Butchering a Goose, then eating its Liver (raw)

And then scald it, pluck it, eviscerate.

Okay, simple. If it's like a duck, I have a feeling we're gonna be scalding for like 20 minutes. Yeah, or not 20 minutes, 2 minutes.

Having the soap in the water, yeah, that helps break the oil on the feathers and gets the water to the skin.

Nick was like, you got soap? I had forgotten the soap. So we got soap in there, 2 minutes in the scald if it's like a duck. 2 minutes in the plucker versus like 30 seconds with a sea monster. Okay, now here's my problem, guys. We have— they're kind of— I'm afraid they might jump out of this trailer. They're no sea monsters. What if we all stood around the trailer and somebody grabbed them, and maybe that would prevent them from jumping out because we'd be surrounding them? Now don't grab the tufted one, that's, that's a guard goose. That's a half-tufted. Okay. Get in. Come down here, please. That one there. The one with the—

the one with the bump.

This one right here is a guardian. And if we catch it, that's great. We'll just go take it across the field. I don't know if this turkey cone is too big. What do you think? No. Jonah and I went ahead and put the other cones up. Let me put the cardboard up. We hang it upside down. The being upside down sedates it. The being in the cone, the hugging effect.

One thing I've never affected any other person do when processing is to have a wire for their feet. Like, I've been scratched in the eye so many times.

That would be a really good idea.

On all of my kill cone boards, I'll put like a little staple nail and have a wire, and I'll just wire their feet up.

So good.

And then it saves your eye every time, and then they can't kick themselves out, especially with turkeys, dude.

Oh my gosh, who thought of this, Nick?

I did, after I almost lost my eye.

I'm gonna do commentary here. Just grabbing his head. Calm down. Got him calmed down. He's looking for the jawbone. Just— whoa, it cut really easy! Or did you, did you cut really hard?

You want to cut nice and firm because you don't want to have to sit there and saw it.

Yeah, it's a nice firm clean cut. Was it a sharp knife?

Yeah, it was sharp.

Sharp knife's a humane knife. Yeah. Ellie, how do you feel about butchering geese for the first time? Good.

No.

Are you excited?

Yeah, I want to gut one.

How many people that are 9 years old get to butcher their own Christmas goose?

I don't know, probably me.

How do you think butchering a goose is going to compare to butchering anything else? It's going to be easy.

It's not going to be that hard, I don't think.

We all We also have Honey Tree Farm, Casey Ostrich, maybe Tori, but their friend Nick from Growing Back to Eden is visiting us from Washington. Can you watch that? And maybe get some ice while it's feeling— yeah, and I'll go make breakfast. I actually just decided, since he's getting the ice, make sure it doesn't get filled up past— I don't know, we don't need that much. Maybe right here, a third.

Okay.

This is Rosie. Shoot, are they gonna be able to fly out? I don't think so. Do we need to get the cage? Remember the cage?

I don't think they can fly out though.

What happens if they do?

They're meat birds.

They keep busting through this pig net. No surprise. But there's— those guys are staying in there. We're gonna go ahead and clean up our stuff. Why? Why just leave it out here. Hey, is it weird for you guys? Like, the poultry— the meat bird season is over.

Not really.

We're parking the meat shaw for the winter.

We're getting a break now.

Yeah, I look— I'm excited about the break, but it's still a little weird. All right, we're gonna put in some soap in our scalder. It's ready to go. Everything's ready. Did you bring some knives, guys? Nick and Casey have both arrived. Hey, Nick's actually killed a goose before. Yeah, I thought we were all going to be here together not knowing what in the world to do, but okay, that makes it not as fun anymore. Oh, I know this isn't gonna be as good of a movie anymore, Nick. Yeah, thanks a lot. You're welcome. We actually have somebody here who knows what they're doing. Okay, so tell us what we're gonna do. We're gonna grab one of these geese, we're gonna put it in the cone.

Yeah.

How do we kill? Do we kill different?

No, we don't have a pith there, so we'll just slit the throat like normal.

You know, we got to get the scalding right, we got to get the plucking right, or this is going to be an absolute nightmare. Are we kind of rinsing it off? Yeah, getting it clean. I like this, Nick. I'm learning all kinds of tricks. It's like, that's like an inch of— that's the exact opposite. Oh, I know. I don't even have skin though. Putting a little more soap in there. You found a fracture, Nick.

So the soap is smaller, so getting the wings and everything to open up— thank you— to open up.

Yeah, that's true.

I've just been on pasture. They don't—

that's right.

Yeah, so their oils are pretty like dense.

Ah, now you need rubber gloves, or you can use that tool that Casey's got there for you because we want to do the feet too. Yeah, you're gonna honk. Sounds like it's farting.

So what happened to the feet?

Get done?

Yeah, the feet are done.

So now that's good, you're holding it by its feet.

That came out pretty easy. See, it's still bone dry. I still think it needs more.

Look, it needs a lot more. It's nice to have that constant roar of the, uh, okay, that was a minute and a half then. He's gonna have to keep it moving because it's a big, it's a big bird.

Starting to cool off, so we're just gonna hand pluck these little guys.

But we don't have a lot of pin feathers, do we? Now you got it at the right time. Yay! That's what I wanted to hear. You don't know for sure until you do it. But yeah, it plucked pretty good, right?

I need that knife.

This kind of stuff, it's easy.

Yeah, it plucked really good.

Nick, are you a perfectionist?

Yeah, I'm all right. I'm a little CDO.

We're gonna cook all this off. I'd rather you be that way than the other way. Oh, you're at 1 minute and 30. You should probably try it. Boom! How else was y'all's called? You went a little longer, didn't you? Yeah, it's like weird to pull it.

