Dan the Man the "BIG RED" Kamado Kooker

For Christmas this last year, Dan the Man received a few gifts cards for Mernards from our boys. For those of you who do not have a Mernards where you live, it is like a Home Depot or Lowes. Danny has been sitting on those gift cards all this time waiting for the summer grills to come in stock so he could use them to help purchase a new grill. Danny has been wanting a new grill, a charcoal grill, for a year or so now. We currently have a gas grill that never seems to work right.

He originally did research on charcoal grills several years ago and ran across one called the "Big Green Egg" or some such thing. He has been obsessed with getting one since. The only thing holding him back is that they cost around $800 and while Danny can easily dish that kind of money out for some piece of machinery or equipment for the ranch/farm... he has a hard time spending that amount on something that falls in the "household" category.

Well, he finally found a "knock-off" version of the "Big Green Egg" at Mernards! Oh happy day! It's called the "Big Red" Kamado Kooker of which Dan the Man is the new owner of. It is about the third of the cost of the egg one. I like it, because it is red and matches perfectly with the Cleary building. Green would not have looked so good!

"BIG RED"
Kamado Kooker

(I just noticed his grilling "tools". What is my garden spade doing hanging from there?)

Oh my gosh, can I just tell you he has been like a little boy at Christmas with his new hot wheels race track that he simply can not get enough of! He has turned into an OBSESSED GRILLING MACHINE! Hee, hee! I'm not complaining, I've actually have enjoyed someone sharing the daily cooking chore with me! I am in charge of making sure there is something thawed out for him to grill each night (unless we are having left overs) and he does all the research on the internet as to the best way to prepare it. Sometimes this can take hours or even days!

We started out easy with hamburgers. Then moved to steaks and chickens.

At one of the winter farmer's markets I bought a chicken roasting pan that Jennie Salters of Chalk Butte Pottery made for me. Dan the Man just HAD to roast a chicken using it in his grill. I succumbed to the notion, but told him specifically, it could not get any hotter than 350 degrees or it could crack. He promised me, that it would not. I told him if it did, he would owe me another one.

Beautiful Open A Bar 2 Ranch Pastured Poulty
(Seasoned with Famous Dave's Country Roast Chicken Seasoning)
5.5 lb Roaster waiting to be roasted in my beautiful
chicken roasting pan, hand-made, just for me...
which by the way I hadn't even got to use yet.


Potatoes with a little olive oil and seasonings ready to roast.




Dan the Man, the chicken and my chicken roasting pan...




Dan the Man carefully setting everything in the grill.

He roasted the chicken for about 2 hours at 350 degrees. One of the nice things about these grills, is that it is extremely easy to keep the heat regulated in.

The finished chicken!

The finished potatoes.

The chicken turned out great! Very moist and juicy. The potatoes... well... since Dan the Man didn't know that he should probably turn them half way through cooking they were pretty brown... well, actually they were BLACK on the bottom half. And perhaps 2 hours was too long for them. And my pan, you are probably asking yourself... CRACKED! Boo, hoo. I am so sad. Guess Dan the Man owes his Country Chicken Girl a brand new chicken roasting pan from Chalk Butte Pottery! Oh Jennie....

Yesterday, he made a huge leap and smoked two 11 lb. chickens! That's not a typo, by the way, the 11 lb. chickens... Some of you know the story about the BIG chickens!!! Those of you who don't... in a nut shell, we had our commercial freezer konk-out on us last year in the middle of chicken production and ended up growing some pretty big chickens, as in 10-13 lb. chickens which we coined as our "churkeys"... chickens as big as turkeys! So these two chickens were from that whole episode.

Anyway, Dan the Man smoked them for 5 hours at 230 degrees and used apple wood chips. Oh my! He might be on to something. Perhaps Open A Bar 2 Ranch will soon be offering smoked chickens! Dan the Man's Smoked Chicken!

I'm just wondering how long this "grilling fascination" will last until it becomes "work" instead of "fun"! When that happens, the grill will end up being my duty!

Did You Get One?

I sent out the 2011 Pastured Poultry Order forms last week. If you haven't received one by now, then you aren't on the mailing list (or I haven't brought it over to you yet, sorry neighbor! I haven't forgotten about you.) If you want one, send me your address and I will mail you one. Or if you are tech savvy and I am guessing that you are since you are reading this blog, you can just print one if you click HERE. Make sure you scroll down to the bottom of the page with the order form on it and click the "print this page" button.

Below is a copy of the order form. I have also posted the letter that accompanied the order form. Important stuff in the letter explaining the price increase and new policy on pick-up and delivery of chickens.

