Chicken Lockdown Mini Cull

###This post contains photos of dead animals and meat prep###

With the Avian Flu lock down yesterday we decided at the weekend to thin our flocks a little bit with a few birds that were going off to go to freezer camp. 

The girls have their favourites! No way were these going to the freezer!

We had two cockerels (Legbar and a Maran) from a small hatch we did in the summer, leaving us with two layers and two silkies from that hatch. And three ducks - all drakes - to leave us with what is a breeding trio from two sources so next year any that hatch should be unrelated. 

Meat Crosses Hatch

This year we've been plagued by bad hatch rates, I've kept changing my methods but I think having posted eggs really doesn't help things. 

These chicks are from our own eggs, with a Indian Game cockerel over some Colombian Plymouth Rock hens. 

What a difference in hatch rate!

Eating Bantams...

 In the last post I talk about processing a few of our Indian game hens for meat. One was a bantam and a respectable 1.3kg.

But as they say the proof is in the eating - so on Sunday we had a little roast chicken for tea. 

Processing Purebreed Chickens - Indian Game

The children and I processed three of our chickens the other day. These were the purebreed Indian game cockerels - two full sized birds and one bantam. 

I decided it made sense to do it after some canning so the hot water from the water bath could be used to scald the chicken for plucking. 

Meat Rabbits

So this is something I've been giving a lot of thought to over the last few years. 

I almost did it a few years ago before we rented the land next door. But then came the sheep and our meat supply was sorted. Although it only happened once a year.

Since selling them I've been thinking about ways to replace that.

Home Butchery

Like many skills I think butchery is one you can only really learn through doing. 

Last week I butchered four more lambs and as I get into double figures now (total) I'm getting a little faster and more confidant in what I'm doing.

A Freezer Full Of Chicken

The picture below is the culmination of a lot of time and work! 

All the meat chickens are now safely processed and in the freezer (this is only a third of it).

How Many Meals Are In A Whole Lamb?

I got asked on Facebook how many meals are in a lamb?

A tricky question to answer as everyone eats a different amount and it also depends on how you butcher it. I just butchered a whole lamb this afternoon while my little boy slept. I'm only an amateur so please be kind as to my cuts! 

Here are the joints and cuts I got from it:

Two legs of lamb. I've kept these whole but sometimes I will split them to make a leg and a chump joint. I'd say this would easily feed 8 people with probably some leftovers. 

Sausage Making

This is a rather late follow on post from the Pig Butchery Weekend I posted a couple of weeks ago. 

 As we were split into two groups on the Sunday the second group went and finished the butchery while a few of us set about getting ready for sausage making.
We minced up all the pork we'd trimmed off the animal and the shoulders we'd cut up as well. There was a fair bit.

 We then measured it out and added it to the first rusk and seasoning pack. The first one was easy, 4kg of meat, packet of rusk and water, ready to go.

 The second batch took a bit more thinking about, as we had a packet of plain rusk and had to work out the seasoning quantities and the water. Should have been simple but for some reason we were all scratching our heads at one point!

 The other guys came in at lunch time and we started making sausages. The skins were natural casings and had been soaking all morning, but one lot of them was quite hard to tread on the pipe of the sausage stuffer.

 Alan made it look easy and did the magic twist and tying of the fat sausages as well!

 We all got a good share of sausages and mine went into the freezer as soon as I got home.

They didn't stay there for long though! Looking forward to making some with my own animals one day, great way to use up lesser cuts of meat.

Anyone else make their own sausages?

Smalec - Polish Pork Dripping

There was a lot of fat on the pigs when we were processing them at the weekend, so gets added to the sausages but there was still a lot there. 

One of the guys was Polish and wanted to make smalec. This is basically like dripping but with pork fat instead of beef and the fat is flavoured. 

It was simple to make. We first minced up a good amount of fat. 

 It was then rendered it down on the hob until it started to separate.

 Then an onion cut in half was added to flavour the fat, he did this on sticks so he could stir it round.

 He took this outside to cool for a while then once it was cold enough to pour into plastic containers he broke up the onion and shared it between three tubs.

 Once cool it solidified.

 Apparently they spread it on bread instead of butter with a sprinkling of salt and fresh onion on top.

I tried it on some fresh bread (without fresh onion - no way can I eat that) and a bit of salt, it was lovely, a great alternative to butter and one worth remembering encase things ever got harder and dairy products were harder to get.

Stores for a long time as well as fat is basically a preserve.

Apparently they sometimes flavour the fat with apples instead of onions. I think I still prefer beef dripping but this is genuinely good to eat. The girls liked it as well!

Who else has tried this or something similar?

Pig Butchery Weekend

#####This post contains pictures of dead animals#####

I received a message the other day from a group I'm a member of asking me if I'd be interested in attending a butchery weekend.

The idea of the group is a great one, to share our skills and help each other learn to become more self reliant. 

