American Bresse vs. Orpingtons: Which Makes the Better Meat Bird?

Why raise American Bresse for the freezer when giant Orpingtons are already on the farm?

Jennifer and Carey compare American Bresse, standard-bred Orpingtons, and Cornish Cross chickens—not just by size, but by growth rate, feed investment, reproduction, flavor, texture, and usefulness in the kitchen.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Why standard-bred and utility Orpingtons are not the same
• How breeding priorities affect growth, egg production, and carcass development
• Why Jennifer selects American Bresse at 17–18 weeks
• The value of a meat bird that can reproduce naturally
• Why older, active birds develop deeper flavor and firmer texture
• Which chickens work best for frying, baking, barbecue, soups, stews, and broth
• Why proper resting after processing matters before cooking a fresh chicken

This is not about declaring one breed “best.” It is about understanding what each bird was bred to do—and choosing the right chicken for your breeding program, freezer, and dinner table.

Transcript

orps_bresse-Jennifer-webcam-00h_00m_00s_351ms-StreamYard 0:23

over to your cage. And I looked at the cage, and I looked at the bird, and I looked at the cage, and I was like, "Okay." And of course, I did not know at this point about double cooping, right? Nobody had said anything to me. I did not know. And so I opened the door. His name was Yankee. And I took Yankee, and I shoved him in the cage face first, and I slammed the door shut. And I stood up and looked at him, 'cause it was a floor cage. And I stood up and looked at him, and this is what I saw. There was just black feathers coming out of every bar, and there was like, there was no space.

0:59

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Jennifer 1:18

Welcome back, poultry nerds. So I got an interesting question the other day. I posted some pictures of my Orpingtons 'cause I went through them and sorted them, and somebody wanted to know why was I also raising the Bresse for meat instead of just eating the Orpingtons. So I thought, that could be a good podcast because it's not a simple answer really, if you don't understand what the differences are.

Carey 1:46

Yeah, when you first mentioned that to me, I was like, time?"

Jennifer 1:49

Yeah, time. So Let's kinda compare and contrast the two things. So my Orpingtons, and this is not true for all Orpingtons, my Orpingtons are standard bred, meaning they're fricking giants. So pictures don't Do them justice. They, it takes them one year to lay, around 18 to 20 months to be full size. I have some cock birds up there, and the spurs on them are, like, four inches long, and they're as big as my finger, big around as my finger. No, I don't trim spurs. I know we have talked about this. I do not trim spurs.

Carey 2:33

I feel sorry for them ladies

Jennifer 2:35

Well, okay, so now first rabbit hole. My males only are with the females during a couple months of the year

Carey 2:44

that's 'cause they're seasonal breeders or seasonal layers or whatever you wanna call it

Jennifer 2:48

So my hens will only lay 100 eggs, if I'm lucky, a year. These are not production birds. These are ornamentals basically. they're yard candy. So when somebody says they have a standard bred, they're breeding them for certain characteristics, and these are being bred for size and color and shape. Those are my three things

Carey 3:19

and it's standard

Jennifer 3:20

Oh yeah, the standard,

Carey 3:21

that's what we mean by standard bred is, APA standard of perfection. That's what we're talking about.

Jennifer 3:28

The book

Carey 3:29

Not, j- you know, they're standard. They're just regular like everybody else is. That's not what we're talking about

Jennifer 3:34

Right. So these are the ones that you would see, like, at a show. If I showed them, which I don't anymore, but would I show them, you would have to double coop them. So I have a story. I If you guys are new to us, then I used to raise standard Cochins, which are just as big. And I-

Carey 3:54

they're, bigger and just not as tall. I

Jennifer 3:58

Thanks

Carey 3:59

I could go bowling and get a strike

Jennifer 4:01

Yes.

Carey 4:02

coaching

Jennifer 4:03

Yes. And so when I went to my very, very first show, which going to a show is a little intimidating, but you just kinda have to jump in and, and learn, right? And so I went to my first one, and I paid the coop fee, which is like two or $3, and I show up, and they give you your cage number, and you go

orps_bresse-Jennifer-webcam-00h_00m_00s_351ms-StreamYard 4:27

over to your cage. And I looked at the cage, and I looked at the bird, and I looked at the cage, and I was like, "Okay." And of course, I did not know at this point about double cooping, right? Nobody had said anything to me. I did not know. And so I opened the door. His name was Yankee. And I took Yankee, and I shoved him in the cage face first, and I slammed the door shut. And I stood up and looked at him, 'cause it was a floor cage. And I stood up and looked at him, and this is what I saw. There was just black feathers coming out of every bar, and there was like, there was no space.