2011 Chicken Order Form

$2.75 per pound dressed weight

Name: _______________________________________

Address: _____________________________________

City: _________________ State: _____ Zip: _______

Phone: ______________________________________

email: _______________________________________

Please indicate how many chickens you would like from each batch.

Remember these are approximate dates!

____ Batch 1 (Mid June)
____ Batch 2 (Mid July)
____ Batch 3 (Mid August)
____ Batch 4 (Mid September)
____ Batch 5 (Mid October)

Here is a copy of the letter that accompanied the order form.

April 7, 2011

The first batch of chicks have finally been ordered and will arrive on April 15th!

Enclosed you will find your 2011 Chicken Order Form. Please take time to fill it out and return it to us. All chickens will be sold on a first come, first served basis. Once we run out of chickens, that will be it until next year. We plan on raising 3600 chickens this year.

This will be our sixth year for raising pastured poultry and we are so pleased that you have chosen to support us. Our goal is to be able to offer our farm fresh poultry year round. We fell short of this goal last year due to the untimely “death” of our commercial freezer right smack in the middle of our pastured poultry season. We are happy to report that the freezer problem is far behind us and we now have a wonderfully large walk-in freezer to accommodate our needs.

We continue to strive to provide the highest quality product for the lowest possible price, but due to the extreme price increase of grain and fuel, we are forced to raise our price this year to $2.75/lb. We still believe that this is an exceptional price due to the fact that our competitors are charging anywhere from $3 to $4 a pound.

As in the past, you will be notified when your order is ready. However due to the large volume of customers we now have, we will not be able to make home deliveries. Chickens can either be picked up on the farm, at the Scottsbluff Farmers Market or at the Morrill Farmers Market. We will also be scheduling specific dates when we will be delivering chickens at a central location in Scottsbluff. Pickup arrangements can be made when we notify you that your chickens are ready.

Once again, in 2010, we completely sold out of our ¼, ½ and whole beeves. We will begin taking orders from now until August for 2011. If you are interested, I urge you to call and discuss this with us at your earliest convenience. We only have a set number of beeves available and all orders must be in before August. This beef will be delivered the end of December 2011. We had to turn away several people this past year and we don’t want to leave anyone out.

We look forward to seeing you again this summer and we feel blessed to be able to offer you our pastured poultry, farm fresh eggs and all-natural beef. We so appreciate your continued support and business.

Sincerely,

Dan & Kathi Manville

Open A Bar 2 Ranch, LLC

(308)787-1111

Project Predator

Some of you who are on Facebook already know that Dan the Man and the Country Chicken Girl have been having trouble with an unknown predator at the Open A Bar 2 Ranch. On two separate mornings they have been greeted with a horrific sight upon awaking and checking on the chickens. Something has been getting in with the meat birds and killing them. This predator is ruthless and cunning... it would appear as if it is killing the poor chickens in their sleep, since there is no warning from the chickens that danger is amongst them.

The predator has ripped the heads off of 4 chickens, leaving the rest of the body untouched, had injured one severely enough that Dan the Man had to put the chicken out of it's misery, and has partially eaten one that it tried to drag away, but couldn't get it out of the fence surrounding the chickens. One of the headless chickens was found right inside the chickens' shelter.

Since Dan the Man and the Country Chicken Girl are no longer crazy, wild and party-all-night kind of people, they decided that an all-night stake-out was out of the question. And being poor-as-dirt, they couldn't afford to hire someone to hunt down this cold-blooded chicken killer, so into effect went...

Project Predator!

Watch the story unfold in this riveting award-worthy video...

Update on the War!

Just thought I would update you on the Possum (or technically I should say Opossum) War.

If you have no idea what I am talking about, then you need to read the previous post...

I Delcare War!

It's been two nights now since the opossum got the three chickens and we have not seen hide nor hair of the dirty little varmint.

I think he got on my blog and read my post and is scared silly, at least I hope that is the case.

So for now... all is well with my dear little chickens!

That is all...

goodbye and goodnight!

I Declare War!

Two nights ago I was working, yes working, not playing on the computer, when all the sudden I smelled a foul smell coming in through the window.

"Peee-yew! What is that stench?" I said to anyone who was listening. No one answered me since no one ever listens to me. Tay-tee, my man, didn't even answer me. He was sound asleep on the ledge by the window next to the computer.

My man, Tay-tee, fast asleep.

Sometimes I sleep with my tongue hanging out and slobber on my pillow!

The stench was getting stronger and I was almost certain that a skunk was outside. I got Dan the Man's attention and told him he'd better get his gun and make sure the skunk was not getting into the egg layers chicken coop stealing eggs.

