You are so wasteful, save the bones to make broth!

Haha!

dcarch

I cut my whole chickens in half BEFORE freezing. Just take the kitchen shears and chomp away down the breastbone and through the middle of the back.

Last Sunday my 6 roosters and one hen got dispatched. I haven't done the math, but nearly every single thing about them will be eaten. I didn't save the combs or wattles, but otherwise... just about everything else is in the freezer.

YES, save the bones for broth! I've done that well before I raised my own chickens, and this has been awesome stock/broth!

Yay, Artemis, you did it! I knew you would, of course, but still....

I just put 28 roasters in the freezer, approximately 160 pounds, and canned 15 quarts of stock. Before that I canned 12 old stewing hens and canned 7 quarts of stock from that. I figure my chicken cost me about 80 cents a pound, but it's all organic, cage free and happy, plus I got eggs from the old hens until they finally got old enough to slow down to about one a week.

I always save the bones and feet for stock, even the bones from a roasted chicken get bagged up and frozen until I'm ready to make soup or until I have enough to make a big batch of stock to can. Others freeze it.

Now I've got to figure out what to do with all that chicken, as I don't particularly care for chicken breast and chicken salad seems like a fancy chicken sandwich with mayo. I like chicken and dumplings and pot pie, but Elery does not. And of course, fried chicken is out because of this Weight Watchers thing. So, we'll be eating a LOT of chicken, prepared in some way or another, I just don't know how yet!

Annie

Annie, do y'all like Mexican? Here are two of my favorite chicken dishes.

https://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/chicken_fajitas/

https://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/arroz_con_pollo/

Dug 6 legs and 2 thighs out of the freezer this morning and boiled them. Deboned, saved the bones for the parrots to chomp on, the skin and knuckles are saved to mix in with canned dog food, mashed pinto beans & psyllium husks for the little one for their breakfast treat. Chopped the chicken up and made 17 chicken enchiladas for dinner, hoping for leftovers for tomorrow. DSI showed up and made a huge dent in that plan! Have a quart of broth in the fridge that will go in the freezer tomorrow.

After I make stock with bones, all bones, beef, chicken, pork ----, all the bones get ground up and used as fertilizer.

For those of you who have freezers, move the freezer outdoors in the winter, you will save a lot of electricity.

dcarch

I had a small turkey breast, like really small. It will make four meals for two adults. Last night will be tomorrow, which will be turkey pot pie - I also have some carrots that really need to be used.

All those meals from one chicken. I'd bet you could feed a family of 6 for a year off of a 25 pound turkey. Lol.

I’ve enjoyed this topic Martha, and good for you making so much of a single chicken : )

I do the same here, and use the bones for stock. Amazing how far food will spread. Even leftovers make perfect lunch meat (I put mine in the fridge a bit for easier slicing). I love to save money, but even more than that, the meals I prepare just taste better to us than eating out.

Dcarch, will you come over and help me move the freezer outside ; ) Actually, we have a fridge/freezer hand truck, so will remember this next winter : )

Artemis_ma… bravo for you! I wondered how that went for you : )

Annie, I’m beginning to think you can faster than superwoman!

Wow, do you ever stretch a chicken!!! I wouldn't be satisfied with just 2 measly wings, so I'd make a huge dent in that chicken.

Having said that, I've got an 8-lb turkey thawing in the frig. This weekend is our Thanksgiving. Hubby has the appetite of a toddler, and I'm hoping that soon changes. He doesn't even get a dinner plate at dinner, just a side plate/sandwich plate. :-(

I am planning to make a turkey pot pie and turkey noodle soup with the leftovers, as well as just eating leftovers.

"dcarch, all three freezers are in unheated outbuildings, but Elery and our local energy company say that freezers will make up the savings in the winter, use more power in the summer. Since I have no place to move them inside for the hot months, it all evens out, I guess."

I would put them right next to each other, touching each other. I would buy from HD 1" thick rigid foam boards and cut to cover the freezers. Save $$$ winter and summer.

dcarch

Annie, I put this on another post. I use these tortillas, they are almost as good as making them. No gluten.

https://olemex.com/products/white-corn-tortillas-2/

My grandson who is very allergic to milk likes this brand of cheese.

https://daiyafoods.com/

I think it was the one with the olive bread. Can't help with the bread, I can make almost everything dairy free, but haven't tried gluten free.

dcarch -- you bury the bones? I was burying lobster shells before lobster got too $$$ (I she'll lobster out completely & sometimes make stock from roasted she'll).

I've got an overload of chix broth, so from now on will make it very concentrated. I feed some bones to our opposums, but have to watch the I don't attract undesirables.

Can we return to the OP? She bought three chickens at 57 cents a pound. She says one chicken was $6. That's more than 10 pounds. For one chicken. Is that the Godzilla breed?

sushi

Cage-free Kansas chickens ... down the yellow brick road, from the market just outside of Oz.

Not quite as large as the Texas chickens ...

Well, some of the chicken breast at Publix look like they came off a turkey lately!

Sherry -- we call them Dolly Parton chickens!

