Canada’s chicken farmers have created a new interactive website aimed at involving consumers more directly in their industry.

Launched Dec. 1 , the Chicken Farmers of Canada website at www.chicken.ca contains special features which include a searchable recipe database, instructional videos, social media and nutritional information.

The revamped website, in preparation since earlier this year, pulls together information from CFC’s previous website and presents it in a more colourful, user-friendly fashion, said Marty Brett, an agency spokesperson.

“What we’ve done is change how we’re doing it, how we provide information, how often we update it. All that is in response to what consumers asked for.”

Recipes are front and centre because consumers browse the recipe pages more than any other. The database currently contains some 300 chicken recipes. CFC hopes to add another 200 before its fiscal year is out, Brett said.

“Recipes are the top visited pages on our site, bar none.”

The recipe of the week, featured prominently during the website’s first day, was for Indian seasoned roast chicken with lentil brown rice pilaf.

A new feature is how-to instructional videos with chefs demonstrating proper techniques for handling and cooking chicken.

The videos are intended as an incentive for consumers to try new things with chicken in their own kitchens, said Brett.

“We want people to eat healthy. We want people to have a balanced lifestyle and they can do that by practising some of the things they see which they might have been afraid of before.”

CFC also hopes to engage consumers interactively through Facebook, You Tube and Twitter, all running on the site.

Fifty-six people had already signed up for Facebook on the site’s first day. CFC began blogging in the summer of 2009 and has been Twittering since before that. All three social media are now available together instead of separately, Brett said.

Many people who sign up are already active food bloggers and the CFC site gives them a chance to expand their reach, Brett said.

At the same time, it’s still a farmer-owned site and should pay dividends for chicken producers, he added.

“People are cooking chicken more often because they’ve got all these new ways of doing it. That’s going to grow chicken consumption.” [email protected]