Chicken Day - Batch 1 - 2011

Whew!  "Chicken days" are a real workout.  It's physically demanding work  but very satisfying.  We've made some changes to make things a little easier and more efficient this year and they really did add to the efficiency.  We added a new processing table that is stainless steel, sloped toward the middle, and has a hole in the middle to let water and "cut-away parts" drain away.  The table lets us run water continuously to keep the work areas clean, which is a lot better than having to run water down a long table and have it run onto your legs and shoes like we did in the past.  That was a great addition.  We also modified a large industrial stainless steel tank to make a large gas-fired scalder.  We had tried to use an electric scalder previously and it was not up to the job.  Since water temperature is key to cleanly plucked chickens, and this is the first step in the entire process, scalding is a make or break part of the entire process.  With the new scalder we're able to fly through the scalding and plucking process.  Not only did the scalder make the process more efficient, it reduced the stress that's caused when this part of the process slows down.  The changes that we made were well placed and helped to make the two days of processing a success.  We still have two more batches to process in 2011.