The weekend would consist of butchering two pigs, one roe deer and some pheasants, we'd be shown how to do it by an ex butcher who grew up doing it, with lots of hands on experience for everyone as well. 

The amazing thing was that the only cost was for our share of the meat that we got to take home at the end. 

The pigs were some beautiful rare breed Berkshire pigs from the smallholding we were staying at and the deer from a local game dealer.

 It was amazing to get some hands on experience, I do a fair bit of butchery but to do it with someones guidance was so much better than a YouTube video.

 I particularly enjoyed the deboning of joints, such a handy skill and so hard to do to start with.

 I also managed to do the butchers knot. Something that I've never been able to do! I must make sure I practice it now and keep the skill in my mind!

There was such a lot of meat on the pigs and plenty of opportunity for us all to have a go. It was also with a great group of lads, lots of laughing and joking around.

We were set up in army style tents and did start to loose light. so we moved outside and then on to using a tilly lamp (I was impressed with how much light they give off!) Here we did the roe deer and the pheasants.

We had a feast that night of meat cooked over a BBQ and then Kevin (the host a different Kevin to me!) made two stews, one pheasant and one of deer as well as a huge tray of crackling! I was stuffed and went to bed full!

Our accommodation for the weekend was the same tents that we'd done the butchery in.
I was surprisingly warm the whole night, although I was the subject of much Micky taking when people realised that I had taken my pillow with me! I might be outside but I will have some comfort!

The next day we went on to sausage making, but I'll leave that for another post!
A great weekend though and I made lots of friends.

Too Much Meat?

The other day I showed a friend a picture of one of our freezers and he accused me of eating too much meat. 

Now I admit that this is a fair amount of meat (and only one of our freezers). This one is full of chickens, some lamb and some mutton, all raised here and  butchered by my own fair hands(except the mutton which was done at the abattoir).

What this friend didn't think about was that this is our food stored for a large chunk of the year. We still eat a fair number of veggie meals, probably at least two times a week, maybe more in the summer. I still visit our local butcher, but now for bacon, sausages and faggots, as well as advice and a good chat, the rest is our own.

Our food isn't delivered every week from the supermarket, or picked up from the butcher. So yes it looks a lot, but it feeds a family of five and lasts us a long time (we also have friends over for dinner and BBQ's a bit as well). If everyone had six or nine months of their meat in front of them (vegetarians  excluded obliviously) it would look a lot as well I'm sure!

Chicken Processing Mk3

We managed to get the last of this years meat birds processed on Sunday afternoon. 

We'd gone on a disastrous shopping trip to a local city to try to choose some tiles for the bathroom. We should have known better than to take the three kids and think we could make any decisions! We left about two hours later, none the wiser but all of use with slightly shorter tempers! We called and had lunch at my brothers which was really good fun, then dragging the kids away, hurried home. 

I knew I had six chickens to butcher before it got dark! 

I got outside around three, the sun sets around four O'clock so I knew I'd have to work quite fast! 

The girls wanted to assist again so we got everything ready. Bowls of warm water and clothes to wipe down, knife and sharpening steel, chopping/rest boards, two buckets (feathers and guts) and a plastic bag to pluck them on so I wouldn't get soaked. Hot water on the BBQ as well so I could wet pluck them again.

The girls got involved straight away again, watching me work, then helping to pluck feathers. I let them spend time picking off the pin feathers once I'd finished the bulk of the main feathers. They loved helping and asking about a thousand questions and they both made me laugh lots - they can be so matter of fact at that age! 

My eldest stayed out with me the whole way through, my younger daughter couldn't quite manage it, but it was getting cold and dark. It was lovely just to have the company and to have her talking to me about anything she wanted. By the time I had plucked all six, it was just after four o'clock, gutting them didn't take long but light was failing. I then bagged them up and left them to rest in the shed.

I was speaking to my butcher the other day and I was saying how when I jointed some of the last lot up the skin didn't stay on that well. He told me that I hadn't let them set long enough and to leave them somewhere for a few days first.

So I'm taking his advice and before I do anything with these chickens I'm going to let them sit and settle first. I think I'll probably joint up four of these and leave two birds whole. It's far easier for me to grab a meal sized portion and cook it up that night rather than always having to rely on a roast and using the left overs (which we do as well!).

How do you store your chickens in the freezer - jointed up or whole for a roast?

Also I now have a big bag of chicken livers in the freezer and I'm wondering what to do with them - does anyone that read this blog make their own pate and do you have a good recipe? I'm totally in love with pate but have never made any myself before.

Chicken Processing Mk2

I got myself more organised on Sunday and butchered 9 more chickens.

I set up a patio table with chopping boards on that could be scrubbed down (this is waste sheet material that can be thrown away afterwards). I sharpened my knife, had a steel to sharpen it as I went and two bowls of hot soapy water to keep everything clean. 

