The General Poultry Chat Forum

Processing meat - red???

I'm processing Cornish cross.
I've left them go beyond 10 weeks to 14 weeks slaughter.
None were lame as they had ample garden area to exercise and I rationed feed.
Weight is averaging 4kg.

Totally different to Wyandottes.

Query: one bird had red breast meat.
As in it looked like blood throughout the whole breast meat, a pure red lump of meat like beef.
Is this colour normal?
What caused it to turn red?
Is it safe to eat?

Cork Wyandotte
Friday, October 14th, 2022

The colour of the meat would not concern me.Different breeds have different colour meats.For example Ayam Cemani chicken meat is black and they have black bones and organs.In fact the whole bird is black from comb to toe. Silky meat is also black. Faverolle meat on the other hand is very white. Broiler meat can be pale or pink or even pink to red.Other breeds have a grey bluish meat.If the bird was perfectly healthy before processing I Would have no problem eating it.It's still going to taste like CHICKEN. So your dark red is most likely a genetic trait and if the were free ranging for a long period of time the meat would certainly be darker compared to commercial fed.
Curious to know what were they cross with???

roostercroweburn
Wednesday, October 19th, 2022

Also if you noticed corn fed commercial chicken in the large supermarkets is very yellow.
Some of my own birds that I have processed in the past have been yellow in colour.This is a result of the maize in their diet.

roostercroweburn
Wednesday, October 19th, 2022

Oh yeah, I know there's black and yellow meat from, didn't know about the blue though.
This carcass was dark blood red, like beef colour.
Not sure what they were crossed with, it was a new breed I tried out. They were just called Cornish cross.

Cork Wyandotte
Friday, October 21st, 2022