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The Antwerp painter Snyders specialised in pictures of animals and still lifes, often incorporating figures by other artists. This painting of around 1612–1615 depicts a kitchen maid selecting chickens. It includes a cock and pigeons, as well as a still life with a hare, mallard and bittern, a cauliflower, celery and artichokes. Traditionally, such kitchen scenes had a veiled erotic content. X-ray photography indicates that the artist originally intended a pure still life dominated by a large hanging carcass of a roe buck. This was subsequently painted out, and the contours of the animal's front legs were transformed into the celery at the bottom left. The figures of the maid and the bearded man were added last, by a painter from Rubens' workshop.