I also had two buckets, one for feathers (that can be composted) and one for feet and guts. I also had some plastic feed sacks on hand, one to sit on (it had rained in the night) and one to have on my lap to stop the wet birds from soaking my trousers. 

A large saucepan of water was also warming on the BBQ. 

The birds for slaughter were pulled out before they'd been fed and kept in a crate away from the others until their time came. 

I started with batched but found it was far better to do one at a time, slaughter, drain, dip in hot water, pluck. 

None of them went very quickly but I learnt that having the water the right temperature makes a huge difference. Unfortunately my thermometer doesn't seem to work so I just had to guess. One bird was dipped too hot so I ended up skinning that one as the skin ripped too easily. 

Once I had all the birds plucked I then wiped down and set up for gutting, never a nice job but it went quite quickly.

I separated the birds up into ones that looked good as whole birds and ones that were better jointed. I kept five birds whole and cut the others into breasts, whole legs and wings. 

I then used my new vacuum packer to bag the birds up and separate the jointed ones into meal sized portions. Three legs or breasts seemed about right for our family. 

I bagged and froze the stripped carcasses as well so I can make a big batch of stock when I get chance. 

I certainly felt more organised this time and it went without a hitch. That said there as some things I'd change: 

• I'd like a chicken plucker, it's not great doing them by hand. 
• I need a bigger saucepan or something to hot dip the birds into, mine is only just big enough and soon needs topping up with more hot water. 
• The bench I butchered them on was too low, my back was hurting as I was bending the whole time, I proper work bench would be ideal. 
• An outside sink would help an amazing amount, something I might have to consider installing! 

So some hard work, but the freezer has certainly been stocked up! 

I've still got six birds left and I'll leave these a while longer to see how big they get, it would be great to have some big ones to save having to buy a turkey for Christmas. 

What do you think? Is there anything you'd do differently to how I set it up this time?

Vacuum Packer

I was gutted tonight.

I got two beautiful steaks out the freezer, from a whole cow I home butchered last year (the cow wasn't from my land - it's a long story I might tell you about one day - but lets just say I ended up with a lot of beef!).

I let them defrost and thought about the homemade wedges, fresh sweetcorn and fried onions I was going to cook with it. 

Thumb not included...

Trouble was after I popped the oven on and started to prepare everything else I could smell something not quite right. It wasn't strong, just a little whiff when you held your nose to it.

Damn it.

Freezer burn on my steaks.

I wasn't willing to risk it, time to cook something else. 

My wife got in from work and excitedly asked about the beautiful steaks on the counter, only to be told she was having a veggie curry instead! 

Now the meat has been in there 18 months and we're getting very near to the end of it, but it's a shame that some has been wasted like this. I hate food waste and I don't want to make these mistakes again. 

I frequently butcher animals for our own consumption and have three freezers with meat and veggies in to make sure we are eating as much of our own produce as possible. I tend to separate the meat into different freezers so I know what to use and what each is (at the moment one has mutton and one has lamb, etc).

With 19 chickens to process soon , they're going onto pasture tomorrow hopefully,  I want to package them in the best way possible so there won't be anything wasted due to storage. and I'm thinking of something better than just a freezer bag like I've been using. 

I was looking at vacuum packers and thought that this might be great way to improve my long term storage, I could use it for packing my chickens before they go in the freezer and for storing my dehydrated fruit and veg. I've also been told it's great for just keeping things in the fridge fresher for longer, then there's the possibility of Souve cooking or marinading meat overnight. 

So does anyone out there use a vacuum packer before they freeze meat?

What one would you recommend? And do you use it for anything else?

Slow Cooked Mutton

Earlier in the year we had a ewe killed. 

The price for cull ewes was rubbish at the time and in all my years of keeping sheep I'd never tried mutton and I quite fancied giving it a try. Mutton is a popular meat all round the world, just in the UK we seem to think that sheep should only be eaten as lamb. 

The ewe was three years old, fairly big and as you'd expect, had a good layer of fat on her. Mutton has a well placed reputation for being fatty, all this means is you need to be careful in how you cook it. 

Talking to friend we decided to make a rub for the meat and cook it long, slow and low. Making the rub in the recipe above (my mate had to come over as I didn't have many of the ingredients!), we then covered the meat, scored the fat and set it in a low oven (160) uncovered for a little while then covered with some water in the tray until the fat started to come out. 

After an hour or so I lifted it up onto a rack on the tray to continue cooking (still covered), this bit is essential because I wanted the fat to cook out of the meat. 

The joint was in the oven for a little under five hours and was cooked to perfection (if I do say myself). I did brown it off a bit at the end by cooking with no cover. 

as you can see the half inch layer of fat in the bottom of the pan shows that this is the right way to cook it! 

The meat just fell off the bone.

I served it chopped up on some rice with steamed french beans (french beans with everything at the moment!), it was beautiful. So tender and so full of flavour. 

Who else likes to eat mutton? 

How do you cook the big joints?