Dan the Man reluctantly got off the couch and went to get his gun. Meanwhile I got the big flashlight. Dan the Man told me just to go outside and see if it was a skunk. I told him I didn't want to go outside without him because I didn't want to scare the skunk away before he was ready to go outside with the gun. Good thing it wasn't a burglary with some crazy prison escapee with a gun, because Dan the Man was as fast as molasses getting his gun, finding the key to the lock, trying to locate the ammunition, putting on his shoes, getting a drink of water....

So needless to say, but the time we made it outside, Dan the Man saw a big old possum going around the side of the house.

Man did that guy stink!

Hey dude... take a shower next time you decide to come around!

I was disappointed that Dan the Man didn't take care of him with his gun, but he didn't.

This morning I had the Farmers' Market in Scottsbluff. I leave the house before the sun even comes up so Dan the Man is in charge of feeding the meat birds (chickens) in the morning when I have the Farmers' Market. He found two of the chickens inside their pen with their heads torn off and one chicken injured so badly that he had to go ahead and put it out of it's misery.

I'm thinking it was the doings of the big ole' stinky possum that was here the other night.

This is only the second time in 5 years that we have ever lost a chicken to a predator.

This means war!

Tonight we are sleeping with all the windows open so I can hear any distress calls from my sweet little chickens.

Dan the Man has the gun loaded and ready.

I am tempted to set up a night watch and to make it mandatory for everyone in the house to take a shift. We even discussed locking the chickens up in their shelters, but that would be a pain.

So right now it is raining lightly and hopefully that will deter Mr. Big Ole' Stinky Possum from coming around tonight.

I only like one kind of Possum.

Guess what kind...

the dead kind.

So wish us luck tonight with our war that we have declared upon the possum.

Here is only kind of possum I like...

Gross old possum I found rotting in the field last winter.

RECIPE: Grilled Famous Dave's Country Roast Chicken

I've been on a serious chickn' grillin' kick lately because we have been working such long hours and grilling chicken is so easy, doesn't heat up the house and doesn't take much prep time or baby sitting while it is grilling. It's so easy to butterfly the chicken, throw it on the grill, flip it after 15 minutes and come back when it is done!

The star of the production!

Ingredients

One roasting chicken (I can not endorse any other chicken besides an all-natural pastured poultry from Open A Bar 2 Ranch, all others are junk!)

Famous Dave's Country Roast Chicken Seasoning (I got mine at Wal-mart)


Directions

1. Heat your grill while you are prepping the chicken. (Don't ask me why there are two steps that are numbered 1. I don't care and I don't want to take the time to figure out the html code either. Just deal with it.)
   

1. Butterfly your chicken. What you still don't know how? Are you serious that you haven't tried it yet, even though I have given you several recipes now that involve butterflying a chicken? What is the point of reading these recipes if you are not going to try them??? Just joking, I love you and am glad you are reading the recipes even if you don't try them. Here's a secret, I have been known to sit on the couch and watch exercise shows on tv and not do the exercising! LOL Isn't that kind of the same thing? Oh and all the cooking shows I've watched and have never made the dishes they did!
   
2. Here's the link for you slackers who still don't know how! How to Butterfly a Chicken
   
3. Oil your grill. Take a paper towel, dip it in oil with tongs and rub it on your grates. There, that was easy! Oh, do not, I repeat DO NOT spray cooking spray on the grates when you have a flame. If you do, I can promise you, you'll never do that again! And you'll be missing your eyebrows for a few months.
   
4. Place the lovely Open A Bar 2 Ranch pastured all-natural free-range chicken skin side down on the grill. Adjust your burners so that the flames in not under the chicken, but on each side of the chicken. This is called indirect grilling. I have a four burner grill so I place the chicken in the middle and use the two outside burners.
5. Generously season the chicken with the seasoning, don't be skimpy.
6. Close the lid, and adjust the heat to 350-325 degrees.
7. Walk away for 15 minutes or so.
8. Come back... Baby come back, any kind of fool could see, there was something in everything about you... remember that song?
9. Flip the chicken over and season again. Shake, shake shake... the seasoning not your booty.
10. Close the lid, check your grill every once in a while to make sure you haven't run out of propane... I hate it when that happens. Roast until done. Take the chicken's temperature. It should read about 175-180 in the thickest part of the thigh and breast. The juices should run clear too, no tinge of pink or red in it.
11. I roasted a 6.6 lb chicken for around 2 hours. It was perfectly tender and juicy!

Ummm, Ummm, good.
Wish you could smell it!


