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Six-Pound Chickens, Dull Flavor, and 'Woody Breast'

P.D.
A black Orpington hen

"Food Guys" Jon Jackson and Greg Patent recapitulate Kelsey Gee's March 2016 article from The Wall Street Journal: "Bigger Chickens Bring A Tough New Problem: 'Woody Breast.'"

Jon Jackson, who investigated Iowa chicken processing plants in the 1970s, recalls his amazement at the time when he learned that a chicken could grow to market size (3.5 pounds) in 90 days. "Now I'm reading that today's farmers can raise a 3.5 pound chicken in 35 days, using 8 pounds of feed." 

Greg Patent recalls having trouble in the past finding a four-pound bird; most weighed just over three pounds. "Now I have a hard time finding a four-pounder because they're all bigger than that - some are 6.25 pounds. If any of the chicken breeders really cared at all about animal welfare, they would not force these chickens to grow to be such enormous birds in such a short amount of time. They're having trouble even moving around."

One problem that comes with modern, gigantic chickens is "woody breast." 5-10% of these big birds develop in a way that leads the breast meat to have a gummy texture, with tough knots. Kelsey Gee writes:

"The effects of woody breast can be so subtle as to go unnoticed by home cooks. Its cause isn’t known, but Dr. Petracci and other researchers say several decades of breeding in favor of heavier, faster-growing birds could be a factor.

“It’s not the final weight so much as it is how fast the bird gets there,” said Sacit F. Bilgili, a professor emeritus of poultry science at Auburn University who has studied such muscle abnormalities for more than five years."

(Broadcast: "The Food Guys," 4/10/16 and 4/14/16. Listen weekly on the radio at 11:50 a.m. Sundays and again at 4:54 p.m. Thursdays, or via podcast.)

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