Meat processing ideas

[Thebear_78]

I always strive to limit waste when it comes to my game meat. I bring out my game as in tact as possible. Generally only leaving the hide and guts in the field.

We tend not to do very many steaks or roasts other than butterfly the tenderloin and back straps. The rest goes mainly to grind and cubed for canning. We tend to can in jars a lot of the roasts as it’s a quick easy addition to any meal and comes out like pot roast anyway. It also saves a lot of freezer space.

I always grind my burger with 20% bacon ends. Sausage of brats with pork fat.

The necks are trimmed for grind but whats left gets dropped in a large pot with the big bones cut into 6-8” sections. Garlic, onion, and salt/pepper get simmered with the bones overnight until a nice dark bone broth comes out.

The picked rib cage and spine along with what is strained out of the bone broth gets offered up to the chickens.

Any scraps, silver skin, or tendons gets dehydrated into dog treats.

From my entire caribou only a handful bones and a small bag of bloodshot scraps get tossed. I think we have it done to about as efficient as we can.

Any of you have any clever ideas on how to minimize waste? Anything I’m missing?


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[Elkman]

I believe that you are about as detailed as one could be, you do a great job utilizing your harvest. Far better than I and as I bet most here. Congratulations on your efficiency.

 

[JD338]

Sounds like you have it all covered.

JD338

 

[DrMike]

That sounds quite efficient. Can't see much room for improvement.

 

[HodgemanAK]

Sounds like you're getting it all.

 

[ShadeTree]

I, like you cut my own meat up. Depends on the size of the deer whether it's mostly cut up for hamburg, or steaks. Rib cages get fed to the dogs raw. Necks generally get cut up in 2-3 cuts for roasts.

On bigger deer after cutting off the meat for grind, I cut the major bones into pieces and my wife cooks them 24-48 hrs in a crock pot for bone broth. She adds a little vinegar to help make the bones porous and extract some of the nutrients. It's then put in the freezer. Needs some spices added for flavor, but it's GOOD for you. Read up on bone broth and what all it can do for you if you've never heard of it.

 

[gbflyer]

We cut our own stuff up too. No other options. I cull pretty heavily, I’d rather have a decent amount of good stuff than a lot of crap. We make a lot of burger and loose sausage as none of us at my house are interested in tough dry roasts. Burger is always used up. Steak the back straps and tenders and grind the rest.

 

[Thebear_78]

We cut our own stuff up too. No other options. I cull pretty heavily, I’d rather have a decent amount of good stuff than a lot of crap. We make a lot of burger and loose sausage as none of us at my house are interested in tough dry roasts. Burger is always used up. Steak the back straps and tenders and grind the rest.

Have you ever tried canning it? It’s one of our favorite uses. With just salt and pepper or done “mexi” style with chipotle southwest seasoning and jalapeño


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[gbflyer]

We cut our own stuff up too. No other options. I cull pretty heavily, I’d rather have a decent amount of good stuff than a lot of crap. We make a lot of burger and loose sausage as none of us at my house are interested in tough dry roasts. Burger is always used up. Steak the back straps and tenders and grind the rest.

Have you ever tried canning it? It’s one of our favorite uses. With just salt and pepper or done “mexi” style with chipotle southwest seasoning and jalapeño


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I’d like to. None of us have done it so we’re scared of poisoning ourselves[emoji1]

 

[ShadeTree]

We cut our own stuff up too. No other options. I cull pretty heavily, I’d rather have a decent amount of good stuff than a lot of crap. We make a lot of burger and loose sausage as none of us at my house are interested in tough dry roasts. Burger is always used up. Steak the back straps and tenders and grind the rest.

Have you ever tried canning it? It’s one of our favorite uses. With just salt and pepper or done “mexi” style with chipotle southwest seasoning and jalapeño


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I’d like to. None of us have done it so we’re scared of poisoning ourselves[emoji1]

Get yourself a pressure canner. You can water bath can for long enough to kill bacteria, but to be completely safe and no thoughts of bacteria being able to survive, you really need a pressure canner. We use ours regularly every yr.

