December, 2009:

It’s been just a little over four months since we hatched our first clutch of chickens. Our first batch produced 4 cockerels and two hens. The hens get to stay as replacement layers for us – we keep a rolling stock of younger birds for this and in the past have bought young pullets at ‘point-of-lay’. One bird was the pick of the bunch and was given as a gift to our neighbours. He’ll get to spend his days cock-a-doodle-doo-ing, dancing and shimmying and having lots of sex. Not a bad life.

So, the day of reckoning for the remaining batch of three young cocks was upon us. Joan and I went to the paddock to collect them. They all started to cock-a-doodle-doo, so no mistaking that they were boys and each one was swiftly dispatched in the time honoured tradition. Plucking chickens is a doddle and all three were done in less than an hour… affording a brief photo opportunity! Line up boys, smile for the camera.

We get amazingly deep orange eggs – unsurpassed by anything else I’ve ever tasted. The eggs are flavoursome, have a bit of body and have lovely creamy yolks. Cooking with them gives everything an amazing yellow cast. These birds, slow raised on a diet that’s mostly open pasture (more of that later!) the carcasses show a  mix of characteristics from their parents. No mistaking the big legs and tall gait of their father and a reasonably plump size. They’re not a meat breed specifically.. rather a cross of a handsome pure bred male and the assorted farmhouse layers we have about the place – all imbued with that amazing cast from a natural forage diet.

Oi! Get DOWN! Naughty kitteh gets shouted at. Again.

When they were dressed the finished oven-ready weights were 1.7kg, 1.68kg and 1.48kg. The kitten got the hearts as a treat for patiently ‘helping’ with the plucking and not actually nomming on them whilst we were working. She did have a few goes though – can hardly blame her as she could sense da flava!

In the months since we hatched these chicks I’ve given quite some thought to the lot of chickens. The average supermarket el-cheapo animal is intensively reared indoors on a fast-grow diet, never sees the light of day and meets it’s end in 43 days. We have excellent Label Rouge birds in the shops here which get to free range and are a minimum of 81 days old and make fine eating. An upmarket bird is available that’s 100 days old and if you wish to push the boat out a poulet fermier can be bought from the boucherie for about €15. What does that time buy you? A better standard of living for the bird, better meat.. more flavour… the animal is a different shape.. it’s got longer legs, less breast meatand with a darker, more intense flavour. A world apart from the pallid, plump, boneless slabs of pink breast meat sold in poly trays. It’s worth the wait.

So, back to our boys. The smaller bird is lined up for todays Sunday lunch and the other two go off into the freezer after a few days. The livers are retained for making a farce for stuffing the birds with. I’ve used minced pork shoulder, minced smoked bacon, black pepper, the livers from the birds, three softened onions, a whole branch of  sage and a respectable slug of Armagnac. Some bread crumbs to bind and it’s done. I fried off a patty like a little mini luxury burger as a cooks sample. Trés bien, chefs privilege and all that.

Necks have already made me a litre of stock which simmered for 7 hours on top of the wood stove yesterday and that just leaves the remarkable and oft overlooked Gizzard. The organ that does all of the work, turning the diet of the bird into the good stuff that we like to eat. And herein lies the key issue around food that we eat… if you take literally the phrase you are what you eat and actually think about it for a moment it really does ring true. I’ll expand.

Our chickens all free-range of course. We feed them a few handfuls of a compound poultry growers feed, a few handfuls of mixed grain and some feedcorn… but the vast majority of what they consume they have to get themselves from the garden / paddock.  They are voracious omnivores so whilst a good 80% of what they eat is grass they love nothing better than a worm, insect, bug, spider, small baby mouse, gecko or indeed… carrot peeling.  Having no teeth they require a gizzard loaded with tiny shards of gravel to munch up all the stuff they eat… and that’s what brings them their colour and flavour. Proof of the pudding is in the gizzard – so to speak.  It’d be rude of me not to dissect the fresh organ for you!

You are what you eat. It would seem grass, mostly.

So, with the chicken’s last meal chucked away, the hard plate inside the gizzard is removed and that sweet, intense dark meat can be used. I’m a huge fan of confit gesiers so I just lightly marinade the meat for 24 hours in sea salt, thyme, garlic and black pepper.

A Cheeky marinade for the gizzards

After a day spent soaking up that flavour they’re ready to be slowly poached in duckfat on the fire for 5/6 hrs until meltingly tender. Only the slightest tremble of the fat is required.. barely enough to ‘glop’ once in a while as they’re not cooked as such,  more taught a lesson in how to become something delicious. It’s a truism for any meat that the bits that are often considered poorer often have the very best flavour. The Gesiers will store for months if kept under the fat and makes a superb warm salad when re-warmed in a pan, chopped and tossed with a mesclun salad.

So, enough offal.. what about the real deal. Well, it was superb. Good, flavourful meat, the breast was meltingly tender, the legs with good strong flavor of real chicken. The farce a particular hit and the resultant fond made from a reduction of the cooking juices and a little vegetable water was pure heaven.