Making Stock and Taking Stock

Yesterday after church I roasted the whole chicken that I bought on Friday. After carving off what I would use for sandwiches and other meals this week, I boiled what was left to make stock.

I bought the chicken directly from the farmer who raised it locally in a sustainable and humane fashion. The local butcher who processes the birds is in the habit of leaving the neck and (inexplicably) the kidneys attached. My point in sharing this being: whenever I purchase and prepare one of these birds, I am always overwhelmed by how close I feel to the source of my food. And I don't just mean that it's local. I mean, somehow (maybe it's the attached neck, which, admittedly, kinda creeps me out), these birds just _look_ closer to the real, living creature than the chicken you buy in the store (they taste a lot better, too).

And in the process of rinsing, roasting, carving, boiling, and picking, I am also overwhelmed by how close I feel to my grandmothers, who have prepared countless chickens in this way as a course of habit and necessity.

Feeling so close to your food, and to those who regularly have (or had) to put this much effort into preparing food, sure makes one excessively grateful. As I was picking the boiled meat off the neck last night (a task which makes me particularly sqeamish), I started thinking about Grandma Louise's stories of Tante Janz, who could kill a chicken by stepping on its neck, grabbing its legs and pulling up, all without ever losing a beat or batting an eye. I shuddered and said a prayer of thanks that I do not live in a time or place where I routinely have to kill and butcher my own food, nor do I have a job that requires me to do so on behalf of others. I also said a prayer of thanks for those who _do_ do the hard, sometimes disgusting, often thankless work that puts so many foods so conveniently on my table.

I think it's good, it's important, to get this kind of reality check on a regular basis - it keeps me mindful of how much I waste, of how much I take for granted. And though I hate handling raw meat and mostly avoid it whenever possible, the sense of connection I feel - to other people, to my community, to the whole of God's good creation - whenever I have a chicken cooking day like this, far outweighs the gross factor. Plus, like I said, the end result tastes a lot better than anything you'll buy in the store!

Peace,
Catrina