The End-to-End Chicken

This story does not end with me choosing to eat a plant-based diet.

Note: I’ve been in your inboxes twice today. I’m sorry. I feel like a boomer trying to figure out how to best house my two publications on Substack. Please forgive me. I’ve also moved everyone who was subscribed to my Open Roads publication over here, and will begin publishing both my essays and monthly standups on this publication.

“Will I get blood on me?” 

Trevor and Rachael, my two hosts at El Jardin de la Vida, the permaculture farm I had been volunteering at for the last 2 weeks, glanced at each other, wordless. 

“... Like, will I have to change my clothes?” 

My follow up question interrupted the pair who were deep in thought.

“No, I don’t remember having to change my clothes afterwards last time. As long as you’re swift and firm with the movement there won’t be much blood”, said Trevor. 

And that’s how I found myself wearing a fitted, black t-shirt dress while I killed a chicken. 

I was 21 years old, on an island in Lake Nicaragua, volunteering for three weeks at a permaculture farm. Towards the end of my stay, Trevor and Rachel asked if there was anything else I still wanted to do. I’d hardly eaten meat during my time there, and I’d been yearning for the yummy, meaty taste of chicken. There was only one butcher on the island who killed exactly one cow and one pig a week, So, when I announced that my parting gift to them would be a roast chicken dinner, I understood that I’d have to handle procuring and preparing the bird myself. 

I never felt as seen as I did watching the episode of Community where everyone loses their minds over chicken fingers.

When they were priming me for the deed I asked if I would get blood on myself. I’ve always found that knowing what to wear eased my anxieties going into new experiences. 

I caught the speedy little thing before it could fly or run off, held it upside down, and pushed the knife through its neck— not swift nor firm enough. It frantically flailed and flapped, and while I didn’t get chicken blood on the dress I was wearing, I did manage to get it in my eye and on my face. 

That was the easy part.

After it bled out a bit, it was now time for me to de-feather the rooster and remove its organs. The dogs of El Jardin de la Vida practically snatched the scraps from my bloodied hands. In removing the neck, the heart, and the innards of the chicken, I accidentally sliced open its esophagus, exposing the vibrant, bright green grass it ate before I killed it. 

By the time the chicken was slathered in butter, seasoned, and ready for the oven, it likely weighed about 1 pound. It was a far cry from the beastly chicken breasts I’d buy back in Canada, one of which is likely the same weight of this entire chicken. 

In the same, fitted black t-shirt dress I wore when I killed the chicken, I brought out the roasting dish lined with potatoes, carrots, and onion. Rachael made fresh buns. The chicken was stringy in some bits and required a few extra bites than I was used to taking. I ate with a huge grin on my face- not only because it was the first time in almost a month that the sweet taste of chicken was in my mouth. It was because I felt a sense of gratitude and connection with the chicken on my fork-- the same chicken that would start singing at the crack of dawn and wake me up every day for the last few weeks. 

Long after that meal was finished, and after I left El Jardin de la Vida, I couldn’t help but compare how that chicken looked, before, during, and after preparing it, to the chicken I eat at home in Canada. It wasn’t a secret to me before: I knew that “mainstream” chicken here is pumped full of hormones, genetically modified, and cage raised. It’s then wrapped in plastic and styrofoam and sold for a huge mark up in a big box grocery store.

If you eat meat, you should catch, kill, and cook your own meat at least once in your life. 

It’s not realistic for me to find, catch, and kill my own meat every time I want it. What is more realistic for me, is waking up at 7AM on Saturday mornings to walk to my local farmers market. I’m lucky enough to live in an area surrounded by small, Mennonite farms. That’s who I get my meat from; people who have been raising their animals with love and care for generations. 

While I’m not looking into the eyes of the chicken and down at the fresh grass it had just eaten, I do get the chance to look into the eyes of the same people who raised the chicken I’m buying while I hand them my hard-earned money. No big corporations, no middleman, no preservatives, weird fillers, or hormones. It’s my way of bringing a little part of my life at El Jardin de la Vida back to Canada with me.

This essay was written during my participation in the Write of Passage. Thank you to

Tommy Dixon

Bennett Jacobs

and literally one of my favorite writers on the internet today

Charlie Bleecker

for the feedback on it this week.