This is a sad story with a very unhappy ending. I can’t believe someone would post a story like this.

Not sad at all. Roosters had a good life, and a quick death, then fed a bunch of people. May we all be so lucky (well, minus the cannibalism I guess). I was all set to do the same to mine, but my local egg rancher took pity on him and gave him a place in her chicken house. Apparently he’s the cock of the walk, while my seven girls out back are egg-laying champions. And I’ve got brilliant compost to boot.

What does this message teach our children? If you don’t like someone or something, or if it is giving you problems, just kill it? Who cares if it feeds a bunch of people - you are killing a living thing that could have been spared otherwise.

We shouldn’t be happily sharing stories like this - they just support the idea of exploiting animals that may not have wanted to live with these people in the first place.

I can understand how having an unfriendly animal in your home or on your land can be problematic, but for the animal who has been placed in that home, it’s a problem for them too.

Next time, if anyone has a situation like that, you can call your local farm animal sanctuary to give away your roosters. Farm Sanctuary is actually located in Northern CA (near the author’s home) and would have gladly taken a rowdy or unfriendly rooster off of the family’s hands.

There is always a compassionate solution to every problem, and for the animals, living out the rest of their life peacefully in a sanctuary is a much better alternative to killing them and eating them.

I’m sure not everyone lives by a farm animal sanctuary. All I’m trying to say is that this is the animals’ Earth as much as it is ours. We need to start making choices that don’t just benefit ourselves, but rather the world, too. Just a thought from an animal-loving, tree-hugging vegan. :)

“Our task must be to free ourselves... by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty.”- Albert Einstein

Oh please. Why do you think it’s called “coq” au vin. Spare me the vegan sentimentalism. We domesticated chickens thousands of years ago in order to eat them. I see no shame at all in raising an animal, giving it a merciful death, then eating it. But I don’t even know why I’m bothering to reply -- this is one of those divides that are probably unsurmountable. But I for one, intend to continue eating sustainably produced meat, and to support my local ranchers (and hunters). And the recipe sounds delicious.

I will respectfully agree to disagree on this issue.

We are all allowed to have our own opinions towards a situation like this. I’m just as allowed to feel that it’s wrong to kill animals for food as you are to feel it’s okay to. I’m in no way trying to push my opinions onto anybody - I was just simply offering a different solution to the author’s problem.

The only thing I do feel the need to reply to is the statement that we domesticated chickens thousands of years ago in order to eat them. It has also been acceptable in the past to own slaves, treat women as property, and segregate races. Just because something has been done for thousands of years does not make it right. That is also my just opinion, and it’s okay if you don’t agree with me about that.

The fact that you at least purchase meat locally is a step in the right direction for our country, as most people purchase meat from animals raised in factories.

Again, nothing written here is meant to offend or convert. I’m simply offering my thoughts. Thank you for reading them, even if you don’t agree with them.

May I ask why vegans even bothered to read this article if offense is the only possible response?

If you want to have eggs from your chickens, not oodles of baby chicks, you have to separate the chickens from the roosters. And if you aren’t planning on having baby chicks anytime soon, the roosters are a nuisance and have little use as anything other than meat. They certainly don’t make good pets. They lived free lives outdoors, not confined in terrible conditions on CAFOs., and were killed quickly and humanely, not in stinking vats of feces and blood. I’d say that regardless of your views on eating meat, that this is a big step in the right direction.

I thought the article was an excellent and heart-warming one about sharing food, culture, and traditions.

I thoroughly enjoyed your story.
Itoo, thought the article was excellent and heatwarming about one sharing food, culture and tradtions.

Also, very nice to know where your food comes from and demonstrates the work and appreciation of the meal.

I respect vegans and their values to avoid all animal products. I also respect the need to grow and consume sustainable food. But this article isn’t a discussion of ethics. It’s an article about food. And as long as we are the top of the food chain, we have a right and a respnsibility to some our resources wisely and with respect, which the author did. I will eventually raise hens and roosters for eggs and food respectively. And I will thank the birds for their contribution each time I harvest from them. And hopefully, I’ll be able to make a great coq-au-vin someday!

