Health benefits are wonderful, they are the main reason, directly or indirectly, that most of us get into sustainable farming. By its very definition, sustainable farming is healthier for the microbes and soil and the earth all around us, it has to be to be sustainable. But with all of that said there is a side of all of us that really cares about taste. It’s not hard to eat healthy when the food we desire is healthy. When healthy and nutritious foods look like something from a nightmare that’s a different story. For a minute, let’s all indulge our more selfish side and talk about something delicious.
There are many reasons our beyond organic chicken tastes better. Pasture raised chickens get fresh grass everyday along with the bugs and grubs and worms that are in the soil. They eat the forage they want, and they really love clover! This is a taste completely foreign to anything you get in the supermarket, even chicken labeled as “free range” or “organic.” The key is the daily movement, that is something we will get into further in a future blog post, but suffice it to say that no matter what label is on a chicken at the grocery store, it is extremely unlikely that the chicken is truly moved to fresh grass daily the way they are on our farm.
As much as these chickens benefit from the goodies they do receive, they also benefit from what they don’t get. Confinement house poultry lives in a sea of fecal particulates floating through the air. People who work in these confinement operations have to wear masks when they work in the chicken houses and that’s only a couple hours a day. Imagine spending your whole existence in these conditions.
The fresh air is a component of a stress free life. Whether it be a cow, a chicken, or a pig, there is no doubt that an animal that is not stressed tastes better when it is eventually butchered. This is absolutely evident with a Bailey Family Farm chicken. When a chicken is not stressed and isn’t releasing adrenaline and stress hormones, the difference is evident in the taste and the texture of the chicken.
When you raise livestock the right way the benefits are numerous and all intertwined. When our chickens are humanely raised they also taste better. The fact that they are living a better life means they are better in every aspect. We believe that when you try one of our chickens, the difference will be evident to you as well.