The Deed Is Done

I know I've been talking a lot about chickens here lately, and I promise, I'll get on to other subjects soon.  There are several rough drafts in the offing on such fascinating subjects as gluten-free bread choices, gf restaurant options and gardening.  But at the present moment we're frankly consumed by chickens.

Jon, manning the cone

This past Tuesday was butchering day and beyond a slight mishap with a knife and the occasional threatening clouds, it went off without a hitch (at least from the human's perspective, the mob may have had a different interpretation).  Thanks to our county's conservation district office, we were able to rent for a very small fee a propane heated scalder, killing cones and the amazing Featherman de-featherer.  Our good friend Jon of Insurgent Chicken blog fame walked us novices through the process and lent valuable and capable hands throughout the day.  For one of the best pictorial examples of a butchering day, check out his Butcher Day blog post.

The scalder and Featherman de-featherer

I won't go into great detail about the in's and out's of dispatching a chicken, partly out of sensitivity to some of my vegan friends and partly out of ignorance as I avoided that portion of the day's events.  But suffice it to say, using a cone is much more humane and gentle way of doing the deed than the stories you may have heard from your grandparents.


Speaking of grandma's stories, the chore of plucking chickens has come a long way, baby!  The chicken still needs to be scalded to loosen the feathers but using a propane scalding tank that maintains a relatively even temperature makes the process soooo much easier.  In addition, I have nothing but awe for the Featherman machine - seriously, this gadget is incredible, taking a fully feathered fowl to rubber chicken status in about 30 seconds.  Our birds seemed to be more "feathery" than the average Cornish Rock so it took a bit longer (like, oh, 40 whole seconds) for the machine to render them naked.  As much as I appreciate the old school method for doing things, there is no way on God's green earth I would subject myself to manual removal of chicken feathers, so being able to rent this baby was a lifesaver. 

The final step is removal of the innards and icing down the birds before freezing.   Being the little biologist that I am, I spent most of my day doing this (yes, I was one of those students who enjoyed dissecting frogs).  We saved livers, hearts, and gizzards.  Birds went into the freezer the next day after sitting on ice overnight.

Chicken after de-feathering

Scalding

De-feathering

The husband at the evisceration station

Because it's a family affair

Altogether we had 33 birds weighing a total of 132.6 pounds for an average weight of just a smidge over 4 pounds.  The largest bird was a hefty 5.6 pounds.  We'll do a recap post in a week or so with our thoughts on what we'd do differently next time.

The end of the story

The night before... dum, de dum, dum, dum!

So tomorrow's the big day.  We've picked up the scalder, de-featherer, and killing cones from our county conservation district, arranged for the offspring to be elsewhere (though they had the option of staying and watching/participating) and sharpened our knives.  I feel like I should cue the ominous music at this point.  Chickens are a bit perturbed they have not been fed this evening and issue stern lectures to us whenever we venture into the neighborhood of the chicken tractor ~ obviously the humans around this joint are slacking.  Poor things, little do they realize they've enjoyed their last meal and now our destined to become a meal.

Here are a last few pics of the mob this side of the freezer.  Stay tuned for a future post on our butchering experience.

Enjoying the sun

The almost-pet in his private palace

Tick, tock

Clock is a ticking, we're down to the less than 2 weeks before E-Day (execution day).  Cornish Rock Cross are known for their exceptionally fast growth, to the point where they get too heavy to walk or fly.  Ours are definitely getting on the more chunky size.  The mob has been spending more time sitting in the past week, but overall they are still quite mobile and occasionally active, even running a few races the length of the pen and even attempting to fly over their cousins in a race to the feeder. 

Our little former invalid still spends the night in the garage, but the husband has rigged an outdoor coop next to but separate from the rest of the mob in which she now spends her days.  This protects her from her more aggressive cousins but allows for a little socializing and some outside time.  In terms of size, she's catching up with the smaller hens in the mob, probably now only about a few days behind.  And speaking of "she" and "hens," I'm not altogether convinced that she isn't a he.  "She" seems to be developing more pronounced comb and wattles; this might explain why the roosters would go after "her" when we tried to re-introduce her to the flock.  That said, I'm not sure she'll outlive her more feminine nicknames of "baby girl" and "princess" (really, we haven't named her/him/it, these are just NICKNAMES so they don't count). 

Homemade Gluten-free Bread from the Crockpot

Bread, oh glorious bread!  It's a staple of life, one of those things we take for granted yet can't seem to live without.  I mean, where would peanut butter and jelly be without bread?  When you start the gluten-free life, conventional bread is the first thing that goes, often with much mourning (at least it was that way in our house). 

If you're suffering from bread withdrawals, may we suggest you look into Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois's book fantastic recipe book Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day?  Most of the book covers wheat breads of various kinds and incarnations, but there is a very well done section on gluten-free breads using the five minute a day strategy for bread baking.  We've tried several of their gluten-free recipes and have been pleased with all of them, plus, as a bonus, this way for making bread is so freaking easy (score!).  Their blog, Bread in 5, is also a good resource for gluten-free recipes and suggestions for using the five minute a day bread method.  In a recent post Zoe shared how to make gluten-free bread in a the crockpot which looks like a quick and easy way to have some really delicious bread without a lot of fuss or time investment.

