assembly line

The subject of butchering chickens came up.

Let me tell you my first memory of my parents preparing chickens for eating. 

I was knee high to a grasshopper. We were out by the barn and Dad was chopping heads off the chickens with an axe. He gave each one a toss on the grass where they proceeded to flip and flop about. And bleed. One of those headless creatures began to chase me. I couldn't run fast enough. Soon I was splattered with blood from head to toe. 

Well, I've always loved fried chicken so I guess I wasn't scarred for life.

A few years later, Mom and Dad raised some more chickens for eating. My sisters and I  probably got involved with chores: giving the chickens their food and changing the water.

It seems that Dad and Mom butchered those chickens when we were at school. The freezer filled up with processed chickens and the pen outside got emptier and emptier.

Remember those wide mouth water jugs we used to fill with ice and water and take along on trips? Maybe we each had a cup of our own to drink out of. Or maybe we had one cup that we all shared.

I remember Mom getting up early and frying a chicken (with the skin on, we used to eat the skin, can you believe that?) Then she filled that wide mouth jug with hot chicken, screwed the lid on and took it with us on trips. The jug was insulated and kept everything piping hot. When lunch time came we had finger licking yummy chicken to eat. 

Hopefully we were at a park where there was a pump with water so we could wash our hands afterwards. 

The two bravest women I know are Esther Geigley and my mom, Leona Skrivseth. (And the most patient)

They provided their daughters with sharp knives, stood them in an assembly line and taught them how to butcher a chicken from start to finish. 

I'm trying to remember if Dad chopped all the heads off the chickens before he went to work. Or did he let Ladina and Lorraine chop off some of them? 

Then we plunged them up and down in boiling hot water until the feathers would come off. That was probably our first job,  plucking feathers. Next, singing any hair that remained.

We were outside. This is early morning before it got too hot. Picture saw horses with plywood on them to make a table. Plastic tablecloths covered the plywood. Dish pans with cold water to put cut up chicken pieces in. 

We were given the easiest jobs at first, cutting the skin between the legs and the body. Cutting the drumsticks and thighs apart. Carefully cutting open the gizzard without opening the sack inside.

I have a feeling Mom and Esther were competing to see who could cut up a chicken the fastest. We watched with bugging eyes. How in the world did they do that? 

Sometimes they left the chicken whole, just removing the guts and we washed out the inside and froze them that way. Most of our jobs consisted of rinsing the pieces to make sure they were clean and packaging them for the freezer. 

I remember watching step by step and attempting to butcher a chicken from start to finish. I didn't  do it often enough to learn all the steps. 

The only way to get  the job done is have a crew to help. It makes me shiver to think of doing this job by myself. 

One last memory is helping at a butchering day at Dad and Mom Harshbarger's place. For some reason we took our chickens home to finish cutting into pieces. I was slaving away trying to get those slippery creatures in the freezer.

Meanwhile Ellis came home from work with  chills. Not a raging fever, instead when Ellis gets chills he doesn't have a proper temperature. He can't get warm, no matter how many blankets are piled on.

It's too bad I hadn't read James Herriot's story of how a farm lady treated him when he came in soaking wet. A roaring fire place to sit in front of. Feet in a pan of hot water. A gigantic mug filled with hot ginger tea to sip on. He was soon steaming inside and out.

That was the end of my butchering days. I only take the skin off chicken pieces now or, better yet, buy boneless, skinless chicken breasts. 

I'm not as squeamish as my friend's daughter who won't eat a drumstick because, "Eww, what's this?" when she finds a dark vein near the bone.

On second thought, I might remember butchering turkeys with my sisters-in-law on the farm. It's all a dark memory that I try not to think about any more. 

Definitely it is the camaraderie and conversations and laughter and working together that make those days possible.

Otherwise - forget it! 

 

Please, don't get me started on cutting up a deer.