A Good Problem To Have

In the past week, I have been kept so busy it seems I barely have time to sleep. It's a problem.  But, it's a good problem to have.  Definitely a first world problem, and even more elite than that as I doubt many Americans have this particular problem.

You see, I have more food than I can keep up with, and I'm running like a chicken with it's head cut off just trying to preserve all this food before it spoils.

Speaking of chicken, that was the first long day of food preservation in the past seven days.  My mid-June batch of broilers went to the processor early one morning.  I dropped them off, went to work, and after my morning's work was complete, I picked them up again.  Rather than having them shrink wrapped, I told the processor to just throw them into several large bags, because I would be parting out most of them once I got home.

My plan had been to freeze maybe 10 of them as roasting chickens; taking the ones that weighed 3.5-4 pounds and freezing them whole, in individual bags.  The rest, and especially any that were 5 pounds, I would cut into boneless breasts, leg quarters, and what I refer to as "soup carcases" (the bird, minus legs and breasts, that I will toss into a pot and boil until the meat is fall off the bone tender, and then use meat and resulting broth for soups, casseroles, pot pies, etc).

Turned out that none of my birds weighed less than 4.5 pounds.  The processor had praised them, telling me I'd raised a "really good looking batch of birds", and now that I was weighing them out, I could see why he'd complimented them. Not a scrawny bird in the bunch; they were each meaty and well rounded.  A couple even topped six pounds.

It took me about three hours to weigh, sort, cut, package, and freeze 26 broilers and one rotten rooster (that I'd had enough of his shenanigans, so he went to the processor too).  And once done with that, I still had to clean and disinfect the kitchen, cook dinner, and see what in the garden needed harvesting that day.

Harvesting the garden has definitely morphed from a fun "what ripe veggies will I find today?" scavenger hunt to a flat out chore.  My back aches from bending and picking, not to mention from carrying full half-bushel baskets.  Suddenly just about everything is ripe today.  And more is ripe tomorrow.  And more the next day. And the day after that. It's hard to find the time each day to work, take care of the late-July batch of broilers (who recently moved from the brooder to the grow out pen), cook meals, harvest the garden and preserve what was harvested. 

It's hard to use my kitchen, it's so full of baskets of freshly picked veggies.  Baskets on the counters, baskets on the floor.  Baskets on the stools.

So much food!  So much fresh, healthy goodness!  I'm so exhausted!

Such a first world problem.  I'm so blessed.