The chickens in pictures

A pictorial presentation of the mob at the end of week 5/beginning of week 6.  We're over half way, only 3 weeks left until the freezer.  We're not sure on the current average weight but they all seem robustly healthy and are gaining weight at a steady pace.  Thus far all seem active and mobile.

The almost-pet - she's spending more time in the garage (because she's LOUD) and occasional time with the rest of the mob.  She's about 1/2 the size of the smaller chickens in the flock.

Feeding time -it's a frenzy with chickens jumping over and crawling under others to get to the grub.

Though cornish rock cross aren't known for their grazing, the mob seems to have figured it out.

The lawn after the mob has been on it for 24 hours.  We're hoping the addition of chicken "fertilizer" and some grass seed will help this section overcome the moss and dandelions.

So, what CAN I eat???

Oh, gentle reader, rejoice, eating gluten-free is not a hopeless endeavor!  So many more foods are gluten-free than gluten-full that your choices are legion.  In addition, more and more gluten-free substitutions exist now than in previous years so your desire to eat a bag of salty pretzels or have an amazing birthday cake will not be in vain.

Probably the best advice we can give those embarking on the gluten-free adventure is to start with whole foods.  Veggies, fruits, meats, seafood, and many grains are naturally gluten-free.   Many dairy products are also gluten-free (though watch for fillers and thickeners).  By filling the majority of you diet from these basic choices you'll find that eating gluten-free is easier ~ as well as healthier ~ then you previously realized.

Once you've identified the huge number of options available to you from a whole foods diet, next consider those things which you cannot live without.  Is it breads and rolls?  A favorite morning cereal?  Crackers?  Birthday cake?  Once you've found those things, see if you can find a gluten-free substitute.  A good place to start looking is the grocery section of Amazon.com by simply searching the item you're searching for and adding the tag "gluten-free." Another good place to start is in the natural foods section of your local grocer; for those of you in the NW, Fred Meyer has a well put together gluten-free section and has also labelled many other gluten-free products throughout their stores.  Natural food stores and specialty markets may also care gluten-free products - it's worth a look or a call to see what might be available to you.

In the coming weeks, we'll be sharing some of our favorite gluten-free choices and other options for common gluten-full products starting with the obvious first choice, bread.   We'll also make suggestions on where to find these products.  Keep an eye out for more installments in our "What CAN I eat" series.

Youngest's Story

In our family's war on gluten, the members are represented by two distinct but equally important sides, the mother who makes the food and the boys who eat it.  Here are their stories.

Thought last into the family, youngest with his more obvious signs of distress was the first to alert us to our gluten issues. After a glorious six-months of chowing from the mom buffet, we started introducing a few solid foods to youngest's diet. Being as he was satisfied with his exclusively breast-fed gig, he resisted. Plus he's an independent soul and having a spoon with gooey mush of undetermined origin shoved in his face was not his idea of a satisfying meal. Around 8ish months solid foods finally took off but he ONLY wanted finger-foods he could feed to himself, thankyouverymuch. Cheerios and small toast pieces, being among the first finger-foods oldest had mastered, started regularly showing up on youngest's highchair tray. And almost immediately our sweet, happy, willful little guy changed into a cranky, unhappy baby that was difficult to console. In addition, his formerly excellent sleep patterns became erratic which meant our baby was becoming crazily sleep deprived as were mama and daddy ~ not a happy combination. We chalked it up to teething or a growth spurt or just a stage, but when the eczema skin rash appeared and quickly started spreading, it finally dawned on us that we might be dealing with a food allergy.

Our amazing naturopathic pediatrician agreed the first place to look would be foods; she suggested investigating dairy, gluten and possibly eggs as a starting place.  Since we don't do a lot of dairy in our family, youngest had yet to be exposed to any (whew!) which made the task of figuring out what the culprit was that much easier.  We decided to start with wheat/gluten and did a three-week elimination diet, a period of time long enough for his body to completely cleanse itself of the gluten and the side-effects to disappear.  Within a few days of being gluten-free his rash dramatically improved and he was sleeping better.  At the end of three weeks we re-introduced gluten by allowing him a single slice of bread and that night he woke up EVERY hour fussing and the next day an eczema rash reappeared on his leg.  Obviously gluten was the problem. 

As a result, we made the tough choice to go gluten-free as a family.  We considered making youngest separate gluten-free meals using gluten-free substitutes while the rest of us continued eating our gluten-full meals, but the thought of creating multiple dishes at every meal and successfully avoiding cross-contamination was daunting (and exhausting) to contemplate.  By going gluten-free as a family we could insure his continued health and make my job as head chef less complicated.  It ended up being the best (accidental) health decision we ever made as it led to the discovery that the husband and oldest also had gluten issues.

We'll share their stories in the weeks to come.


Youngest's symptoms:

• eczema skin rash, rapidly spreading
• change in temperament from happy & content to cranky & sometimes inconsolable
• Multiple night wakings, often hourly (*yawn!*)
• Occasional stomach upset