Home grown chicken for the table

Last September a group of friends and myself embarked on the journey of raising day old meat chickens through to slaughter for our own tables.  I had never processed a live chicken for eating before then and the thought of doing so was rather scary and intimidating however I wanted to do so for the ethical side of it.

I wanted to give them a good life, let them live like a chicken with the sun on their backs and being able to run around and be like chickens and not some factory product to go down a production line where the journey in the truck from the 'farm' to processing plant is horrific, where the process by which they kill the chickens is terrible, scary and not always a cleanly executed process.  Plus I want to know more about what I am eating and take more responsibility for this.

Almost 6 weeks ago we got another batch of chooks.  The meaties, as I call them, are the same breed as the chooks that are sold in the supermarket, we get them from someone we know who orders a heap in from a hatchery and they cost us $3 each.

Doing this myself is not a mentally easy process to do, the job of processing the chickens isn't physically difficult once you know how to do it, but the fear of something going wrong with the kill is always there for me and I make sure I have a back up plan.

I think something like this shouldn't be an easy process, it's taking life to put food on your table and each one I thanked.

This is the first time that I've processed a chicken entirely on my own at my house.  Previously I've done my birds at a friends place with her assistance and I've helped others before with their birds, but this is the first time on my own and at my own house.  I've processed quails at home on my own before, however never a chicken. 

I processed the first four birds two days shy of six weeks of age, I have a witches hat attached upside down to a wooden stake with the tip cut off the cone.  The chicken goes in upside down, which stops the bird from flapping about.  I said thank you to each bird and then with a quick and confident movement I hold their head in one hand and use a very sharp knife in my other hand to cut through the veins in their neck and then fully remove the head.  I prefer to take the head off as then I know that they are definitely dead and can't feel anything.  The birds then tend to have involuntary nerve movements which is where the cone is handy as it holds them in place quite well.

Once the bleeding reduces (a few minutes) I then dunk them in a pot of hot water (btn 65-70degs C) which has a splash of detergent in the water and move them gently around in the water for 40-60 seconds.  At about 40 seconds I check the wing feathers to see if they remove easily, if they do then the chicken is removed, if not it's put back in the water for a bit longer.  I then pluck the chicken and gut it and clean it all out and it needs to go in the fridge for around 24hrs before being eaten.  The whole process took on average 20 minutes per bird and this weekend I did 4 birds.

I've kept the livers and I will be making pate from them during the week, everything else goes in the bin.  I believe you can use the giblets but I need to learn how.  I plucked them near the compost bin so all the feathers could be composted.

Day old meat chickens from the hatchery

2 Weeks old

About 4 weeks old

Killing cone

4 finished chickens ready for the fridge

All cut up for the freezer

Vacuum sealed into portions

4 carcasses for the freezer to make stock from

Home made cider

Yesterday I helped a friend to make some cider.  There was a group of us all learning how to make it for the first time from our friend, Barbara.  

We started by chopping up 50kg's of apples and getting rid of all the bad bits of the apples and then cutting them up into 1/4s or 1/8s.

We then fed them through the chopper, then into the press and pressed them all twice to get the juice out.  It was then poured into a demijohn with some other ingredients like yeast and tartaric acid 

The chopper

Inside the chopper

Chopped up apples

The press

Liquid gold

Rather large demijohns

We've had some rain...

Over the past 3-4 days Melbourne has had 50-60mls of rain, my backyard pathways don't cope very well with the rain, the vegie gardens are OK but the pathways just go to slop.  My long term plan is to do drainage and gravel along the path but that takes a bit of time, effort and money so for the past few years I've gone and got a few bales of straw and spread it out... time to do that this weekend!

This is the pathway from my pergola to the chook house

I started sinking

Quality products last longer

One of the idea's behind simple and sustainable living is that when you do buy a product you buy something that will last instead of something that will need to be thrown away in a short time frame due to not lasting the distance.  This is where this awesome store comes into it - the Odgers & McLelland Exchange Store.  They are based in outback NSW but these brushes are made in Germany, I've bought a pot brush, a vegetable brush and a dish washing brush and I am pretty damn excited about them.  There is so much on their website that I want... like their enamel bakeware and teapots and well, pretty much all of it!

Natural hair brushes

Natural hair brushes, the brown bristles are stiffer

Clearing out the summer crops

It's that time of the year where it's clear out time in the vegie garden to get it ready for the winter crops.   From my 4 raised beds I pulled out all the dying tomatoes, zucchini's, corn, celery (that did nothing!), basil and cucumbers and I've let the chooks in to scratch around

Secret stash of eggs in the celery

The compost is now full

These garden beds are now cleared

The chooks earning their keep - I hope they don't kill the bean

Some very optimistic tomatoes popping up

The final harvest from the summer crops

The first vegies in the front yard

In early January I made the decision that I wanted to clear my front yard and start growing vegies in it.  Due to my bad hands (I've since had surgery on one) a friend offered to clear it all.  I then layered it all with cardboard, straw, 3 cubic metres of vegie mix soil and then more straw and this is the result:

My front yard

Today I put the first vegies into it:

Snow peas on the close tower and peas on the far one, planted as seeds

Calabrese Natalino Broccoli and brussel sprouts along the drive way side

Calabrese Natalino Broccoli

Brussel Sprouts

Seeds - the magic of germination

Last Thursday I finally got around to planting some seeds for my winter vegies.  My past history with seeds hasn't been very good but I am now determined to do this well to a)save money and b)plan for succession planting so that I don't have a whole seedling punnet of vegies ready at once and then nothing! My current plan is to try to plant a few seeds every 2-4 weeks or so.  Each time I'm trying to only plant about 4 or so of each except for the beetroot and spring onions.

To help I've got these in the living room under a window and I am spraying them with a water bottle to keep them moist. 

When the first seed popped it's head out of the soil I was pretty excited - it's working! They're alive!

The first seed to come through was a broccoli after only 3 days. 

Here is the progress 5 days on

Spring onions

Brussel Sprouts and Kale

Spinach - no action yet 

Beetroot - the colour is awesome!

Broccoli and cauliflowers

I also have pea and snow peas sprouting on moist paper towel after having soaked them for 24hrs 

Yum!

Welcome...

Welcome to my new little place on the internet - my adventure into trying to live a simple life.  A simple life doesn't mean an easy life but it should lead to a more rewarding, fulfilled, relaxed and slower life.

I'm currently reading the following two books and really enjoy them both and they are both providing useful information in leading a simple life and self sustainability

A bit about me - I live on the northern edge of the suburbs of Melbourne on a suburban block that's 448sqm which is mostly house.  I've had a vegie patch in the backyard for the last 3 years or so which is north and west facing and I am now going to start planting vegies in my front yard so that I can plant a lot more!  The challenge with the front yard though will be winter frosts as it faces south.

I currently have egg laying and meat chickens and quails also in the backyard.  I try to grow and raise all my own chicken via the meat chickens bought as day old chicks and I also incubate my quail eggs and harvest the birds for their meat.  I also have two cats, but due to the chooks they are indoors only and don't produce anything edible, but do provide good company.

I haven't been able to do a lot in the garden for the last 5 weeks due to having Carpal Tunnel Surgery on my left hand.  Thankfully I am right handed though, but I am still very limited in what I can do as recovery can take 4+months and up to a year in some cases.

I hope that you enjoy following my journey towards a simple life.