WHERE THE FARMHOUSE AND THE DOGHOUSE ARE ONE AND THE SAME

Friday, September 16, 2011

Chicken Diaries: New Romance

Robert Rooster loves Paulie.  They hang out together a lot.  He keeps extra-close watch over her while she's laying her eggs, and they just seem to have a good time.

Robert Rooster and Paulie Newman

All this hand-holding and fraternizing has been good for Paulie; this sweet girl has been giving us gorgeous blue-green eggs for several days now!  I've caught her in the nest box doing the deed a few times.  


Paulie's grown into quite the young lady.  A few months ago, she seemed very shy.  She never came to greet me and kept to herself most of the time.  Now that she's all grown up, she seems to have become more gregarious.  She's my best feathered friend now.  Sorry, Stevie.

 Stevie.  We used to be BFF.

Paulie, the girl with the teal eggs.

Because I'm so thankful for the beautiful eggs we've been getting,  I wanted to give the chickens a fun snack.  I remembered that there was a winter squash with a tiny little patch of mold in the basement.  I had meant to give it to the ladies and gent a few days ago.  Perfect snack.

Amish Butter Squash

I took the Amish Butter squash up to the kitchen for dissection.  As soon as I cut into it, I knew that it was just too good to give to the chickens.  It was so incredibly aromatic that Thurgood woke up from his nap, hopped out of the bed, and trotted into the kitchen looking for a treat.  It smelled just like a sweet cantaloup, and Thurgood loves melon.  The juicy-sweet smell lingered in the air as I scooped out the seeds and put them in a bowl for the chickens.  As for the flesh, I put that on a cookie sheet, and into the oven it went.  It will roast until it's mushy soft, then I'll sprinkle on some brown sugar and let it caramelize in the oven.  After cooling, I'll peel the squash halves and puree them.  I'll put the squash into the freezer and use it later in a pie, soup, or beer.

Chicken Salad?

For snacktime, I paired the squash seeds with leftover sweet potato fries.  I garnished with nasturtium leaves and flowers.  It was pretty popular.

Nancy and Denise seem very interested.


They went for the squash guts and sweet potato immediately, but weren't too excited about the nasturtium.  Typical.

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