I just noticed that you have to give your email address to watch the above video clip from Cook's Illustrated, so if you don't want to do that, here is a video you can watch without the hassle. Although I do love the Cook's Illustrated website and I think it worth the hassle to become a member. They have lots of good cooking stuff.

I also ran across this one and it made me laugh. The guy is wearing gloves (?), the chicken looks pathetic, no doubt a grocery store chicken, that must be why he is wearing the gloves. Like I said, grocery store chickens are junk. He also says to use a 3.5-4 lb chicken. I bawk at that. Are you serious? A roaster in my humble opinion is at least a 6 pounder! He also has you take out the breast bone, but I don't, more work, but I guess maybe I'll try it next time to see which way I like it better. And finally, he says there a "little clean up to do!" Uhh, not with an Open A Bar 2 Ranch chicken dude! He says to cut-away the fatty material... Once again, no fatty material on the Open A Bar 2 chicken. Go ahead and watch it, but don't believe everything he says!

The End

Handsome Calendar Men! Whoo-hoo!

Some of the men in my life...

So cute they should be calendar boys!

Since we had a month of Calendar Girls, I thought I'd start doing one for the boys!

Do yourself a favor and click on each picture to see a full screen view of the photo
then hit your browsers back button to return to the blog.

Big Red

Mr. Big Guy

Herbie

Big Red, again

My main man, Tatum
aka:
Ta-tee
Ta-tee Cakes
Tator



That's all. Just wanted to share those pictures.
Goodbye and good night!

The Chicks are 3 Weeks Old!

Time sure flies when you are a chicken farmer! Hard to believe that the first batch of chicks are already 3 weeks old and the second batch is already a week old. Actually as I as writing this, the first batch will be 4 weeks old tomorrow, April 28th, and the second batch will be 2 weeks old.

The first batch continues to get their feathers in and are getting bigger every day. The feathers on their wings are completely filled in along with some of their tail feathers. The older the chicks get, the harder it is to take pictures of them. This may surprise you but Dan the Man doesn't have much patience with me or the chicks when I am trying to photograph the chicks. My pictures can only be as good as the chicks decide to behave and since Dan the Man's patience with them is only as long as one of his romantic thoughts, well... you get the picture. Let's just say I have, if I'm lucky, approximately three whole minutes to get a good picture of each chick if I want Dan the Man's help. So, I'm looking for a new photography assistant if anyone is interested! Pay is terrible, but rewards are wonderful!

Cornish Cross 3 weeks old



Gold Star 3 weeks old



Americana 3 weeks old



Barred Rock 3 weeks old (black one)

Cornish Cross & Barred Rock kissing, how sweet!

Come back my sweet, I wish to kiss you again!


If anyone wants to come visit the chicks, you are more than welcomed! 200 more newly hatched chicks come on Friday, so we'll have a total of 600!! You really should come to see them, children are welcome and will love it!

The Chicks are 2 Weeks Old!

Cornish Cross 2 weeks old

Well, our first batch of chicks are now two weeks old. All 200 of the Cornish Cross and the 19 egg layers. We had 25 egg layers to begin with, but 10 of them I had ordered for a friend who has since came and got his. Then I bought 4 new egg layers at The Mercantile earlier in the week. At two weeks old they graduate from the nursery brooder to the next brooder which is larger and has less heat lamps. The nursery brooder needs to be around 90 degrees warm the first few days and then you gradually decrease the heat as the chicks begin to get their feathers. It's amazing how fast they grow in just two short weeks. By the time they are ready to leave the nursery, they have just about outgrown it.

Cornish Cross 2 weeks old

The new brooder they are in now is about four times bigger than the nursery brooder. I will gradually "wean" the chicks from the lights completely so that by the time they are four weeks old and have all their feathers, they will be ready to go outside. This applies to the Cornish Cross (meat birds) and not the egg layers. The egg layers don't grow near as fast as the meat birds so they will stay in the brooder until they have all their feathers.

Gold Star (egg layer) 2 weeks old

Once the egg layers have all their feathers, then it will be time to gradually introduce them to my one year old egg layers. Chickens have a definite pecking order and if I introduced the new chickens to the old chickens before they could defend themselves I think I would end up with disastrous results. I will partition a part of the egg layers coop so that the new birds will have their own space in the coop but won't be in physical contact with the old chickens, but they will be able to see each other and get to know each other this way first.

Barred Rock (egg layer) 2 weeks old

We moved the 2 week old chicks on Thursday. On Friday we received our second batch of chicks. 200 more of them, so now we have 400 chicks!! So the new babies are in the nursery and the 2 week old chicks are in the 2nd brooder. There is never a dull moment around here this time of year!

