A Momentous Occasion

Today is one for the history books, folks.  After three months, Beautiful Sweet the Silkie hen has laid me another egg!!!! OMG!!!!!  wanted to put a pic of her here, but taking half an hour is ridiculous.

She was doing so well when she first started laying.  We got about 4 a week.  Then she started getting picked on by the big girls and boys.  She lost a lot of feathers, and I was seriously considering removing her (yeah, you know me, dontcha) and making a house chicken out of her.  Where I had previously scorned chicken diapers, I was looking at patterns.  I was thinking about where I could possibly keep her so that the dogs and indoor cats wouldn't eat her.  But, I decided to give her some more time.

Sure enough, those feathers started to grow back.  She started venturing outside to scratch in the yard, and even pecked some of those big girls who tried to get her favorite greens.  Mind you, she weighs about 2 lbs.  The big girls weigh about 7.  So check this out:

The one on the upper left is Mary (Rhode Island Red).  Upper right is Hyacinth (Buff Orpington).  Beautiful Sweet's is at the bottom.  A little more than half the size of the others.  So who works harder for that egg? 

Plus, Beautiful Sweet lives up to her name.  She's the tamest, friendliest chicken out there.  I admit, I picked her up this morning (and when you weigh 2 lbs, having someone looming over you in a hoodie and work gloves could be scary!) to cuddle her and tell her thank you.  She takes well to having people hold her, so she's the official ambassa-chicken for our farm.  Her cute little button eyes, her fur-like feathers . . .too awesome. 

So let's go back to that egg.  There's a reason besides cuddling that I want more silkies.  My favorite part of the egg is the yolk (since I like mine sunny side up).  That lovely little ivory egg is mostly yolk.  I was stunned the first time I cracked one--there was almost no white.  LOVE IT!  Can't wait to use that special egg to make veranike for my family tomorrow.  For those of you who don't know what that is, it's dry cottage cheese (with an egg to bind it together), salt, and pepper, wrapped in a dough pocket.  First you boil it, then you fry it, then serve with sour cream gravy.  EXTREME numminess.

Have a great night (or day), folks.  We'll talk soon.