sir.

I was part of processing my first set of chickens not long ago and I was responsible of the scalding and plucking. Now we had a plucker because we were doing 15 birds. I think 165 degrees is a bit on the high side. I would say that would be on the top edge of the temperature range. We ran 155 if I am not mistaken. We had a temperature controlled scalder, which made it easy. The scalding time varied a bit from bird to bird, but 6 minutes is way too long. Usually it took 1-2 minutes. I definitely can see the skin starting to give out if it was that long. Easiest to tell is once the skin on their legs come off it is long enough. You do not want to scald them too long, because you are not trying to cook them.

Hope that helped
-Boris

 

[DesertIguana]

I don't want nothing to do with killing & processing Chickens, use to Bird Hunt, mostly Quail, they are not bad to process.

Now I have Quail come in my yard to look for food, honey they are more fun to watch, then most of stuff on TV.

 

[blethenstrom]

As luck would have it, half of them turned out to be roosters!

We keep hens for eggs as well, but we always buy pullets instead of straight runs so we do not get an overflow of roosters unless that is what you want. You were lucky it was just 50% roosters because a lot of straight runs are much more rooster heavy than that.

 

[nortac]

We keep hens for eggs as well, but we always buy pullets instead of straight runs so we do not get an overflow of roosters unless that is what you want. You were lucky it was just 50% roosters because a lot of straight runs are much more rooster heavy than that.

One of my "pullets" turned out to be a rooster to!

 

[nortac]

I will definitely keep the water temp closer to 155 degrees and the dunk time no longer than 2 min. next time. Thanks @blethenstrom for the feed back!

 

[nortac]

@Old Hippie , as far as decapitating the bird, I did that after shooting it in the head and after it stopped most of it's flopping around. Probably not the best technique, but that's what I did.

 

[helicopter]

I just peel off the skin of every bird. I know it is the best part, but skinning makes things a lot easier.

 

[blethenstrom]

One of my "pullets" turned out to be a rooster to!

Oh yes sexing chicks is not 100%. You still may end up with one here and there.

 

[DrStrange]

@Old Hippie , as far as decapitating the bird, I did that after shooting it in the head and after it stopped most of it's flopping around. Probably not the best technique, but that's what I did.

Whenever I've killed roosters,
I just grabbed their heads and spun them around real quick.

 

[nortac]

Well, I think I'm done harvesting roosters. Wife baked the rooster as soon as I had quartered it. She's a pretty good cook. But the rooster didn't smell right as it cooked and was nearly inedible . I don't know if it's the testosterone or what. It was a young but fully grown rooster raised as a chick this spring. I wouldn't think there was a problem with the way I processed it that would have affected the taste like that. Disappointing to say the least.

 

[DrStrange]

Well, I think I'm done harvesting roosters. Wife baked the rooster as soon as I had quartered it. She's a pretty good cook. But the rooster didn't smell right as it cooked and was nearly inedible . I don't know if it's the testosterone or what. It was a young but fully grown rooster raised as a chick this spring. I wouldn't think there was a problem with the way I processed it that would have affected the taste like that. Disappointing to say the least.

Coq Au Vin is a recipe specifically for cooking old roosters.
I have never been able to get it to taste good.

Coq En Cidre should not be translated into English
in mixed company.

 

[Old Hippie]

Well, I think I'm done harvesting roosters. Wife baked the rooster as soon as I had quartered it. She's a pretty good cook. But the rooster didn't smell right as it cooked and was nearly inedible . I don't know if it's the testosterone or what. It was a young but fully grown rooster raised as a chick this spring. I wouldn't think there was a problem with the way I processed it that would have affected the taste like that. Disappointing to say the least.

One of those little "country rules" I learned a long time ago is "Never eat chicken the same day you kill them." Mainly it's because you've got the smell of the processing still forefront in your mind, in my experience. I'd hazard a guess that you would have a better experience if you held the carcass cold in the fridge overnight or even over two nights before cooking it.

That wasn't an old bird, but I'm also guessing that you let them run around instead of putting them in a tight cage and piping the food in one side and the waste out the other. That'll make them leaner and more muscled if they can run around like chickens ought. Holding them cold for a short time lets the immediate biological changes from death have a bit of time to settle out.

I've always found that a nice pizza is a great meal on Chicken Day. All our roosters were always named "Lucky" because we bought straight-run chicks and let them grow up a little, then picked out the lucky one that looked the best before sending the rest of the males off to Freezer Camp.

O.H.