Tag Archives: chicken

Chickens - Chooks, Frugal Choices, Home-Based Business, Thoughts

Time Management Lesson

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Too many times I engage in projects which end up as time wasted. Case in point this 12×12 chicken tractor. After spending time and money on it, I’m now faced with more time wasted disassembling it. I have no intention of raising layers on pasture again and it’s too awkward to move very far and a waste of space to store it. The high quality tarp from Troyer Tarp will be stored, however, since it is a $100 item. I’m learning, albeit slowly and with the wisdom my children bestow upon me, to utilize my time more wisely.

Cheers!

tauna

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Chickens - Chooks, FAMILY, Recipes

Spatchcock a Chicken?!

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Start with a fresh or frozen pastured (preferably) broiler.  Using scissors, cut out out the backbone.

 

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Cut backbone out completely – this is easier than it looks.  The WSJ recipe says to use the backbone to make broth or discard – DISCARD!  what?!  no way.  Make broth. Using it to make egg drop soup.
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Turn the bird over and smash down breaking breast bone so that the carcass lays fairly flat.

 

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Smashed and ready for rub.
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Rubbed in seasoning of 2 tablespoons olive oil, 1 tablespoon salt (i used Hebridean Sea Salt Flakes harvested from the shores of the remote Scottish Hebridean Isle of Lewis), and 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper.
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Heat 3 tablespoons olive oil in a heavy skillet then place chicken breast side down.  The recipe i used said on medium high heat for 20 minutes, but thankfully i checked this at 12 minutes and it was a bit too brown.  Perhaps using a cast iron skillet made the difference since they hold heat so well.  Next time, i plan to use medium heat for 12 minutes.
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Place aluminum covered bricks on top of chicken to press it down.  I didn’t have any bricks covered, so my improvisation was to lay the cast iron lid upside down, then stack a couple smaller skillets on top for added weight.  Do this for both sides of the chicken.
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Using tongs, flip the chicken over and weight down again, reduce heat to medium low and cook another 15 minutes or so.  This shows needing a bit more time.
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Crispy and done all the way through, including the thick breast meats.  My family really liked it.  So easy, too!

 

Spatchcock a Chicken Recipe
Here are the original instructions as found in Wall Street Journal some years ago.

Cheers!

tauna

FAMILY, Liquid and Soft Diet Recipes

Asparagus Soup

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Nearing the end of Jerry’s two weeks of liquid diet!

Asparagus Soup

3 cups home made chicken stock

1 bunch of asparagus

1 onion

2 cups milk

Cut the tips off the asparagus (i cut them about 2 inches long) and set aside.  Combine the rest of the asparagus (i cut the stalks into 3 inch lengths so they’d fit in my 3 quart pot more easily) into the chicken stock along with the quartered onion.  Heat to just boiling, turn down heat then cover and simmer about an hour.  Add the milk, heat through, then strain soup through a cheese cloth after removing vegetables with a slotted spoon.  Add some salt if you like.  I never add pepper for this purpose of healing from hernia operation because it’s imperative that he not have any indigestion.

Use organic, local, and dairy products from grassfed cows if possible.

Jerry is a picky eater and even he liked this one!

Cheers

tauna

 

Liquid and Soft Diet Recipes

Egg Drop Soup for Liquid Diet

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Home made egg drop soup:  (Tan Hua T’ang)

3 cups of chicken stock broth.

1/2 teaspoon salt (use Real salt or something that is 100% salt – check the label)

3 tablespoons cold water

1 tablespoon tapioca flour (cassava)* or cornstarch

2 eggs slightly beaten (farm fresh from pastured hens is best)

Heat broth and salt to boiling.  Mix cold water and tapioca flour; stir gradually into broth.  Boil and stir 1 minutes.  Slowly pour eggs into broth stirring constantly with fork, to form shreds of egg.  Remove from heat; stir slowly once or twice.

You can also make this without thickening it with the tapioca flour or cornstarch if it needs to be absolutely thin liquid.

For best medicine, you need to find a local farmer from whom you can purchase healthy pasture raised spent hens or broilers.  You may have to butcher them yourself.  Cook them down bones and all, pull off the meat bits, then throw the bones and cartilage back into the water and simmer another hour or so.  The goal is to get as much of the chondroitan out of the cartilage and minerals out of the bones and into your broth.  Once done, strain out the bones and let the broth cool.  Chicken fat is quite soft, so if you want to skim it off, you’ll eventually have to put it in the frig or other cool spot so that it will harden on the top of the broth so that you can remove it with a slotted spoon.

Buying chicken broth in the store is NOT the same product as what you are making here.

As always, find certified organic or organically raised ingredients.

This was a big hit with my father-in-law who is recovering from hernia surgery, is very weak, and really doesn’t have an appetite.

However, it’s quite good even if you aren’t sick or in recovery.

Cheers

tauna

*my friend Francoirse raises cassava in DRC!

Find a local producer near you using a handy website search, here are a few:

Localdirt.com

Eatwild.com

Localharvest.org