Pressed Chicken

"Big Chicky" giving the" all clear" on the side porch. I wish he'd find some place else to crow!

I love listening to my chickens talk to each other.  Actually, "Big Chicky" does most of the talking. He's the head rooster and he takes his job very seriously.  As Big Chicky escorts his hens around my yard and pastures he keeps up a constant chatter, scratching in the grass and dirt and showing the hens all sorts of choice goodies. I'd love to record his "talk" some time and try to figure out just what he's saying. He has definate phrases, or at least it seems that way to me.   He's also the flocks main security guard, letting out a screeching call when danger approaches.  His crow, besides greeting the morning, is also his "all clear" call.

When I was a kid my mother and grandmother made something they called "Pressed Chicken".  My dad came home for lunch every day and my mom always had a good meal waiting for him. Pressed
Chicken makes a great cold summer lunch.

 I expect Pressed Chcken was created as a way to use an old stewing hens but any chicken parts will do.  It's basically stewed chicken molded into a glass bread pan, then sliced for sandwiches or just eating with pickles on the side.  To make it you stew a chicken in water with salt and pepper until the meat falls off the bones. Strain off the resulting broth and refrigerate the broth and the meat. When the meat is cool chop it fine. Add salt and pepper to taste, pack the meat into the loaf pan pressing down until it is packed in tight.  Spoon a cup or more of the firm gelatinous broth into a pan and heat until it is liquid again. Pour the broth over the chicken in the loaf pan until it is almost to the top of the chicken. Put a piece of waxed paper over the chicken and weight it with another loaf pan filled with a pound bag of beans (you can leave the beans in the bag).  Chill over night.  Next day, unmold the pressed chicken and slice.

You will have a lot of leftover good rich gelatin broth, so be sure to save every bit of it, packed in pint freezer containers and stored in your freezer. It's the perfect base for a nutritious soup.

You can also add lots of good things to the cook pot to make an even more flavorful pressed chicken and chicken broth.  Add a couple of ribs of celery, a peeled carrot, an onion, a couple of cloves of garlic, herbs such as thyme, parsley, rosemary, sage, whatever srtikes your fancy.  Regardless, don't forget to put at least a teaspoon of salt and lots of black pepper in the pot when you stew the chicken.