Jennifer 5:03

His face was up The wire.

Carey 5:04

took a picture of that. Cause that, that'd be a great visual to be able to give folks. Not that your representation of it wasn't fantastic,

Jennifer 5:12

Yeah

Carey 5:13

but I'd like to see the bird just really trying

Jennifer 5:16

So he was at the end of the, the aisle closest to actually the exit and enter of the auditorium, and everybody that walked in was like, What

Carey 5:28

So not

Jennifer 5:28

am I looking at?"

Carey 5:30

was also about to fall off the end... Okay.

Jennifer 5:32

Yeah. He was like, what? Everybody was like, "What is that?" So they're just really big birds.

Carey 5:38

Yeah

Jennifer 5:38

okay, so when you breed to exaggerate a characteristic, something else is going to get lost in the mix because you're playing with your genetics, and if you're concentrating on one thing, or in my case three things, then something else is not going to be on the hierarchy, and that's going to be egg-laying or meat production. Now, I do...

Carey 6:06

that ain't on the scorecard.

Jennifer 6:08

Exactly

Carey 6:09

Even though it's a dual pur- supposed to be a dual purpose bird, egg-laying, meat, that's not on the scorecard. one of the reasons why it gets overlooked by so many people. They don't r- show people don't really care because we can get enough breeders give us some options for next year. It's just overlooked

Jennifer 6:26

So if I'm pushing the size and I'm pushing the color and I'm pushing their width of back, which, you can lay your arm across their back, so you're, it's gonna take time to get to that. So in answer to this lady's question, who was asking me why I don't eat them first of all, I do eat them, but like a year later, so that's an, a very expensive chicken. An-

Carey 6:50

You gotta know if it's worthy of

Jennifer 6:53

Exactly.

Carey 6:53

or not

Jennifer 6:54

So a standard chicken, my Orpington, will build frame first. So while it's growing, all it's basically doing is taking all the nutrition we're shoving into it and building bone. Like n- it almost seems like nothing else. When you pick him up, you can feel every bone in his body. He's like an awkward boy teenager that's growing really tall but has nothing on him yet. That's exactly what these Orpingtons do. And if I showed you a picture of a four-month-old Orpington, you would be like, "That is a really ugly bird. He's very strange-looking." Because his head is massive, but he's got no hackles. So he's got a skinny neck sticking straight up, and then he has no tail floof. Like it's starting to come in, but he looks like he has this giant long back and he's all bony and, I don't know, it's just a hot mess looking thing. And so you just have to laugh when you pick him up. So the other day I was sorting them. They're four months old now, and I was checking them. There was nothing, and I didn't expect to find anything, but there was nothing to cull for at that point. But what I'm checking for is a straight keel bone. Wanna make sure their back seems nice and straight, and there's no issues there. Their face is nice and wide. Their legs are nice and long. Their feet are good and no crooked toes. But I could care less if they mature for 12 months. And I have discovered that if I, and I'm fixing to do it because I'm gonna break my breeders apart, if I take one of my big males and put them in with my juvenile males, he'll be so dominant that they will stop maturing, and they'll just continue to grow. It's like it keeps their testosterone down.

Carey 8:54

Yeah

Jennifer 8:55

So I'm controlling their environment to control their growth that way. And so that's what's actually fixing to happen probably this week. And so If I wanted to eat the Orpingtons and turn them into a meat bird, to make it worthwhile, I would actually have to breed them down in size and change my selection points to fast-growing, not fast frame-growing, and putting the meat on. Am I saying that right? Okay.

Carey 9:28

I get it

Jennifer 9:28

So that would be your utility Orpington. It's bred for fast egg-laying and so faster maturity. So it's not putting, building the frame first.

Carey 9:40

And there's lots, like you can get utility Orpingtons. there's a lot of people that have them, and they lay a whole lot of eggs, they're, nice color, nice size, everything good about them. You ain't getting that with a standard

Jennifer 9:54

No. And 99% of the Orpingtons that you see out there are going to be utility. I even still have two here. We call them Crooked Toe and Old Mama, and the reason being is, is they're about 13, 14 years old now. They're old. Yeah, exactly. And one of them, you know, they've got the three toes, well, they curl.

