Butchering Ducks Part 4

Butchering Ducks Part 4

Part of the Self-Supporting, Self-Sufficient, Sovereign and Free Series.

Parts and Pieces

Start here to open up the inside of the duck.

We laid the body breast side up, located the middle of the ribs and made an incision towards the vent. Underneath the skin is a thicker layer of fat and under that are the innards, which you do not want to cut into, so we stopped cutting before we hit the innards, but cut very carefully around the vent.

Once we cut around the intestines, we reached into the body cavity as far as we could and pulled the innards out. By pulling gently, we avoided squishing the gall bladder and making a mess.

We separated the liver, heart and the gizzard from the intestines with the scalpel, or a sharp knife.

You can keep the organs and use it for pet food. The gizzard can be cut in half, the rocks inside rinsed off and the yellow layer on the inside peeled/cut off. The rest is muscle, which also makes good pet food.

The intestines and extra fat go into the scrap bucket.

Then we rinsed off the outside and inside of the body and the organs 

with water.

The Gizzard

A gizzard is an organ found in the digestive tract of a chicken. Similar to a stomach, the gizzard is used to grind up the foods the bird eats. See all the small rocks in this gizzard. This is what helps grind up the food for the bird.

Gizzards are considered a delicacy in certain cultures, and provide a healthy dose of certain vitamins and minerals.

Slice cooked chicken gizzards into a bowl of stew or vegetable soup. Saute chicken gizzards with olive oil and onions and add to cooked noodles for a quick meal high in protein.

Grill chicken gizzards with fresh vegetables for a nutrient-dense meal that supplies fiber, potassium and vitamin A.

After you clean out the rock and other items in the gizzard, rinse well with water and then peal out the liner shown here as a some what yellow color. This is a very tough liner and most do not attempt to eat it. Reminds you of an tire inner tube. Just saying.

Picture to the right here shows the gizzard peeled and washed and ready for you to use in a soup, stew or stir fry, the choices are endless - well maybe.

The first duck was now butchered. Parts separated and ready for the freezer.

If it is hot outside and you are butchering several ducks, keep the ones that are done in the bucket with cold water until all the cutting up is done.

Once all the butchering was done, we cleaned off the table, dried off the body with paper towels and wrapped it up in two layers of freezer paper, marked on the wrap “Duck 2015” and off they went to the freezer.

We can't wait to smell duck roast in the oven.

There you are. One step closer to being more self- sufficient, armed with the knowledge of how - to.

One of the benefits we enjoy here is the fact that we grew this food source and we know that it is as healthy, organic, Non-GMO and as much as possible a regenerative source as we can make it.

Yes, it is more work doing this but then we have to evaluate what our health is worth to us and that is as they say the bottom line for us. Heck, Just writing about it is a lot of work, but we love to share our knowledge and experience and hope it will help you become more self-sufficient.

Thank You

The Survival Center Farm Team

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