This story brought back 40 year old memories when I accomponied my grandma out back to twist the neck off a chix or rooster then after the convulsions stopped thrusting in boiling water to losen the feathers I helped pluck. Ultimately eating every bit except the head. Soup with the feet was my fave, I sucked out every smidgen of grizzle between the joints. Once or twice a year around major celebrations a hog would be slaughtered which by appearance is more violent by sticking the knife in the neck and gobs of blood spurting out. I can’t remember this fresh kill meat being any better tasting then stale supermarket mass produced options but I can attest the the milk I would pick up once a week was. I was still warm when poured into my lechera. Since we had no refrigeration what was left over became butter and dessert - sugar was readily available being the center of cane production. Fruit grew in abundance everywhere. We had access to a rice mill and some veggies grown in the yard. What couldn’t be grown or produced at home was purchased from local purveyor, provided they had inventory and we had ration card entitlement. I have reduced meat consumption for health reasons only. Increasingly becoming meatless vegetarian makes me a flexitarian. I meet many vegetarians and a few vegan types through the food co-op, cycling groups, and yoga classes. To become one or the other on the basis of what is a natural world order seems a bit spoiled and out of touch with world conditions. Precisely why other nations despise western excess.

I used to be vegetarian, but now I sometimes eat humanely raised meat. The part about this article I found offensive was that the author was seemingly proud of throwing away the head and feet. If it’s good enough to eat the wing, why is is not okay to eat the feet? Perhaps someone with the wealth to own a farm in Provence/home in northern California, and have a housekeeper can afford to waste like this.
Believe it or not these organ meats are delicacies in many cultures of the world -- perhaps why your housekeeper thought you’d appreciate them. You didn’t even try to keep it for stock, feed it to the dog, compost it or anything. Simply just throw it away.

I enjoyed sharing your story about your farm. My husband and I are considering raising bees and chickens so this was good information for me. Thanks.

“Oh my....” I thought this was a nice friendly cooking site. I’m rather disappointed that this has turned into a “cruelty to animals” discussion. I don’t think it belongs here. There are many other places to debate raising, killing, and eating animals. Yes, obviously there are two sides to the story, and I respect that. However, this IS a food site, and it is not strictly a vegetarian site. By the way, I too am a vegetarian, but enjoy the site just as well. It’s sort of like religion, isn’t it? If you are not religious, don’t go into a church and complain that they preach religion.

That’s HORRIBLE, I can’t believe someone would brag about murdering roosters. Poor birds, they may have been annoying but they didn’t deserve to die.

I always wonder how vegans benefit from reading something they object to when they clearly understand the topic before reading. There’s a benefit in it some how but...what?

If I were a vegan, I would not be reading this article. Therefore I would have no reason to post the horrified comments these commentors made. To each his own, and please stop the drama. There are many vegetarian web sites for vegans, so go there and be fulfilled, please.

My egg-laying chickens were nearing the end of their productivity, and I asked my Hmong neighbors down the street to butcher them for me, and we split the birds. The woman and her husband sat on small stools and with an ordinary garden hose, and butchered the chickens so cleanly that I was never going to see a chicken in a bag as healthy again.

THey calmly and humanly slit the necks and held the birds until they peacefully died. They use the blood for something I didn’t ask about. A big pot of water boiled on an outdoor gas stove and within an hour we all had food.

In the mountains of Vietnam and Laos they had to butcher whatever they wanted to eat. It was second nature to them.

I did try to stew a bird, but found the taste too strong, so I gave the remaing frozen birds to them and they were delighted.

I still raise chickens for eggs and I try to find homes for the “retired” birds. If not, I have to kill them myself.

This is life. Get used to it.

This is not about non-meat eater vs. meat eater. It’s about the basic principle that all people should respect nature and other living beings. If you are annoyed by a rooster simply living its life, so annoyed that you maniacally plan its death, then you have some issues with anger and a lack of compassion. People who hit and lash out at their defenseless children often do so because they can’t stand the screaming or crying anymore and just wish the kid would be quiet already, much like the author with the defenseless crowing roosters.

Peppel should learn to appreciate the world around her and not be so affected by other beings going about their lives, not harming (or slitting the throats) of anyone. Live and let live.

