A whole new level of backyard chicken keeping

Fair warning.

This post and the accompanying links may not be for the squeamish...  It is all about our family taking a new step into keeping a backyard flock of chickens.

Chickens lay eggs and they are food too.  That is your last hint...



In the last few weeks I have become more convinced that one of our newest chicks was not a potential egg laying hen (which are really called pullets), but a potential noise maker and hen hassling roo (which are actually called cockerels).  In a backyard flock of 10 (now 9) birds, roosters aren't really desirable especially by the neighbors.

A few days ago The Boss Lady bought a magazine about different chicken breeds.  The suspected rooster was an Australorp and he had huge, long tail feathers.  The magazine all but confirmed my suspicions.  But conventional wisdom says that you don't know for sure until the bird gives you either a crow or an egg.

That noise I heard this morning when I was walking to the car?  Yeah, that was NOT an egg!

I posted an ad on our local chicken message board, but I knew that this guy needed a new home quickly if we were not going to make the neighbors mad. Yeah, their four barking chihuahuas?  That is another story...   No nibbles on the ad, AND Wednesday is trash day which would make it a lot easier to get the "leftovers" taken care of quickly.  It was looking like the rooster's fate was sealed.

This evening The Boss Lady and I decided to butcher the bird ourselves. So, like all good urban farmers, I hit up Google and found this link:

How to butcher a chicken in 20 minutes or less... 

After a few hours of reading up on how to best process and butcher chickens, I decided that this was the best method for us to try for our first time. We would skin the bird, instead of scalding and plucking all of the feathers and there was not even a small chance I would eat the livers and gizzards...

Cut to the chase.  We did the deed and it took less than an hour, including the times that we stopped to read the instructions I printed out.  Now the bird is in the freezer and we will cook up some chicken and dumplings later this week. 

When we started with backyard chickens, I promised the kids we would not be eating their pets.  But this seems like we are kind of coming full cycle with having chickens and growing our own food in the garden. The Boss and I decided that we will tell the kids about the roo and give them a choice when it come time to eat the chicken and dumplings.

Create-A-Day

The Princess woke up early (or at least earlier than I planned) this morning. I wasn't totally ready to face the morning pet-feeding chores, so I went and crawled into her bed to chat for a few minutes.

She started telling me all about her awesome bear stuffed animal. Yeah, I had no clue either. Turns out, she was trying to remember all the details of a toy that she had dreamed about. The Princess was ready for me to fire up the sewing machine and get working on her newest masterpiece. Now I am not totally clueless around a sewing machine. My mother would have never, ever allowed that. But creating a 3D toy from scratch? Yeah, this sounds like a project best passed onto mom.

Less than 2 hours later The Boss Lady and The Princess have a pattern created and the fabric parts cut out and pinned together. They have a plan for finishing the bear in short order. Planning and working quick, not my strong suits...

The Talker set out this morning to design a brand new board game. He worked solo for an hour or more and in the end the wife and kids sat down to play the new game. It involves a lot of math, so I wasn't invited.

With all of the creativity flowing around here, I went out in the backyard and worked on my newest masterpiece, the wine bottle tree/garden trellis. All I need now is to empty another few dozen cool looking bottles. Or maybe I'll gather some from the neighbor's recycling bins and save my liver all that hassle.

The Boss Lady has her own plan for creativity today. She and the boy are leaving in a few minutes to take the dog to Dirty Dog Wash for a bath. That is always a three hour adventure in wet, smelly mess. Lucky for me, I get to skip out and watch movies with the girl!

Oh cruel fates...

I robbed the garden of all the good stuff, tomatoes, cilantro, jalapeño peppers, onion and I even dug up my first ever garlic. Set to work and created a masterpiece of salsa goodness.

Finished it up, and then i realized we are out of tortilla chips. Dang. And this stuff smells gooooooooooooooood, too.


Locking the kids in the chicken coop and making a run to the grocery store. Back in 20.

So it was a good choice then?

"So what do you think about the wine I chose?" I asked The Boss Lady.

She quipped "Well, it is cheap and stinky... kinda like you".

The boy is 8!

The Talker is now 8 years old. And he says it has been a great birthday, maybe even "the best ever"!

We are bypassing the big birthday party extravaganzas for the kids this year, in favor of smaller, more family focused (meaning cheaper!) events. Besides that, I turn 40 this year and I want to have the cool party!

Last night The Talker picked the dinner venue and he got to take one of his best buddies. The Talker chose to have his birthday dinner at our favorite steakhouse. That's my boy! We celebrated a day early since the boy's basketball team practices on Wednesday evenings and The Talker could not be dissuaded from attending practice.


This morning, before school, he got to open one gift. The Boss Lady, little sister and I picked out a Dallas Cowboys football set for his gift from the family. The Talker loves to play pretend football games in the backyard. He dresses in all of his gear, runs plays, scream and yells and even keeps score.

The Talker has several team jerseys and t-shirts, but so far his only football helmet has been from a Houston Texans play set that he has had for a couple of years. Now he can dress like a real winner! Ironically, I ordered the set from Meijer, who does not even have a store in Texas as far as I know, for $20 less than I could pick the same gear up locally.

Today at lunchtime I visited the kids at school, celebratory chocolate covered donuts in hand. Then for dinner I whipped up one of the kid's favorite meals, pork chops, mashed taters and green beans. OK, the kids could do without the green beans. The Boss Lady made an awesome birthday cake and we chowed down after basketball practice.

