Last year one of my friends raised chickens to order so I got some beautiful, heritage chickens from them. This year they moved into town and couldn’t raise meat chickens so I talked my Dad into getting some 
The cute little fuzz balls came in early June, I love that McMurray Hatchery throws in an extra chick for fun… this little guy has some great personality among all the other chickens. Because my Dad didn’t have a good spot to house the chickens for a long time we went with the Jumbo Cornish X Rocks since this hybrid grows so fast.
How cute!
They have been hanging out in the bottom of my parent’s greenhouse. One of the other nice things about this breed is you can butcher them when they are smaller to get a “Cornish Game Hen.”
Starting to fatten up at 4 weeks.
My Mom likes the small size for making dinner for two so we butchered 6 of the birds when they were 4 weeks old. Here’s the set up we used:
Cleaning Station
Cold water to clean chicken & containers with giblets on ice.
Ready to wrap & freeze.
Besides the beautiful birds I kept the tasty offal (heart, liver, gizzard & feet). I kept all the giblets separated into type so I actually have enough of one item to make something with. With the feet I submerged each one in hot water (just before a simmer) for 1 minute, cooled them for a second in cold water, peeled off the dark yellow skin & pinched off the outer nail.
Prehistoric looking, no?
Then I froze them on a cookie sheet so they stay separate and I can easily grab a couple to throw into my stock after I roast a chicken. The feet add a lot of gelatin, calcium and nutrients to stock so why wouldn’t I keep them?
My Dad pollinating plants above the chickens
With my Dad and I working together it went really smoothly and I could keep everything super clean. Their cold well water made for easy cooling after scalding & plucking the birds. Next weekend we’ll do another 6 birds so by the end of processing we’ll have small, medium & large birds in the freezer. Yum!
Nice job!
I have a small flock of hens that I think I’d like to eat after they stop producing eggs. I just don’t know if they will be good to eat or even how to go about dressing them out. Are there tutorials or something where I can get advice?
Justin, the meat will most likely be tough in an older bird. You can make stew out of them as the water helps to keep them tender. Or just made a nice chicken stock with the bird and not eat the meat if it’s too tough. But low and slow will usually work to make the meat usable
Here’s a little blog post I found: http://www.waldeneffect.org/blog/How_to_cook_an_old_chicken/ & there are lots of videos on YouTube on how to butcher a chicken. I just didn’t want to post anything too graphic on my blog but if you have other questions let me know!
Thats a clever way to keep your chickens and plants! Great idea. When i have enough space for chickens i’l try this =)