Americana (egg layer) 2 weeks old

If you need an escape from the city, or even if you live in the country and want to come see the chicks you are always welcome. You know every proud parent loves showing off their children! Just give me a call! Seriously, you'd have fun and your kids would love you if you brought them here to see the chicks. I only ask one small favor that if you are bringing children that you realize that this is not a petting zoo and I ask that I be present to help with any holding of the chicks.

Come see why a day in the country is worth a month in town!

RECIPE: Chicken Feed for a Crowd!!

Today I thought I would share my scrumptious chicken feed recipe with you. Why, because I love you. But you have to promise not to give it to anyone. It is an Open A Bar 2 Ranch trade secret. Dan the Boss Man would fire me if he knew I was telling you...

What did I just say...

Dan the Boss Man would fire me if he knew I was telling you...

Wait one second, I'll be right back. I've got to go tell Dan the Boss Man that I am telling you our trade secret chicken feed recipe. I hope I get fired!! Wish me luck!

Okay, I'm back.

He didn't care, what a waste of time.

Oh well, here's the recipe.

Open A Bar 2 Ranch Chicken Feed
(TOP SECRET!)

2200 lbs corn

40 buckets of corn now and 40 buckets at the end...

dump corn into mixer...

It's helpful to keep track of how many buckets you have filled and dumped...

dump in two 60 lb bags of Nutri-Balancer

1/2 of 50 lb Bag of Kelp

dump the kelp in the mixer...

One 50 lb bag of calcium...

Three 50 lb bags of Fishmeal...

Dump 'er all in there...

Pee-U, this stuff stinks...

Six 80 lb bags of Oats...

Dan the Man... He's so strong...

Might be easier to lift with the both of us. Too bad your hired hand is taking pictures of you instead of helping you!

956 lb of Soy Bean Meal...

Hey dude, that looks like tons of fun!

Oops, you spilled some, better scoop it up! We might has only gotten 955 lbs in there.

40 more buckets of corn...

Mix 'er up real good...

Uh, Dan the Man...
You've got chicken feed dust all over your face.

Beat around on the mixer for a while...

This is a requirement and daily occurrence with all pieces of farm machinery!

Crawl under the mixer and beat on it from under there...
Uh, Dan the Man...
You be careful under there.

Do not attempt this at home. This is being done by a trained professional!

Auger it into the storage box...

OOOO look at 'er go!

That's a whole mess of feed, that there it is...

Feels like gold dust running through your fingers...

I think?!?

Never felt gold dust running through my fingers,
but this must be what it feels like!

Wow, wee, look at all that feed...

I SAID...
WOW, WEE LOOK AT ALL THE FEED!

Maybe he could hear if his ear wasn't full of chicken feed dust!

Crawl into the mixer and shovel all the feed into the auger...

IMPORTANT: MAKE SURE THE MIXER IS TURNED OFF

Crawl on outta there...

Dude, you are really dirty...

Maybe we should be wearing dust masks...
Good thing my mother doesn't know I do this...

I can just hear her now...

"You two really should be wearing dusk masks!"

Don't worry mom...
We can use the air compressor to blow the dust off,
It works real spiffy...

Just look at how it is blowing Dan the Man's hair,
but I don't think it's going to blow that gray hair away!

REPEAT PROCEDURE THREE TIMES!!
Seriously...
We've got a lot of chickens to feed.
And this isn't even enough to last the whole summer.

Last, but not to be forgotten...

Take a nap in the corn...

Oh Lordy, if my Grandma was alive she would be fit-to-be-tied if she saw this picture or heard that I did this! When we were children we use to play at our grandparents farm. Remember Lori? We would run around in the grain and Grandma always told us to never get into the corn or we would sink to the bottom just like we were in a bottomless pit of quick sand. We would deliberately disobey Grandma and sure as snow in March, we'd run up to the top and back down the big piles of corn they had to feed the cattle. When we would come back into the house our shoes would be full of corn and we would get "the lecture."

Look Grandma, I'm in the corn and I am not sinking to the bottom!!

WARNING: DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME OR YOU MIGHT SINK TO THE BOTTOM JUST LIKE YOU ARE IN A BOTTOMLESS PIT OF QUICK SAND.

THE CORN WILL EVENTUALLY SUFFOCATE YOU AND YOUR NOSE AND MOUTH WILL BE FILLED WITH CORN AND YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO BREATHE! SERIOUSLY!

Having given that warning, I must say that laying on a bed of corn feels so neat-o. I wouldn't mind a bed of corn. It conforms to every contour and curve of your body and provides support like no other mattress I have ever experienced. The kernels of corn are mystically cool (as in cold to the touch) and feel so wonderful on hot tired achy muscles.