Considering we started this party at dinnertime yesterday and things are just now winding down, 28 hours later, I think The Talker's 8th birthday will be one for his memory book!

A peek at the awesomeness

A week ago I promised some upcoming awesomeness . I admit I have been negligent in posting the goods and I have been a tease. Turns out I don't have a flatbed scanner anymore. I thought there was still one in the garage. As a result, the project is going to be a little more time intensive than I thought.

So for the time being I bring you this. (Are you sure you can handle the awesomeness?)










Wait for it...







This little 15 page cookbook from 1965, turned up when The Mother of the Bride was at her Aunt's house. The MotB thought I might like it. And turns out she was right. Just like she always is. Isn't that correct, MotB?

Anyways, I'll try to figure out a decent way to share some of the recipes soon. Until then I am off to bake up some Bean Dip a la Dr Pepper. Or maybe I'll whip up some Dr Pepper basted Barbecued Spareribs...

More than you ever cared to know about blue eggs

Yesterday we got our first egg from The Talker's Easter Egger Pullet. I wanted to follow up with a little more info about the odd looking little egg.

First of all, yes they are edible. And like all of our backyard eggs, the blue eggs are very tasty! I can now vouch for this personally, since I just polished off 2 egg and cheese tacos.

One interesting tidbit about the blue egg shells, they are blue all the way through. Look at the brown egg shell to the left and you might notice that the brown eggs are actually white on the inside. The brown coloring is only on the outer surface of the shell. Not so with the blue eggs.

Roadrunner's egg, left. One of M&M's eggs from the last 4 days, top right. Grocery store organic, free range egg, bottom left.

The brighter color of the yolks from our backyard eggs is even more noticeable when compared to regular, white shelled, grocery store production eggs (which happen to make way better boiled eggs, by the way).

The three egg yolks in closer comparison. Roadrunner's egg bottom. M&M's egg top left. Grocery store egg, top right.

As chickens get older and lay more eggs, they tend to lay larger eggs. Their first eggs are smaller and the yolks are noticeably smaller. This is true regardless of egg shell color.

And finally, the real reason to keep a backyard flock! Egg and cheese tacos with a little Hell on the Red hot sauce and side of Dr Pepper! Good eating, thanks to our chicks!

Wait for it...

There is something AWESOME coming shortly. Need to work on it today and hopefully will be getting it posted up shortly.

Set your faces to stun.

But until then, try to get some work done.

Let's get cooking!

After almost seven and a half years at home, you might think I have this house husband thing down pat. But one of the many domestic duties I have still yet to master is cooking for the family. Oh believe me, I have cooked enough food during my time that we are not starving. Far from it. I just have not gotten GOOD at it. But now the kids are gone to school 8 hours a day and I have been trying to step up my kitchen skillz.

Let's start with the House specialty. After years of resisting, I bought a crock pot a year ago. I wanted it for a specific item, pot roast. Now my pot roast is finally good enough that I served it to my own mother. I have pretty well conquered the gas grill, too. Burgers, hot dogs and chicken are no problem. Sometimes I even branch out a little and grill some veggies. I bought a smoker last year and I can crank out a pretty good smoked chicken.

I even do pretty good when it comes to putting an entire meal together. Fruits, veggies (almost always green beans) and other sides. But I seem to be in a cooking rut. We eat the same things frequently. The biggest problem with that is that the kids have grown resistant to trying new foods.

Recently I have brought out some new meals, baked potatoes and all the fixings and several different stews. The black beans I made from scratch tasted blech. Tonight we are eating chicken fajitas and I just finished a batch of home made re-fried beans. They turned out OK, but hopefully a second effort will be a little tastier.

When I turned into AtHomeDaddy I looked for a cooking class. Never did find one that wasn't geared at gourmet or specialty cooking. But now, after all these years of trial and error, I seem to be getting the hang of the kitchen.

The 7 year old MIGHT live through the weekend

As I was declaring a general strike on my laundry service if the boy would not, at a minimum, put his worn clothing in a dirty clothes basket, The Talker tried to make a funny:

"Yeah, and Dad, if mom does not get all of the laundry folded this morning, then we will FORCE her to do it, right?"

"Uh, son, have you met your mother? I have and I don't think either one of us will be FORCING her to do anything, anytime soon."

Just FYI, there is also a strike called in the kitchen. If dishes don't make it all the way INTO the sink, they don't get washed. I am not a hunter/gatherer, so don't leave a trail of plates for me to collect or they won't get washed anymore.

You betta Chex yourself

The Princess and I are in full scale Chex mix production mode this morning. Who knew there were hundreds of recipes? Or that there was a dedicated website for Chex mix?

The girl and I are a little more care free about our mix. Lotsa whatever we find in the pantry, plus butter and a little something to spice it up. Throw it all on the oven for an hour and stir every 15 minutes.

It is incredibly easy to make, but it isn't a terribly easy recipe to replicate. If we end up with a great batch, we just have to savor it. The next might not turn out as great.

Or it might be even better.

After we make a batch for the kiddies, then it really gets fun. The cayenne and Tabasco come out to make the spicy stuff, the man food of Chex mix. Nothing like snack foods that can burn your insides!

Come over in half an hour and see how great this first batch turns out. Or wait a couple of hours and man up. The spicy stuff will be ready at noon.