Blogging Siaya: The Chicken (Food Culture Part 1)

During my first week in Siaya, when I was overlapping with my predecessor, I noticed he didn't have any meat in the fridge. He wasn't a vegetarian, he told me, but the only available meat was fresh. If I wanted some, I could ask the office assistant, J, to show me how to slaughter and butcher a chicken.

Needless to say, I quickly identified this as one of the emblematic Kenya experiences I was determined to have.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on the reader's point of view) I didn't take a couple of the would-be key photos in the series. But there is still a pretty good "before" shot...

 And a nice "after" one, too:

In the end, the meat was a little tougher and stringier than I am used to, but the sauce, which featured the blood of the chicken as well as the more prosaic garlic and peppers, imparted a rich flavor. After this point, beware, there is a little blood.

J got the ball rolling by buying the chicken from the compound next door. Their free range chickens have been strutting around our yard, eating our trash. When she came back with it, she showed me how to hold it by the base of the wings, and went in to grab our knife, a big bowl, a tupperware for the blood, and to set some water boiling.

She and another one of the staff showed me how to step on the chicken with one foot holding down the legs and the other securing the wings. They slid the tupperware under the hen's neck, and told me to cut off the head.

"Cut it all the way off?" I asked, knowing the knife was a bit dull.

"Yes, just cut it off."

"How should I cut it?"

"Just cut it off, it's OK." She plucked a few feathers out of the front of the neck.

I shrugged, bent down, and sawed through the chicken's throat with as few strokes as I could manage. The animal didn't put up much of a struggle until the blade was well into its throat. After I had the head free, I held the stump so that the blood (mostly) went into the tupperware. It kept trying to flap about for a little bit.

We put the chicken in the big bowl and poured the boiling water over it. On the first try, the water wasn't quite boiling, in fact, and plucking was difficult.

We did a second round of water, and the plucking was much easier.

I understand the custom is to place the chicken on a small charcoal stove (a jiku) for a few seconds to toast off the small "hairs" from the skin. We didn't have one. In the end, the skin had a slightly unpleasant pungent flavor, and I wonder if the charcoal treatment would have gotten rid of that.

The butchering came next, and, perhaps surprisingly, that was the point at which I could no longer retain my perfect composure and blase' expression. It was the subtle smell that did it, but in spite of my desire to appear stoic and worldly, a growing wave of nausea drove me outside for some fresh air. E, the project manager, took over after I'd made the first few cuts under her attentive guidance.

Then we through the pieces in the pot, J took over, and when it was done cooking (we only have one burner), we whipped up some ugali and ate.

Coda: I also snapped this photo after we had slain the chicken. Notice the (morbidly) curious visitor behind the chair leg.