It's like sticks to your hand and stuff.

Look at those lungs. That's how they get them honks out. Yeah, got the liver right there. Yeah, let's eat some. Yeah, it's still warm.

I hope so.

What does it taste like?

That's actually not that bad raw.

Okay, I'll taste it.

You're like, you want to try it, Nick?

I mean, it's a superfood. It's not necessarily the tastiest food. Are you gonna try it?

Yeah.

You ever had warm raw liver? It's not that bad. That ought to give you a boost of energy.

Never mind.

It's got an awful aftertaste. Does it?

Aftertaste is a little off.

You can finish it.

You gonna try it? We eat a lot of fermented vegetables. We're good. Fermented vegetables? We make a lot of beef broth.

You put liver in it.

Get out of here. It kind of tastes like I'm eating a wet chicken, kind of like a wet dog. It has that kind of, uh, aftertaste to it. I gotta get used to liver. This is superfood, but it's gonna be— but cooked.

I eat a lot of cooked liver.

It's good. How do you cook it?

Um, we just put it on the pan, fry it, bunch of onions, liver and onions.

Okay, we'll try it. We'll try it before you leave. How about that? Will you try it then? Yeah, I'll eat it then.

Have you ever eaten lung? I haven't eaten like bird lung, but lamb lung— oh my gosh, this stuff's so good. Eat that every Greek Easter. It's like the best part of Greek Easter.

Wow.

It's so chewy.

What's Greek Easter?

Just Greek Orthodox Easter.

Are you Greek? Yeah, I'm Greek.

My whole family's Greek.

Oh, cool. Yeah. All right, Rosie. She's more scared of being alone than being killed. Such a compliant goose. This is Rosie. This is Grandma's guard goose. Grandma's gonna get her chickens back actually real soon. I think this week.

Here.

Where's the other goose? There it is. Doesn't seem like it's going to be a problem. Well, that's nice. 1:30. We probably started at 11:30. 2 hours. 4 geese. Christmas goose coming very soon. On today's episode of Burn It Up Cooking Show, what are we gonna cook, Nick? We got a special guest.

Liver and onions.

All right, Nick, who are you and where are you from?

Um, I'm Nick, obviously. Um, I live at Paul Gauci's, so the guy who did the Back to Eden film, and Yeah, I got my Instagram page, Growing Back to Eden. I've used that as like teaching platform, taught gardening, regenerative agriculture, all kinds of stuff on there.

I got the skillet on medium. Hey, whatever you do, Nick, don't, don't put a burning hot skillet— I know, I saw on our counter. Yeah, Rebecca has forever branded.

Too bad it doesn't read right though. That'd be kind of cool if it did.

Lodge sponsorship. Yeah. How can you get us a sponsorship? You're at least going to burn the counter. Everybody, man, he's so casual. He likes to cook with one hand in his pocket.

That's what I do.

That's how good he is, huh? Let's see it. They're waiting. Their mouth's watering over there, Nick.

To what, some liver and onion?

Yeah. So do you eat liver and onion because you like the taste?

Yeah. Oh yeah, I grew up on it. My whole family thinks it's disgusting. Well, Not my whole family. Everybody but my grandmother and I.

And you guys like it?

Yeah.

Oh, well, good for you, man.

Yeah, I've been eating it since I was really little.

You're just warming up the butter?

Yep.

So is that the trick, the onion, or is it— or is it the cooking of it?

I don't know, this is how I've always done it.

Because raw was pretty rough. Raw was pretty irony.

What, having it raw out there?

Yeah, I need to like Liver. Yeah, it's so good for you.

Liver is the real, like, superfood.

Golden brown, that thing. Those things, you fried it in butter. Yeah. All right, let's do the liver. I like that. Yeah, that's the sound of the Burn It Up Cookie Show. That's right. We need some smoke. I'll get it. We've got some.

Let it sit for a minute.

Okay, that took no time at all. How did you know it was done?

I mean, I just don't like it like overcooked because then it starts getting real mealy, like gross. Okay, but I don't know, as soon as the color changes, like that big piece.

All right, yeah, cut it up some more so everybody can have a little bit of these. Hey, are you gonna try this liver? Here it is.

Oh my word, good stuff right there.

Just get a lot of onions and a little bit of liver. There we go. Is it better cooked? Mm-hmm, a lot better cooked.

Yeah, the kids came over here.

I'm waiting for the bad taste. It's good so far.

Papa ate liver and I was like—

there it is.

There's the flavor.

But no, it's not bad.

Better not be, I cooked it.

I know. That is so much better than raw.

Really, y'all?

I think I would do it for my health.

I don't— like, the more spices you put on it, the better. This is a real basic. This gives you like the nice cooked liver flavor. I never would have guessed it's liver. It's good.

This is salt and pepper. Have you tried it?

No, it's right here. I'm so afraid.

Well, it's just medicine. Just look at it like medicine.

I take desiccated liver. Do you put milk in with it to make it more tender or just the onions? This is better for me, he says.

Yeah. He wants you to have it for Snowball.

He wants Snowball to have a good start. I don't know if I can get— okay, so I heard this podcast once and they said if you are having a hard time getting over—

When it gets cold it gets worse.

Eating, um— eating organ meats, then just kick it around in your head for about 6 months and then try it. It's been kicking around in my head for about 4 or 5 years.

Yeah. You won't start tasting the liver for a little bit.

Oh, but I'll starve myself.

Oh no. I'm gonna faint. Here it comes. There it is. Good job, Nick. Thank you very much. Okay, thank you guys for helping butcher today. You can have a goose. Will you cook him a goose before you leave? You want a goose? Yeah.