Mama likes chicken breasts. She doesn't like meat to remind her that it used to be alive, and white meat is nice and dry and bloodless. These days, she and Aunt Flo buy white meat only and they both get what they want and all is well. Or, if some of her descendants are coming over, she gets a whole chicken and roasts or fries it and that works. Because Forrest and I, not having been exposed to white meat in our childhoods, like drumsticks and thighs and wings and even backs. As Julie and Richard were growing up, I used the white meat for casseroles or else bought only dark parts.Having developed my chicken taste towards drumsticks is fine if I'm cooking or if I'm buying parts at the deli. Even if I buy roasted chicken at the grocer, I get the quarter with the drum and thigh and I'm in tall cotton.
But if I want to eat chicken at a restaurant, they serve breasts. Or if I want to have an easy dinner at home, all of the frozen meals, from Hungry Man to pot pie to Healthy Choice this and that, is all white meat. Campbell's soup is made with white meat. Canned chicken is white meat. So, I want to know. What is happening to all those extra legs and thighs? I figure the wings get used in Buffalo wings, but what is happening to the rest of the dark meat? Does it go down a black hole? Get fed to pets? And how can I get my hands on it?
8 comments:
Humm Maybe Colonel Sanders knows?
Maybe they put it into those awful pressed chicken rolls. Do they still have those in the stores? They were Terrible!
I much prefer the juicier dark meat of the chicken...but, you're right, all the commercial brands seem to consider the white meat as premium.
I like both...white meat and dark meat. :-)
I think it's interesting that tiny grandma, who never has eaten a lot, would get dibs on both breasts of a chicken, or a turkey even, and thus you grew up only eating the dark meat. Very odd.
Well, a lot of it gets sold to China, where they prefer those cuts.
Weird, huh? Shipping all those bits of chickens to a country with lots of chickens.
Compcat
Our family was set up perfectly for a chicken or turkey. My father preferred thighs, my older brother the drumsticks, I loved the wings, so my mom got the breastmeat. Come to think of it, I wonder if she actually enjoyed the breastmeat of if she was just being all mommy-like and ate what the other's didn't want. Hmmm...
As far as all of that dark meat, in processed foods, I bet it ends up in the cheaper items. Anything that doesn't boast it only contains white meat, then you know they get the dark meat. When I'm cooking, I actually prefer thigh meat myself. WAY more tasty, and it's CHEAP!
Julie,
Grandma had the other part of it for lunch the next day or three. I remember when I was little that a chicken fed us for more than one meal. I would take some to lunch at school and Forry would eat some.
Cherry, yes I like to use the thigh to do soups and such and they are better and cheaper.
Compcat -- China? Now that is odd. Now that I think about it, it is almost always dark meat in Asian restaurants!
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