Carey 10:17

chicken

Jennifer 10:17

Yeah they curl over. I don't... I can't do it with my fingers, but they curl over sideways, all three of her toes like this, and they have her entire life. And Old Mama, she's just, she still- and they still freaking lay. I found a whole nest the other day. I knew they laid anyway, and earlier this year we did podcasts, they were the ones that were broody in the trash can. Those were the old girls.

Carey 10:39

a surprise

Jennifer 10:40

No, they're very prone to broodiness. So it's August right now, and I still have about 10 out there that are broody. Okay, so now let's talk about the Bresse for just a second.

Carey 10:48

Okay The Bresse grow frame and size seemingly equal to maturity, and you want that in a meat bird because you're not eating the frame.

Jennifer 11:03

The meat. You only want enough frame to support the meat until you, you harvest it. You don't really need more support than that. So, like, if you have a Cornish, it grows so rapidly that the frame cannot support the meat, and that's why you see them laying, falling over, falling back on their hocks, or their heart's just giving out. That would be an extreme, an opposite example of the Orpington. So the Orpington could carry all that weight that the Cornish puts on, but it has to build the frame first. The Cornish can't support the weight because its frame never developed. The Bresse is like the perfect middle ground. It only grows enough frame to put the meat on and support it until you're ready to table it. Now, what

Carey 11:54

it

Jennifer 11:54

to table it. And so I want to harvest mine at 17 to 18 weeks. That is my plan for my selection points. And so what I have been doing is selecting my males by what I want them to look like on the table at 17 to 18 weeks. So I- let's just say I have 10 cockerels out there. I line them up, and I find the one that looks like a table bird.

Carey 12:25

Ja

Jennifer 12:26

deep, he's wide, he's long, 'cause I'm working on my length of tail. When I got them, they had very short backs, so I'm working on those, those length of backs and that lower tail. them nice and wide across the shoulder and nice, round, beefy table bird.

Carey 12:44

Ja

Jennifer 12:44

He's the breeder. He's not the table bird, because he's the one that got to 18 weeks and looks like a table bird, so he's the one I want genetics from. I don't wanna eat him. So then you eat all the rest of them. Now, the, the rub comes in the Bresse community because everybody is looking for consistency. Well, what's the weights when you butcher, and what's your, your carcass weight? I don't wanna get involved in that conversation, and I'm gonna explain why. Because you're eating culls. You're not... eventually you're hoping to get to a consistency, but I mean, my gosh, my quail have got to be in the 30 to 35th generation at this point, and I'm pretty consistent, but you're always gonna get that runt or that weirdo that's 20 ounces. I mean, they're living organisms, and there's always going to be some genetic makeup that comes up that's just different, mix of genes. And so in, in the world of the Bresse, the beauty of them is they're reproducing, you're eating eggs, and you're eating the culls. Now, hopefully, eventually, the culls become more consistent, and I noticed that last week we butchered 20 of them and put them in the freezer, and there was a couple runts. But when I first started, there was like half of them were runts, and out of 20, only two were runts this time. And

Carey 14:18

good forward progress

Jennifer 14:20

Right. And here's the next thing. We butchered a whole bunch of pullets too, and it just made my, my neck hair stand up because I've never, I've never butchered pullets. That's not... You know, in, in our brain, you keep the girls, but not with the Bresse. With the Bresse, you have to be super selective. Well, I mean, you do with the Orpingtons too. Um, the difference with the Orpingtons is I just throw them in the backyard, so I don't eat them. I just use them for egg layers. And so, but we butchered 20 total, and there's still six over there. Um, we just ran out of coolness of the morning, and so we quit. But the pullets are being selected for the same width, width across the shoulders. Their chest is deeper than on the males, so I'm looking for that heavier chest because that's where your Bresse meat comes in. And then I want the lowest possible tails that I can get. I have zero idea what the proposed standard is. I know that some people are working on it, but I have zero knowledge on where it is in the planning stage, what it says, or anything else, because I don't care. These are for my freezer, and I'm the only one that matters in this whole scenario. So that's what I'm breeding them for. Now, I want them to be solid white. I want them to have the blue legs. I want them to be Bresse. But at the end of the day, you don't eat feathers. You don't eat blue skin. You don't eat white earlobes. I mean, I know what the French standard is. I'm breeding for me and my family, and if that aligns with the breed standard, that's fine. But-

Carey 16:18

when you first started on this whole venture with them, y- your goal was to replace the Cornish Cross.

