Chickens Are Weird

Some grievances, some conspiracy theories, and a recipe

Chicken as a concept is incredibly weird. I think I would be hard pressed to think of a more abused and emotionally dissociated food in the world of restaurant cooking and probably also home cooking. The word chicken evokes not a being as much as an omnipresent and infinite source of anonymous, lean protein. Chicken feels like a thing that can be printed out. Chicken is marketed as plain, safe, familiar. No one cares about chickens, nobody understands them, nobody minds killing them. In the rare moments that Chicken the Animal crosses the mind instead of Chicken the Dry Strips to put on a salad in order to not get hangry later in the afternoon, the thoughts are honestly kind of malicious.

Everybody thinks chickens are stupid. Everyone is always asking me, are there truly millions of chickens in the world, or is there one single master chicken controlling the minds and actions and flesh of a de-centralized army of dinosaur birds? People are always shouting that pigs are as smart as dogs and so should not be eaten but chickens are stupid and should be. People are always saying that the smarter an animal is, the more it’s like us, and the less we should eat it. People are afraid that eating smart animals is a slippery slope to cannibalism. People are always shouting KILL THE CHICKENS BECAUSE THEY ARE DUMB. KILL THE CHICKENS BECAUSE THEY ARE SCALY AND FEATHERED AND BEAKED AND MILD TASTING BUT ALSO JUICY.

Chickens are way freakier and far smarter than most people really understand. First of all, their flavor is actually way fucking intense, but nobody notices it, because we are all made up of about fifty percent chicken meat (this is substantiated on the WHO website actually). It’s largely impossible to separate our own flesh from that of the chicken bird. We have had too much. We cannot separate our own odor from that of the chicken. We cannot detect the reality of the experience.

One time, however, I did. One of my chickens named Kazoo got attacked by an opossum. When I scooped her up to take her inside, she was very badly injured. I was overwhelmed by her smell: the smell of chicken meat. Even though I’d processed chickens before, I still had never experienced a living chicken that smelled so very much like chicken. I saw her raw flesh where the wound was, and it also looked like chicken, which is actually because it was. It is strange to smell warm, raw chicken, because everyone is always shouting to PUT RAW CHICKEN IN THE FRIDGE. Everyone knows that warm, raw chicken equals salmonella. Everyone does not hang out with warm, raw chicken. But lo and behold, I did hang out with warm, raw chicken, and it turns out that chicken is chicken, and it smells like chicken. Mild? Not at all.

It is strange, the way that we have collectively accepted the phenomenon of captive dinosaurs everywhere. It is weird that all of our food is dinosaurs this, dinosaurs that. Printed out dinosaurs cut up on a caesar salad. Printed out dinosaur breasts. Dinosaurs on every menu.

I almost never serve chicken at the restaurant, because it harms me to join in on the conspiracy of one printed out dinosaur being the overwhelmingly safe choice to eat. I like chicken a whole lot, but I like friction more. I like when choosing is about joy instead of fear, and Chicken Entrée feels like the order of an anxious soul: one that needs so much to eat an anonymous, pale bird that won’t cause any physical —or, even worse—emotional feeling.

There is very much irony in the lifestyles of Chicken Entrée and Add Chicken. A bird that lives so dangerously should become the safe choice?

Chickens are hedonistic creatures. I have ten of them at home, and they love to gather at the large, dry, dirt patch in our yard to take baths and nap. They roll all around in the dust to clean their feathers, and they rest their heads on one another’s butts. They stretch out their scaly legs and flex their long toes. When they are content and warm and clean, they tup tup tup their little beaks, and their eyelids slowly roll up for sleep. They close their bottom eyelids instead of the top ones, which I particularly like. They hunt bugs and frogs and run around, greedily trying to steal each others’ catch. They are absolute cunts. They aren’t polite. They yearn for the very best bite.

Chickens don’t play it safe. Chickens do not look for the meekest menu item. The day after half the flock gets eaten, the other chickens will fly out of their protective enclosure to continue pursuing the best possible day, the best possible food. They will run like hell and fight for their lives when faced with predators, but they won’t forego an exquisite meal in favor of protecting themselves from danger.

