Focus on... Poultry

Having taken a look at beef and fish, we thought we'd turn our attention to a food source with wings - poultry.

Poultry is the term used to describe any bird kept for the use of its feathers, eggs or meat
The most common poultry birds are chickens, turkeys and ducks, but geese, guinea fowl, pheasants and even ostriches and emus are also domesticated for the same reasons
Behind beef, at 38%, poultry is the second most widely eaten meat in the world, accounting for around 30% of all worldwide meat production
Chickens were first raised to be used as food in Southeast Asia thousands of years ago and the chickens we eat nowadays are descendants of a species known as the Red Junglefowl
The main parts of any poultry bird that are eaten are the breasts, legs and wings
There are more chickens in the world than any other type of bird
Chicken can be cooked in many ways, from being chopped up and used in a stir fry, minced down for sausages, cooked on the bone in a curry or roasted whole
In the UK, a poussin is a chicken younger than 28 days old. Older birds are generally classified as either small, medium or large
A chicken's heart can beat up to 315 times per minute
Eggs are high in protein, vitamins and minerals; one chicken gg contains around 70 calories
China produces around 160 billion eggs per year
In Britain, we eat around ten billion per year
An Ostrich egg can take up to an hour to boil and one is equivalent to about 24 chicken eggs
One thing we're still not sure of is the answer to the question of which came first - the chicken or the egg?