Is this poultry good enough?

[laohaire]

I am anti-CAFO and only eat meat from local sources that pasture their animals. I've only been doing this for about a year (before that was vegetarian for 10 years). For some reason I couldn't stomach poultry until about 6 weeks ago. I had a bird (turkey) in November and another one (chicken) in December. Now I want more but it's January and nobody around here is wintering birds. I didn't stock up mostly because I only just started eating them, but also because I currently only have a standard freezer with no extra room.

Anyway, the idea of waiting until May to eat another bird is making me crazy. (I have actually gone as far as to arrange with a farmer that I can come help them process the chickens then!). But I have ethical standards and I will adhere to them! So all the farms around here are dried up but I looked at my local Wild Oats and they offer chickens from this farm, farther away:

http://www.mistyknollfarms.com/

Our chickens range free in spacious, specially designed enclosures.

Yuck. They "free range" in enclosures, great. They are fed grain.

This is MY ethical choice, so I can't ask you guys if this is good enough for me, but I'd be interested in opinions. Visiting the farm is not feasible (the drive is too far) but I'm willing to call and ask questions. They would not be my first choice. But what do you think, is it far enough from being CAFO to be worth buying maybe three or four chickens to last me until the warm season, and then I can properly plan ahead and never buy from there again?

[spughy]

I would probably be ok with those, if I really needed chicken. After all, if you live somewhere where nobody winters birds, it's probably because they'd be inside now anyway, right? They won't be AS happy as pastured birds, but I don't think they'd be suffering, and chickens IME don't actually mind eating grain - of all the animals that we feed grain to, chickens are probably the best adapted to be healthy on it. Even if a large proportion of the grain is soy, eating 2 or 3 chickens fed soy isn't going to do much to you unless you're actually allergic.

[laohaire]

Thank you for your thoughts, I appreciate that!

I did suddenly realize that I probably sound out of touch with the reality of farming. It's true, anybody wintering chickens around here are 1) feeding them all grain and 2) very likely keeping them indoors. So I'm not surprised that I can't get a freshly slaughtered chicken that was living outside on pasture in January. It's more that I suddenly got stuck wanting this after the season was over, and nobody has any extra frozen fall chickens around here, which would be my ideal.

But, yeah, logically if I can't get that, then I either wait until May or get indoor chickens.

Part of my issue is that I'm out of broth. So, same choice here: I go to the store and buy CAFO broth (no), I buy from this farm (maybe) or I just settle for vegetable broth (maybe... but, I want the chicken broth!!!).

This brings me to thinking.. maybe I need a small extra freezer next year, I wonder if I can afford to buy that and bulk meat.

[dachshundqueen]

If you're okay with the chickens, roast one and make your own broth?

Liz

[laohaire]

Yeah, that's the plan. Was just saying that it's not just a want for meat that drives this, but also running out of broth.

[Mollymae]

It's so funny that you posted this, because I have been struggling with the Misty Knolls question myself! Right now I am unable to get pastured local chicken - I found a source that will be ready in Feb/March, but I am also unsure whether we will be able to afford the $6/lb that the farmers charge, because my partner just lost her job and we are struggling to pay the bills. Misty Knolls is by far the best option available in my local co-op, and I have bought chicken from them twice since September - the only chicken we've bought/eaten in a long time. I have been craving chicken and chicken broth!

The two birds we've bought have been delicious and have gone a long way (slow-roasted for dinner one night, chicken stir-fry the next, a good rich broth from the carcass, etc.)... but I always wonder if I'm compromising my ideals by buying birds that, as you said, "free range" indoors.

I'll be interested to hear what people think and what you decide!