 

[Thebear_78]

It’s really pretty simple.

You can use pints or quarts. Cut the meat into 1-1.5” chunks.

Place the meat into the glass jars until you get to the neck, 1/2” or so from top.

3” of water in the bottom of the canner. Put your jars in and put lid on it.

Put on medium heat until steady stream of steam is coming out of the weight spout. After 10 minutes of steam, place weight on the canner and bring to 11 pounds of pressure.

75 minutes for pints, 90 minutes for quarts at 11 pounds of pressure. After time is up turn off heat and allow to cool to 0 pressure. Remove jars and place on cooling rack for 12-15 hours. Then store in pantry indefinitely.

I add a little cube of beef fat or bacon fat to each jar. You can add onions, green peppers, garlic, or jalapeño for different flavors.

Very easy to use in many recipes.


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[Guy Miner]

Thebear 78, I think you're way ahead of me.

Guy

 

[ShadeTree]

Thebear 78, I think you're way ahead of me.

Guy

Guy, or anybody else for that matter, no need to be intimidated about any sort of canning. If getting a pressure canner, any legit canner of any sort of quality will come with a ton of instructions for all sorts of canning. Just follow the instructions and anybody can do it, and do it safely. No different than reloading in that regard.

The old style of water bath canning and hot pack canning takes some tricks and knowledge passed down from somebody. We do both pressure canning, and water bath and hot pack, depending what we are canning.

Basically all fruits in a pressure canner just require a 1/2" of headspace in the jar. Vegetables and meats should have an inch.

10lbs of pressure is standard for meats, but at below 1000 ft. If canning over 1000 ft, it should be done at 15 lbs of pressure for the prescribed time depending whether you're doing pints or quarts, and depending whether bone in, or just meat chunks.

Have at it and have fun. It sure makes for some good food over the winter. We've canned every Saturday for the last 4 wks. This weekend will be a couple boxes of peaches I traded some sweet corn for. We water bath can those for 20-25 minutes.

 

[D21ALASKA]

Want to learn how to can? First, don't be scared, it's super easy. Second, buy a quality pressure canner (All American) and this book...
https://www.amazon.com/Ball-Complete-Bo ... 250&sr=8-3

Add some simple pieces of gear, most of which you already own, and go to town. All sorts of things you can do with it and it's always a good cold/rainy/crappy weather day project.

And Bear you sound just about like me. Pretty particular, OCD some may say, about meat care and using everything. I do pretty much exactly the same as you. Bummed that I haven't hauled the moose ribs on the bone out the past two years but just too much added weight for the mile pack on the older every year back. Man they're delicious braised low and slow on the bone though. I've even taken to boiling down the scraps/cutoffs for the dog. Cooks down to a meaty gelatinous mess that I add to her kibble throughout the year.

She likes it fresh too though...

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[ShadeTree]

D2Alaska, I do much the same with the scraps. Gets fed to the dogs, although I don't cook it, just feed it raw. Rib cages and all, they can make it disappear.

 

[mjcmichigan]

My dogs loved the livers, and I usually cubed it up and pan fried for them… they loved seeing a new deer come home…


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[ShadeTree]

For probably 2 months we were canning something or multiple things out of the garden every Saturday. Had a couple weeks off here from that with the garden being done.

Thursday got a big beef brisket that we hadn't used up, out of the freezer to thaw. Saturday trimmed the fat off of it and cut it into cubes. 1 teaspoon of canning salt on top of each qt jar, a very small amount of hot water just to help warm the jars before going in the canner, and put them in the pressure cooker for 90 minutes at 10 lbs of pressure.

Only mistake was bringing the jars into the house to cool instead of letting them out in the garage. Had to smell that all evening. Hope it tastes as good as it smelled.