December 2024 (due Dec 16) Highly-pastured, Gourmet American Bresse Heritage Chickens (2 chickens ~6.5 lbs)

* Higher nutrition from higher degree of natural live-food foraging

* Pastured, beyond-organic-fermented-fed, rotationally grazed, slow-cook gourmet chicken, with rich, tasty meat

(~6.5 lbs, 2 whole chickens, optionally dressed no charge)

(Pick up at the farm, frozen, starting Dec 19.)

(Free cut up option for orders of 2 or more pairs.)

(High meat quality due to on-farm processing, surpassing IL & US standards, IL & US inspection-exempt.)

• The "Champagne" of chicken!
• Bred in France for hundreds of years for a highly-pastured diet
• American Bresse are imported from the Bresse region of France, and we give them more pasture than the French Bresse standard.
• Bresse “has the reputation of being the best quality table chicken in the world”, bred for its distinguishing blue legs and feet.
• In 1825, one of the world's first and greatest foodies, the 19th-century epicure and gastronome Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, described the bird as "the queen of chickens, and the chicken of kings".
• *pastured on >1200 square feet per chicken per year*, which is >10 times the Certified Human Pasture Raised standard of 108
• pastured on diverse vegetation for vitamins, minerals, soil biota, and your nutrition: higher omega-3s, CLAs, & vitamin E
• pasture maintained with a minimum of 95% live forage cover
• rotationally grazed for avoiding pathogen cycles, with clean pasture and a fresh salad daily
• beyond-organic-fermented-fed with feed mix with no soy, no gmos, & including and a huge diversity of over 80 all-organic ingredients, manuka honey, and raw goat's milk
• indigenous practices of feeding including fallen fruit, raw comfrey, and high omega-3 sprouted grains
• humanely bred & raised for mobility, very low stress, health, & heartiness
• ethically selected, growing both males and females
• able to express natural species behavior, foraging, scratching, digging, & thrivng
• outdoor enrichments of shade, sun, perches, shaded water
• entire life on farm with continuous outdoor living on pasture by 4 weeks of age, and cage free
• 16 week slow growth, for less stress and more marbling of meat
• harvested ethically with low stress hormones, precision dressing for maximum nutrition, & no artificial chemicals
• best cooked low and slow! A low heat and long cooking time is vital to getting the most out of this renowned heritage breed. See our example recipes.  We recommend roasting pastured chicken at 325 degrees for at least an hour and finishing it by raising it to a final peak inner thigh temp of 165 degrees, with a 20 minute rest after roasting - not a quick convenient meal, this is gourmet slow food. :)
  7 Tips for Perfect Roast Chicken (Pastured of Course!)
• whole chicken, giblets on request, allows you to use the entire pastured chicken to maximize your investment in your health. The parts were designed for your health. Here is one path:
  • Oven roast whole including skin & fat (recipe), and eat the easily removed pieces of meat, throwing nothing away.
  • Debone the remaining meat and use in multiple recipes including chicken tacos, chicken & rice, stir fry, etc.
  • Crock pot the bones along with any unused parts (feet, neck, etc.) and vegetable scraps to make highly nutritious bone broth (recipe), and strain. Use broth as a base for other recipes or as a breakfast drink to support gut health.
  • If you don't cook the organ meats (the highest nutrition parts) in separate recipes, dice them and include in the bone broth recipe.
• exceeding the animal welfare standards of even the Polyface, French Label Rouge, and French Bresse methods

"Having personally raised and eaten hundreds of top-quality hens over 50 years in the US and France, I can assure you that the Bresse chicken produced by Shire Regenerative Farm is as good as it gets." - Jeff.

"It was fantastic." - Jim, at a 5-course wine tasting dinner featuring our chicken as the main course.