View report page

123
Hints as to the proper methods of preparing and packing
Poultry and Game for Market
1.-KILLING.
(a) Birds intended for slaughter must be kept for a certain time
without food.
Twenty-four hours is the shortest time that should be allowed for
"fasting," and this should be increased in hot weather.
If killed without proper fasting, the flesh will not keep properly,
and will not look so well.
(b) The greatest care must be taken to prevent damage to the skin
and tissues of the bird,—bruised flesh rapidly decomposes. The simplest
plan of killing is by dislocating the neck. The birds should at once
be placed on shaping boards, head downwards. Plucking should be
commenced before the flesh is cold.
Game should be hung up or laid out separately until quite cold.
2.-PACKING.
Poultry and Game must be allowed to become quite cold before packing.
To this end each bird should be laid out separately in a cool place, if
possible in a direct current of air. More loss is due to inattention
to this important detail than to any other cause.
In sending Poultry to the London markets there is a prevalent
practice of hurriedly dispatching imperfectly cooled consignments to
be in time for market.
The cooling will be carried out while "shaping."
Poultry and Game should always be packed in such a way as to
receive as much fresh air as possible. The packages must be freely
ventilated.
Hampers and baskets may be made sufficiently open to allow of
ample circulation of air.
If wooden cases are used, they should either be crates made of
battens, with wide spaces, which are useful and inexpensive, or, if boxes,
openings should be made in the tops, bottoms and sides.
The material used for lining the cases and filling in between the
birds should be light and porous, and the packing, while loose enough
to allow of ventilation, should be sufficiently firm to prevent bruising of
the flesh. Thoroughly dry wheat (not oat) straw is the best material
for packing.
It is certain that, if the above points are carefully attended to,
Poultry and Game will arrive at market in far better condition than at
present, and much preventible destruction of good food will be avoided.
The above hints have been drawn up after consultation with some of the
leading salesmen in the Market, whose valuable co-operation is hereby
acknowledged."
WILLIAM COLLINGRIDGE, M.D.,
Medical Officer of Health, City of London.