Chickens and roosters come from the barn yard. If you have been buying them from the grocery store and don’t realize this, then it’s time to start figuring that out! Roosters make wonderful stew! In fact, I have one on right now. They have a lovely life here for as long as they live. Then they become dinner. If we didn’t eat roosters, then they’d go to waste, as half of the chicks are born hens, half roosters...and the roosters kill the hens and each other. Get real. Get over it.

Great story! Have the same problem with our own rooster. Inspired us to do away with our rooster and try making coq au vin ourselves. Turned out great! Thank you.

As far as actually EATNG animals (horror of horror!!), I cannot think of anything more humane. I could take little baby chicks, deep fry them to a golden brown and dip them in cocktail sauce. That and a gigantic bowl of salad and a tall glass iced sweet tea. And I have no anger issues at all.

Wait... I take that back .... I am angry at this surface level prentiousness about killing animals for the purpose of a meal. They and I know that they would join me in my chick dippin’ extravaganza if there were nothing else to eat. Thats what I mean by “surface level”.

I am suspicious of people that value animal life more than humans simply because they value animal life more than humans! Why is it that the animal shelter in this city is more luxurious than the people shelter? It has all of the “creature comforts” (pun intended) That to me is inhuman. Dishuman. Un-human.

I checked out this recipe because we have three more roosters crowing and no more room in the freezer. We live in a city where roosters are a $400 fine, so when they crow, it’s time to go! Poultry breeders generally sex their chicks at birth and drown the males, because everyone wants hens, both for laying and meat. This seemed more humane, to raise both so they have a good life up to the end. But next year, I’m going to order hens like everyone else. They’re very aggressive, although beautiful.

My daughter and I have taken a “chicken harvesting seminar,” and we’re training several of her friends, both guys and girls. The connection to reality, in terms of how labor-intensive our food is, is important. If we were doing all the labor ourselves, I’m not certain anyone could survive as a vegetarian - fats, carbohydrates, and proteins are extremely difficult to extract and process even using fossil fuel machinery.

When the author of Farm City went one month only eating food she’d grown, raised, or traded from someone who grew it, she concluded that it wouldn’t have been possible without rabbit. Our ability to be “picky consumers,” I fear, depends on millions of people deprived of their land and water to produce export crops for transnational agrobusiness. So I agree with those who feel that wasting food is unethical, but that this is a step in the right direction. We’ve all got a ways to go.

As a small farmer, I have been over run with roosters, I have also been spurred and left bleeding from those animals. As much as I love the crowing of a rooster I hate the fact that some will hurt, maim or kill all manner of other animals and each other. I came to this site looking for a responsible way to dispose of a dangerous animal with an out come that benefits everyone. I love the recipe and the story thank you.

I thought this was an excellent article. As someone who grew up on a farm, I can also attest to how belligerent roosters can be. As others above noted, these animals had a good life; that they ended up in a pot is not shameful, since that was why they were raised in the first place. Everything eats everything else; it’s the rule of Nature.

And to the person who drew a link between eating a rooster and child abuse... stop reading online and find a good therapist. Your issues run deeper than articles about eating chicken.

I am about to do the same to my handreared 5 month old roo. He’s beautiful, but I have a tiny flock in a surburban backyard and well, my pocketbook could use the break (chicken is expensive) and my tummy can use the food. Yay for caring for your food.

Do the very sensitive souls that cannot tolerate the slaughter of roosters have any idea how brutal roosters are to each other? I have 4(5 out of 6) hatched naturally by their mother out in the yard that are attacking and humiliating each other now and need peace, and my family needs to be fed. What would one suggest be done? Our local humane society would scold me for wasting their time with a call about roosters. I will keep two, one bantam and one Marian. The others I will prepare similarly to the author to feed my family. Thank you for sharing your story

I’ve always wanted to make an authentic coq au vin, if only because the inauthentic varieties tasted so good. Like you, I have found it difficult to find instructions however for cooking with rooster. I assume from your post the emphasis is simply on longer and slower cooking, but were any other accommodations necessary? The last time I tried to guess at what an “authentic” coq au vin might be, I used capon, and the results were a comical if emasculating disaster. (http://fristrom.wordpress.com/2010/01/12/anthony-bourdain-i-fail-fail-again-fail-better/).