I think that spirit is worth honoring a bit more than we tend to do.

When I serve chicken, I want to serve Chicken. I want it all. I want the stink of good chicken meat and the juice and the cartilage and the offal. I want to give the bird a really good showing for its sacrifice. I don’t care to serve a throwaway dish that’s only on offer for tepid eaters that think chicken can be picked up from the bank. So we rarely serve chicken. But when we do, we make it a big deal.

Right now, at Cafe Mutton, we are serving a chicken thing, and I really love it. It is, unshockingly, a terrine. We take whole chickens and braise them in chicken and pork stock for hours, until the meat is falling off the bone. Then, we pick the carcasses clean, shred the meat, mix it with a bunch of chopped up herbs, cram it into a loaf pan, and pour the rich, gelatinous stock over it before setting it in the fridge.

We serve pork terrines all the time, but there is something special about the chicken terrine. It is incredibly flavorful, like our other charcuterie, but it is in good balance with the abundant, fresh herbs and rich, jellied stock. Cold chicken is a delightful thing. Cold chicken in the summer is even better.

We serve the jellied chicken over very garlicky, herby mayonnaise and set a little hard boiled egg on the plate next to it. It feels right that the chicken has sort of brought its own condiment to the dish. This is another thing about chickens. They are considerate in that way, always showing up with gifts. Sometimes, we put a couple of small tomatoes or cucumbers on the plate. Today, we are adding a cold, boiled leek. Jellied chicken is a humble dish but also a very special treat. One that can’t be printed out or picked up at the bank.

Cold, Jellied Chicken

makes a full pullman pan of terrine (lol); cut recipe in three if you are a normal human

• 3 chickens, about 3# each (if you’re local to Columbia County, I recommend sourcing from Kinderhook Farm, Yundwell Pastured Poultry, or Stone Point Farm)

• 4 qt pig head and/or foot stock

• 4 qt chicken stock

• Salt

• 1 pt chopped herbs (we use tarragon, parsley, and chives, but dill is also a fun one for this)

• Gelatin if needed

Braise the chickens in stock for two or three hours. Make sure they are covered with liquid until tender. If you need, use more stock. Add some salt in the beginning, but don’t fully season the stock, as it needs to reduce.

Remove the chickens and boil down the remaining stock to one and a half quarts. Season with salt.

Take all the meat off the chickens and shred it a bit but not so much that there aren’t nice pieces. Toss the chicken with herbs and salt. If you braised the hearts and gizzards with the birds, chop them up and add them in.

If your stock was not at all gelatinous to begin with, you might need to strengthen it by adding gelatin. The correct ratio is 12 sheets to a quart for a nice, firm slice, so you can use that info to correct the set of your own stock. For example, if you used strong trotter stock, don’t add gelatin. But if your stock was weak or thin, maybe add some sheets, you know? Anyway, test out the gel by chilling some stock before finishing the recipe, because you don’t want to have to melt down the whole terrine to fix it the next day. If you are using powdered gelatin, look up the conversion, because I don’t know what it is (but I am rooting for you).

Pack the chicken into a plastic-lined terrine or pullman pan. Pour the liquid over it, and press it down to make sure there is stock up to the top of the terrine. Place another pan on top or a piece of cardboard cut to size and put something with a little heft on top to weigh it down. Chill in the fridge.

The next day, slice it up and eat it like I said before, maybe with a hard egg or some vegetables or on a sandwich but definitely with the herbed mayo. Oh and also maybe some anchovies if you a freak.

Herbed Mayonnaise

• 5 egg yolks

• 3 cloves garlic, minced or microplaned

• 3 lemons, zested and juiced

• Salt

• 1 pt neutral oil

• 1 c olive oil

• 1 c parsley leaves

• ½ c picked tarragon

• ½ c picked mint

In a food processor, combine lemon juice and zest with garlic, egg yolks, and salt. Stream in the oil until thick and nice (add more oil if not thick and nice), and then add in the herbs and blend until you achieve a pale green color with some flecks of herb. Taste and adjust. Good job.

OK BYE.