Jennifer 16:24

Yes.

Carey 16:25

And

Jennifer 16:26

I've done that

Carey 16:26

What you're after is a bird you can reproduce to an extent where you can supply your family with chicken and get what you need. It's a lot easier to do that with a Bresse than it is a Cornish

Jennifer 16:41

So in answer to the lady's question, the, the be- the I love pros and cons. If you guys listen to us for any length of time, I love pros and cons. The Bresse have zero cons as far as I can tell. They shoot out eggs dang near daily starting at like, what, 17, 18 weeks?

Carey 17:02

Yeah

Jennifer 17:02

Mean, and they're massive eggs. They dwarf the Orpington eggs, and they just continuously shoot them out. Now, I do have some broodiness in my line. That is on my list of things to breed out. I have zero interest in a broody Bresse. It doesn't serve my purposes, so I will be working to breed that out. The, the meat is, like, really, really good, smooth, silky butter. I, I don't even... Yeah, I don't know how else to describe it

Carey 17:36

It is really good

Jennifer 17:37

So the, the Orpington meat is not silky smooth. It has a whole lot more texture to it. It has more chewiness to it. It has more flavor to it. It has it's darker. And to be honest with you, that's to be expected because the Orpington grew longer. It flapped its wings more. It jumped off the roost more. It built that muscle tone more. It ate more. It ate more bugs. it used all of those pieces and parts and developed ligaments and fibers and that's what creates the texture. So if you go to the other extreme of Cornish, where they lay around and eat all day they don't have any reason to develop ligaments and tendons, and they don't jump off of roosts. So when your doc...

Carey 18:33

get on a roost

Jennifer 18:34

Yeah, no, right? So when your doctor tells you to do strength training to, to strengthen your bones, that's also to attach your muscles to your bones and build your ligaments and your tendons. And so when a chicken flies and runs across the yard flapping its wings like an Orpington does, you know, that's what's happening there. And if you take a Cornish and you cook those bones down into a broth, it's like what you get at the store in that box. It's like clear tannish liquid that you can see through. If you do a Bresse chicken, then it's gonna be a little bit darker, a little bit richer because, you know, it grew three times longer. It developed its flavor just a little bit longer, and it's good. But if you do an Orpington at 18 months, that broth is dark, and you can't see through it, and it's so rich. And once you've had that kind of chicken broth, then you can't go back to the box broth or the, the canned soup or, or anything like that. It's just not the same. So when I'm asked to explain my choices, if I were to have all three on the property, the Cornish would be set aside for, say, barbecue chicken because it's gonna stay moist and tender on the barbecue grill. The Bresse are gonna be fantastic for baked chicken, fried chicken, those chunk chickens, like in... Yeah, any kind of chicken. But the Orpington's gonna be reserved more for soups and stews and something you could grind into like a chicken patty, things like that where you can break it down unless you really enjoy the flavor of the more wild flavor maybe and the texture of that. So they're different flavor profiles. It would be like saying eating buffalo, beef, and venison. It's different.

Carey 20:38

Yeah, that, that is very different

Jennifer 20:39

Yeah. So I hope that kinda explains the difference between my choices and maybe helps you make a choice in the future for yourself

Carey 20:49

I've had Bresse fried and I've had Cornish fried, and, having the chunks of the Bresse, they're just It's like that buttery flavor. It's really good. It's hard to explain, but yeah, it's definitely worth some trying

Jennifer 21:05

Yes. But there are, there are things you have to do to a fresh chicken in order to get it edible and not chewy, and I'm going to actually start an entire blog on the Bryant's Roost website on how to actually make that chicken edible where you can cut it with a fork or chew it without yanking it out like a piece of jerky.

Carey 21:31

Nice

Jennifer 21:32

There, there is a system to that, so look for that in the future over on bryantsroost.com

Owen 21:38

There isn’t one perfect meat chicken. Cornish Cross, Bresse, and Orpingtons each offer different tradeoffs in growth, feed efficiency, activity, carcass shape, flavor, and texture. And regardless of breed, proper handling after harvest—including allowing rigor mortis to pass before cooking or freezing—matters. Which breed do you prefer for the table, and why? Tell us in the comments. If you enjoyed this conversation, subscribe to Poultry Nerds so you don’t miss the next episode. Until next time, keep asking questions—and keep learning from your birds.