One simple mode of fattening, which is adopted by many, is the following: Shut the fowls up where they can get no gravel; keep corn by them all the time, and also give them dough enough once a day; for drink, give them skimmed milk; with this feed, they will fatten in ten days; if kept longer, they should have some gravel, or they will fall away.
Oats ground into meal, and mixed with a little molasses and water, barley-meal with sweet milk, and boiled oats, mixed with meat, are all excellent for fattening poultry—reference being had to time, expense, and quality of flesh.
In fattening ducks, it must be remembered that their flesh will be found to partake, to a great extent, of the flavor of the food on which they have been fattened; and as they are naturally quite indiscriminate feeders, care should be taken, for at least a week or so before killing, to confine them to select food. Boiled potatoes are very good feeding, and are still better if a little grain is mixed with them; Indian meal is both economical and nutritive, but should be used sparingly at first. Some recommend butcher’s offal; but, although ducks may be fattened on such food to an unusual weight, and thus be profitable for the market, their flesh will be rendered rank and gross, and not at all fit for the table.
To fatten geese, it is necessary to give them a little corn daily, with the addition of some raw Swedish turnips, carrots, mangel-wurtzel leaves, lucerne, tares, cabbage leaves, and lettuces. Barley-meal and water is recommended by some; but full-grown geese that have never been habituated to the mixture when young, will occasionally refuse to eat it. Cooked potatoes, in small quantities, do no harm; and, apart from the consideration of expense, steeped wheat would produce a first-rate delicacy.
Those who can only afford to bring up one or two, should confine them in a crib or some such place, about the beginning of July, and feed them as directed, giving them a daily supply of clean water for drink. If from a dozen to twenty are kept, a large pen of from fifteen to twenty feet square should be made, well covered with straw on the bottom, and a covered house in a corner for protection against the sun and rain, when required; since exposure to either of these is not good. It will be observed that, about noon, if geese are at liberty, they will seek some shady spot, to avoid the influence of the sun; and when confined in small places, they have not sufficient space for flapping their wings, and drying themselves after being wet, nor have they room for moving about so as to keep themselves warm. There should be three troughs in the crib: one for dry oats; another for vegetables, which ought always to be cut down; and a third for clean water, of which they must always have a plentiful supply. The riper the cabbages and lettuces are with which they are supplied the better.
Slaughtering and Dressing. Both ducks and geese should be led out to the pond a few hours before being slaughtered, where they will neatly purify and arrange their feathers. The common mode of slaughtering the latter—bleeding them from the internal parts of the throat—is needlessly slow and cruel.
Fowls for cooking, that are to be sent to a distance, or to be kept any time before being served, should be plucked, drawn, and dressed immediately after being killed. The feathers strip off much more easily and cleanly while the bird is yet warm. When large numbers are to be slaughtered and prepared in a short time, the process is expedited by scalding the bird in boiling water, when the feathers drop off almost at once. Fowls thus treated are, however, generally thought inferior in flavor, and are more likely to acquire a taint in close, warm weather, than such as are plucked and dressed dry.
In dressing, all bruises or rupturing of the skin should be avoided. A coarse, half-worn cloth, that is pervious to the air, like a wire sieve, and perfectly dry and clean, forms the best wrapper. The color of yellow-skinned turkeys—equally well-flavored, by the way—is improved for appearance at market by wrapping them for twelve or twenty-four hours in cloths soaked in cold salt and water, frequently changed. For the same purpose, the loose fat is first laid in warm salt and water, and afterward in milk and water for two or three hours. Some dust with flour, inside and out, any fowls that are to be carried far or to hang many days before being cooked.
The oldest and toughest fowls, which are often pronounced unfit for eating, thrown away, and wasted, may be made into a savory and nutritious dish by jointing, after the bird is plucked and drawn, as for a pie; it should not be skinned. Stew it five hours in a close saucepan, with salt, mace, onions, or any other flavoring ingredients desired. When tender, turn it out into a deep dish, so that the meat may be entirely covered with the liquor. Let it stand thus in its own jelly for a day or two; it may then be served in the shape of a curry, a hash, or a pie, and will be found to furnish an agreeable repast.
Old geese, killed in the autumn, after they have recovered from moulting, and before they have begun to think about the breeding time, make excellent meat, if cut into small portions, stewed slowly five or six hours with savory condiments, and made into pie the next day. By roasting and broiling, the large quantity of nutriment contained in the bones and cartilages is lost, and what might easily be made tender has to be swallowed tough. Young geese, as well as the old, are, also, often salted and boiled.