The remaining 2011 Dinner chickens were dispatched on Monday. Four girls, plus the intolerable cockerel. Two girls for us, two girls for OC (other chap) and the boy will be for a shared coq au vin on Saturday.
DH did the gutting of ours yesterday; the Girls are much harder to deal with than the boys, especially when they have reached maturity.
We had roast chicken for dinner, for the first time in months. Actually it's hte first time in months we've cooked chicken, as the only chicken we cook is chicken we have raised ourselves. (We do still have chicken on the odd occasion that we have a takeaway or restaurant curry).
Once again I remind myself that,as I am not going to become a vegetarian, if I want to eat chicken then it's best to eat a chicken that I know has had a happy and full life and a quick and painless death. If we weren't raising them ourselves, we would not really know what life they had. If we weren't raising them, these birds would never have known life at all.
Sometimes...only sometimes... I hanker after blissful ignorance. When I could buy meat without thinking about it. When letting meat go past its sell by date and then get thrown away didn't trouble my Conscience at all.
Now, we work hard not to waste any meat, whether we buy it or raise it ourselves. We try not to overindulge, create and use leftovers, etc.
The second bird is in the freezer. By the time we get round to eating her, time will have passed since the whole dispatching/gutting bit, and it won't be quite so difficult.
DH did the gutting of ours yesterday; the Girls are much harder to deal with than the boys, especially when they have reached maturity.
We had roast chicken for dinner, for the first time in months. Actually it's hte first time in months we've cooked chicken, as the only chicken we cook is chicken we have raised ourselves. (We do still have chicken on the odd occasion that we have a takeaway or restaurant curry).
Once again I remind myself that,as I am not going to become a vegetarian, if I want to eat chicken then it's best to eat a chicken that I know has had a happy and full life and a quick and painless death. If we weren't raising them ourselves, we would not really know what life they had. If we weren't raising them, these birds would never have known life at all.
Sometimes...only sometimes... I hanker after blissful ignorance. When I could buy meat without thinking about it. When letting meat go past its sell by date and then get thrown away didn't trouble my Conscience at all.
Now, we work hard not to waste any meat, whether we buy it or raise it ourselves. We try not to overindulge, create and use leftovers, etc.
The second bird is in the freezer. By the time we get round to eating her, time will have passed since the whole dispatching/gutting bit, and it won't be quite so difficult.
