How to Cook an Old Laying Hen or Rooster

Homesteaders seem to be divided into two main camps: Those who refuse to butcher excess roosters or older hens who aren't laying well - and those who, as needed, do. This post is for the latter camp.

While it's true that roosters and older laying hens are naturally more tough than young chickens raised specifically for meat, it's also true that it's easy to tenderize them. In fact, we find rooster and older hen meat quite moist and extremely flavorful. Older chickens, especially, have a lovely flavor - in fact, I recall Julia Child writing something about how the chickens in France had a better, more "chickeny" flavor; I've often wondered if that was because the chickens were older. Yum!

That said, there are a few things you should know before you butcher:

* Commercial meat breed chickens, which are the type of chicken you buy at grocery stores, are big and breasty. Good egg-laying breeds are generally quite small with teeny tiny breast and little meat; dual-purpose chickens are in between.

* Grocery store chicken is butchered at a very young age - and previous to butchering, birds are not allowed to move much. Therefore, they are much more tender than excess homestead roosters or older hens are.

* To have excess homestead roosters or laying hens become tender eating, you just need to know a couple of tricks.

Trick #1: Never butcher a rooster or laying hen and then eat it right away. Instead, age it so the meat naturally tenderizes. I recommend aging for at least four days; seven is better.

There are two basic ways to age chicken. One is to put it in a pot in the fridge. This is ideal when you only have a bird or two that needs aging. The other way is to fill a cooler with ice, add the meat, and then keep adding ice as needed. Although many people will tell you the meat must be held up from any liquid (like melting ice) during aging, I've aged chicken in ice water with excellent results. Because you'll be aging your roosters or older birds for so long, though, I do recommend draining the water daily and replacing it with fresh.

Cock-a-leekie soup.

Trick #2:

Cook low and slow. Like any other tough meat, old hens and roosters benefit from being cooked very slowly. This is why roosters and old hens are traditionally cooked in soups or stews. In fact, some famous dishes were originally designed for using up these tougher birds, including the Scottish soup cock-a-leekie ("rooster and leeks") - a recipe found in my A Vegetable for Every Season Cookbook - and the French coq au vin ("rooster in wine"). Just bear in mind that modern recipes use grocery store chickens; therefore, you'll need to cook your homestead rooster or old laying hen considerably longer than the recipes call for.

The key is to cook the bird for a long time (8 hours is generally recommended) and with plenty of liquid.

Trick #3: Pressure cook. Just remember, your homestead rooster/old laying hen is going to take longer to cook than a grocery store chicken. Keep cooking until the leg meat falls off the bone.

Trick #4: Brine. This is not an absolute must; proper cooking, as described above, is far more important. However, brining the bird for a day or two in the fridge can help make it more tender.