Oops -- I am so so sorry -- they were not quite $4 each -- I was hoping to get chickens for $1.50 to $2 and had to get bigger ones and in my memory the bigger went up to $6 rather than $4 (I just checked the remaining chicken in the freezer)

Six meals from a $4 chicken is even better!

I agree, you did a great job with that meat. But it is something that's bugged me for a while now, the monster (and tasteless) size of some chickens. We use to pound thin a chicken breast for piccata and similar dishes, but now we need to slice them. I prefer the Costco chickens that are more like 3 pounds, roasted.

The Springer Mountain chickens are closer to the size chickens used to be. They are more expensive, but may be worth it.

http://springermountainfarms.com/Merchant5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=smf&Category_Code=chicken

I will admit that the two I've made so far had good flavor and yes, I prefer smaller chickens especially if it is just the two of us.

I suspect all the 3# or so chickens are getting skimmed off the supply for supermarket rotisserie chickens and fried chicken joints like Col Sanders.

I think so also, ci_lantro. I got a small fresh chicken not long ago and the cashier was talking about how cute it was.

cilantro, I suspect that you are right.

Sushipup, I agree. The "frankenchickens" I've raised can reach 7 or 8 pounds in 7 weeks, and I was told that at 2 or 3 weeks they were "Cornish Game Hens", at 4 or 5 weeks they were fryers and at 6 or 7 weeks they were broilers. The poor things are so misshapen that they waddle when they walk and they are bred to have those enormous oversize breasts because everyone wants "boneless/skinless chicken breast." They are prone to heart attacks and broken legs from their fast growth and would become extinct in a single generation due to their inability to naturally reproduce. However, they are fast to raise and many people find the stronger flavor and different texture of a heritage bird unappealing. I believe that a bird which has had time to develop muscle and age property does have a different flavor, or more flavor, than the younger birds. However, a heritage bird takes 6 months compared to 6 weeks for a Cornish Cross, so they are far less efficient.

I prefer the heritage birds, although they don't have those big overgrown breasts and are more muscular, not as spongy and soft. Other people who buy chicken from us do not agree, so depending on the use and the recipient, I sometimes raise the Cornish Cross type. I do make sure their food and water is placed outside and far from each other, so they have to go out and walk around. I've found that I can overcome many/most of the heart and leg problems just by making them get outside and walk around.

Annie

"petalique

dcarch -- you bury the bones? "

Absolutely. Also fat, meat, 100% shredded and buried. I must have buried many tons and tons of kitchen scraps. Scraps that didn't go to mess up our environment.

My garden soil is incredibly fertile, never had to use fertilizers.

BTW, don't bury your food scraps if you use a lot of salt in cooking.

dcarch

Hmm, don't animals dig all that up?

No Not for me.

I use my rototiller as a hole digger also. The hole I bury food scrap is very deep.

dcarch

Note: how to get "back to OP topic"? Just talk about it; no one preventing you.

Now, I want to address the original topic as well as a couple of offshoots. Feel free to just skip on by.

Martha Scott – you are one of the incredible cooks on this forum and I so love reading your post looking at your cooking and I want you to move in and cook for me. That chicken pie with your biscuits or the Pillsberry biscuits looks so doggone delicious. And I think it's incredible that you got so many great dinners out of such a bargain. Good going. I'm a little bit confused though because I thought or read(?) That with a bird, a good amount of the week is composed by the frame and that unless one goes over The minimal weight that you pretty much you're paying for the bones and cartilage and skin. So DH and I have been in the habit of buying the largest roster that is in weight. Please some of you good cooks set me straight! Thanks.

Now to the bone very topic burying topic ;-)

Oh my, dcarch! I love it! You must have incredibly good soil, as in delta or river valley soil to be able to drill straight through without breaking your post hole digger or tiller motor.

Where I live it's so rocky that in between the forest leaf mold, about every 4 inches is a good size stone, or at least the tip of a boulder. I end up having to hand dig just about everything. I want to know what type of a tiller you have that will accommodate a post hole digger fitting. Tell me?!

Bumblebeez -- I think DC arch said this but what I do is to bury things deeply – whether their lobster shells or dead bodies. When I say deeply I mean maybe 2 feet. If you have coffee grounds or onions or grapefruit rinds, you can put those on the top.

Someday I'll put this in another post but to you chicken lovers and roasters, I would love to get a rotisserie cooked chicken set up someday* . In fact, I actually have a couple of rotisserie motors and spits, but they have not yet been set up or attached to any device or cooker.

** Oops, just remembered, I am supposed to avoid chicken skin or saturated fat. Is there any point / can on reasonably bake, broil, roast chix without the skin?

Martha & others (Annie?) who grow tired of the regular chicken salad, try this: make a curried chicken salad and two it add some raisins and some candied ginger pieces. You can avoid using mayonaise by using a mix of a little bit of sour cream, yogurt, and either coconut cream or mayo. And it's great to have it on artisan rustic bread or a rye sourdough.

Martha, I'm making up your room.

Ed -- please forgive & work around typos