Poultry Talk Ontario (pto.ca)

Well trying to come up with another few ways to cook my cockerels. They aren't nice plump, young tasteless birds like you get in the grocery store and require different cooking strategies. I have quite a few favourite recipes I've tried with limited success.

Sadly, many traditional recipes that were developed for heritage birds have been revised for the Franken chicken and no longer are suitable for the traditional heritage type bird. Even many Coq as Vin recipes these days use boneless chicken breasts!

So, what do people do to adapt their favourite recipes or do you have some good ones to share that work for heritage chickens?

Maybe as a PTO fundraiser we could create a cookbook for Heritage Poultry!

OK to make coq au vin work you have to cook different pieces of the bird for different times. I recently did this with my BSW turkey drumsticks. Americas Test Kitchen is awesome for tips and tricks to make recipes work!

I suggest you start with a copy of the book from Edna Staebler , Schmecks appeal, its a recipe book of Amish cooking. Everything from scratch and useful for woodstove. Its a set of small books or one big volume. Common enough to find in used bookstore or Salvation Army. Lots here in Ottawa.
Cooking tools and technique is important, cast iron is best or Creuset (an expensive French ceramic covered cast iron set of pots)