Back in great grandma's day there was no running to the grocery for some boneless skinless chicken breasts. if you lived in town you likely got your chicken from the local farmer, but if you lived out in the country you just made a trip to the barn. When we moved to our small farm I knew that I wanted to start living as self-sufficiently as possible and I wanted to start raising our own meat. We have been blessed to purchase a 1/2 a cow yearly from my parents and pork from some friends, but chicken was something we were still buying at the store. However, I have watched too many documentaries about how our food is currently being produced in the U.S. (just check out Food Inc. on netflix to start) so I wanted to get away from that.
The first year we moved in we got 10 chickens to use for meat (different breed from our laying hens) but this year we just finished up with a batch of 25 chickens. I was proud of myself that we took care of the chickens from day one until time to butcher, and we even did that ourselves. (don't worry no pictures or further details) We have come a long way since the tales of chickens running around "with thier heads cut off" so to speak, but it was still a hard task.
So my freezer was gloriously full of whole chickens but that leads to learning to cook differently or cut the chicken up and figure out how to make dinners out of all cuts of meat, not just the breasts. NOTE: if you are purchasing a chicken at the store, this would still be a skill that would serve you well as whole chickens can sell for .99 cents a pound whereas breast meat can run you upwards of $2.99 a pound...doesn't take long to add up the difference in price.
Here it is, how to cut up a fryer:
The first year we moved in we got 10 chickens to use for meat (different breed from our laying hens) but this year we just finished up with a batch of 25 chickens. I was proud of myself that we took care of the chickens from day one until time to butcher, and we even did that ourselves. (don't worry no pictures or further details) We have come a long way since the tales of chickens running around "with thier heads cut off" so to speak, but it was still a hard task.
So my freezer was gloriously full of whole chickens but that leads to learning to cook differently or cut the chicken up and figure out how to make dinners out of all cuts of meat, not just the breasts. NOTE: if you are purchasing a chicken at the store, this would still be a skill that would serve you well as whole chickens can sell for .99 cents a pound whereas breast meat can run you upwards of $2.99 a pound...doesn't take long to add up the difference in price.
Here it is, how to cut up a fryer:
Here is one of our whole fryers that we vacuum packed (I won't be doing it that way again). The most important thing is to have a VERY sharp knife. We start by slicing the leg/thigh off from the whole chicken. (In the future I may part up the chicken before freezing but we had worked so hard the day we butchered that I was not in the mood then...lol)
After slicing off the leg/thigh portion on both sides hubby ran the knife down the breast bone keeping as close to the bone as possible to cut the breast sections off.
He repeated on both sides to get the breast meat off the bones.
Here are the leg and thigh protions as well as the breasts and on the left is the back and cavity of the chicken (perfect for putting in a pot with water, salt and pepper and making a bone broth- read my earlier post for further directions on this).
Here is the breast meat all chopped and ready to go for the fajitas I am making for dinner, I tell you nothing beats the taste difference in fresh chicken!
