You'll pay more for a free-range or organic bird at a farmers' market, specialist butcher, online supplier or supermarket, but you'll almost certainly discover what the meat 'used to taste like' in the days before the birds were intensively reared.
Buying a whole bird is often cheaper than buying individual cuts – for example, for the same price as two chicken breasts you can usually buy a whole chicken, which will yield two breasts, two drumsticks, two thighs, two wings and a chicken carcass with which to make your own stock.
When buying fresh chicken from a supermarket, make sure the meat is well-wrapped with no seepage. Make sure the limbs, flesh and skin are undamaged and the meat looks firm and plump and smells fresh. Birds hung in the butcher's for at least three days have a much better flavour; most frozen birds aren't hung. When choosing frozen birds check the wrapping is intact, that there are no ice crystals or discolouration and that the skin isn't damaged.
Most poultry is available year-round, though turkey and goose are still seen as Christmas birds.
