Yes, Joe Silvestri says, you can still take a chicken or turkey home "warm."
"If you really want to see it killed, and have a hot bird, tell us," says the owner of Wyckoff's Goffle Road Poultry Farm. After all, that was the norm back when his grandparents opened a little poultry farm in Paterson in 1926 — customers would line up around the block before Thanksgiving, wait for a worker to chase down and kill a turkey, then take the bird right home.
These days, it's only the occasional customer who chooses this option, mostly people who want to brag at the Thanksgiving table. ("Real Housewives of New Jersey" viewers will remember that cast member Teresa Giudice winced and opted for a chilled bird during her televised visit to Goffle.) Silvestri says there are no real benefits anyway — poultry meat is tough the same day it's slaughtered; it softens and improves from a few days' chilling in Goffle's refrigerated warehouse.
Opened in 1948, Goffle is among North Jersey's best-known farms; it's held in high esteem by home cooks and restaurant chefs alike for its naturally raised, antibiotic-free, cage-free birds fed a high-protein, soybean-based diet. "It's like feeding them finer foods, as opposed to giving them cheaper foods and then having to stimulate their growth," Silvestri said. "The birds are more stable, they're healthier.
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