One of our goals at Southern Soil is to help consumers understand the value of supporting local farms and farmers. There’s no better way to do that than to share the farmers’ perspectives and demonstrate the vast difference between food that is grown and produced with care and attention and that which is done with profit margins as the driving force. It’s the people behind the processes that carries through to final product. Food that feeds the body and the soul! Please support your local farmers!
Brandon Chonko is a pig and poultry farmer with strong roots in South Georgia and the soul of a poet. If you don’t already, be sure to follow him on Instagram! Brandon is a talented writer whose prose will draw you in and keep you coming back for more.
What follows is one of his posts that he kindly gave us permission to share here with you.
Zen and the art of chicken processing. Poultry genuinely are a magical thing to watch on pasture. I use them to fertilize my gardens and in turn they use me to eat and in turn I use them again to feed people. 2-1 advantage moi. I process in batches of 60 or so. I do this often. So often in fact that on my tombstone it should read “Here lies Birdmane, doing chickens with the Lord now”. Its about a hundred years too late to brag about this but I can process 30 an hour alone. I just let out a contented sigh typing that. It’s an art. I say that without irony. It is. A beautiful dance between life and death. Processing is a nice way of saying slaughter. People get so squeamish at the word slaughter. It’s a very quick and humane death after a very good life and believe me we should all be so lucky. A good death. Besides if you were a grasshopper they’d eat you faster than Stetson Bennett scampering into the end zone on that long run vs Auburn. Animals have zero issue with death. They don’t even acknowledge it but rather carry on as usual as their buddy bleeds out in the grass. What they don’t like is panic or being singled out of the group. Startle a bunch of hogs and make one squeal loudly a few times and they’ll all go beserk as if they were in a mosh pit. Make a chicken shriek and the other birds will freak and haul ass. When it comes to processing day I find my zen and go with it. Everything calm. Quick. I admit I’m quite fond of it. Many a bad day or mental black hole has been escaped through chicken processing. If I’m down it makes me feel better somehow. I used to dread it but I grew to love it. Not in a bloodthirsty way, more like a circle of life way. No clue how many I’ve done, tens of thousands I’m sure. I go in multiples of 8 because I have 8 kill cones and because 4 birds fit in the plucker perfectly. Slice, bleed, scald, pluck, eviscerate, rinse, ice, repeat. The key is in the scald. Too hot and the skin rips. Too cool and the feathers don’t pluck right. Either is the worst. It’s gotta be perfect. I can tell it by the way the water feels on my knuckles as I dip the birds. The perfect burn. The perfect scald. The perfect pluck. Zen.
Brandon Chonko is the owner of Grassroots Farm in Camden County where he raises hogs and chickens, supplying some of the best restaurants in the South. (He also sells direct to consumers.)
Grassroots Farm has been featured in Southern Soil, Zagat, Garden and Gun, Eater and on PBS.
Brandon is also a BBQ pitmaster who is passionate about whole hog cooking, “rooter to the tooter”. He offers a unique from-the-farm catering service.
He grew up in Stone Mountain but moved to South Georgia “on a wing and a prayer” in 2012. Brandon has a History degree from Valdosta State. He believes in the power of small farms and healthy food.
Brandon brings his own brand of wit and wisdom as co-host of Streak of Lean. A podcast which covers the local food system, farming, lifestyle and pretty much all things relating to rural South Georgia. Follow him on Instagram @grassrootsfarmsga