Yesterday, I was woken up at 8 in the morning with the sound of a crowing rooster. The early bird that I am not, instead of "taking care of business" right then and there, I put him in a box. It was a very large box with a bunch of food and water mind you. I figured that as long as he didn't see the early morning sky he would be fine by midday. My boyfriend, Alex, got up for work at around noon (he works late nights, so waking up late is a common occurrence). I asked him to take the rooster out of the box. He did. Not 10 minutes later the rooster was back to crowing again. Since Alex had to leave for work soon, I had him take care of the hard part before he left. Instead of slitting the throat like we did last time, we pithed it first and then slit the throat. Pithing is basically putting a knife in the birds mouth and piercing the brain. After
a lot of research, I believe this is the most humane way. This time I did not feel as bad as I did about the first one, because it was over a lot quicker.
Last time I just skinned the chicken and carved the meat off of it so I wouldn't have to deal with the innards. With the rooster I had planned on trying my hand at plucking. I had a pot of warm water, about 150 degrees, ready to go. I swished the rooster around in the pot a couple times, to loosen the feathers. Plucking was very tedious. Eviscerating was pretty gross too. But, I am more satisfied about the amount of meat that we'll get off of it this time.
For the best step-by-step website for processing a chicken check out this blog:
http://butcherachicken.blogspot.com/
It's what I followed when I processed this one.
This is what happens when you wake me up at 8 in the morning
