Poultry
IN selecting a chicken, feel of the breastbone; it ought to be smooth and soft as cartilage and bend easily. A young chicken has soft feet, a smooth skin, and abundance of pinfeathers. Long hairs, coarse scales on the feet, and an ossified breastbone are pretty sure signs that it is an old fowl. By the same marks you may choose a tender, young turkey, also ducks. To dress and clean poultry, hold the bird over a flame, either alcohol, gas, or burning paper, and blaze off all the hair and down. Cut off the head and pick out the pinfeathers with a fine-pointed knife. With an old fowl or turkey it is worth while to pull the tendons. This operation makes the dark meat so much more tender. Find the portion just behind the leg joint where there are a bunch of tendons, with a finepointed scissors, cut very carefully the cartilage skin that covers them, and strip it down till you leave exposed the bunch of white sinews. If the bird is fairly tender, they can be pulled by inserting a stout steel skewer, lifting each tendon by itself and twisting it until it snaps. A turkey will frequently require something as strong as a screw-driver. To admit the hand, make an incision through the skin just below the breastbone and remove the gizzard, heart, etc.; be very careful not to break the gall bladder, as even a drop of its contents would give a bitter flavor to everything it touches. Pull out the lungs-they lie inside the ribs-also the kidneys, crop, and windpipe.
Draw the neck skin down and cut the neck off close to the body, leaving skin enough to cover the opening. Cut out the oil bag in the tail, then wash the fowl by allowing cold water to run through it. If the chicken is to be cut up, sever the skin between the leg and body, bend the leg back, and cut through the flesh. Separate the second joint from the drumstick, take off the limbs and cut the breast away from the back, starting just below the breastbone and letting the knife pass between the small ribs on either side through to the collar bone. When trussing a fowl for roasting or boiling, draw the legs close to the body and insert a skewer under the middle joint, running it straight through until it comes out opposite. Cross the drumsticks, tie them with a long string together and fasten to the tail. Put the wings close to the body and keep them in place by a second skewer. Draw the skin of the neck under the back and pin down with a toothpick. Now turn the bird on its breast, take the string attached to the tail and tie to the lower skewer, cross it, draw through the upper skewer, and cut off the ends.