Butchering? DIY or take it to the pro's?

Have done all my own butchering and sausage making for the past 27 seasons. Would not dream of lumping my kill in with all the rest of that stuff some guys call well handled meat. If you farm out your sausage making be sure the outfit does not put everyones meat into a "meat pool" ... as most do.
 
I cut my own. We have a Butcher in our Controlled Hunt group. He went through the Butchering process with me, about 7 years ago! Once you get the hang of it, it is dead simple, and you know exactly what you are getting! There is no voodoo magic to butchering, and there are no secret cuts. It may take you a few hours the first time you do it, but the more experience you get, the easier it becomes. I have it down to about an hour and a half, skinned, butchered and wrapped. I freeze the off cuts, and wait until the season is over, then I grind all the leftovers! I am going to try making sausage this year!
 
M12shooter said:
Have done all my own butchering and sausage making for the past 27 seasons. Would not dream of lumping my kill in with all the rest of that stuff some guys call well handled meat. If you farm out your sausage making be sure the outfit does not put everyones meat into a "meat pool" ... as most do.
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what kind of butchers do you have out that way !

if I choose not to do it myself I take it to St Malo Meats and Deli - while they have changed owners this past year, the new guy is just as amazing as the previous owner.
 
MudChucker said:
what kind of butchers do you have out that way !

if I choose not to do it myself I take it to St Malo Meats and Deli - while they have changed owners this past year, the new guy is just as amazing as the previous owner.
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Many butcher shops here in Winnipeg, as of late, have gotten out of the wild game thing due to health regulations, etc.

I hunt with a good group of guys and have heard of many horror stories through the years.

I will not speak negitively of some in this capacity for obvious reasons but have heard nothing but good reviews from Millers in the city. They would even bone out if a guy wanted to pay extra. Not sure if they still cut wild meat though.

Several of us get together after the hunt and cut, bone, grind and wrap our animals. It's a whole day affair in most cases. Ground trim and shoulder is packed in 2 litre fibre milk cartons which hold four pounds more or less and is frozen for later sausage making.

We make sausage, garlic, smokies, pepperoni later in the winter when all outdoor activities have cooled down. The only service we "contract" out is the final hot smoking of finished product.:)
 
There's no hunting here in my zone in Southern alberta on mondays and tuesdays in November. I thought that was to give us time to butcher our deer!
I took a deer to a local butcher years ago. He cut it into about 10 bits, wrote "roast" on them all and gave me about half of it back.
Nowadays I make all my own cuts, hamburger, soup bones, etc.
Gonna get some sausage skins soon and experiment with sausage mixes before this season comes around. I never buy meat, why would I when it's free?
 
At home.



I had a small bear. Took me all day to cut it. I got two liquor store wine bottle boxes of packages of meat including 19 packs of home ground burger out of it, plus half a box of bones for soup.
 
At 17 years old, i butcher all my deer, and it's not that hard. Get all the cuts out of it. Learned from a hunting buddy, and a butcher book.
 
I took a 8 week meat cutting course after I graduated some 30 years ago. Its easy, cleaner, and I always know exactly what goes on or into with my meat. I have a complete meat processing shop the back of the acreage. Smokers, grinders, bandsaws, tables, wrappers, hangers, coolers, ect. It takes little time or smarts, its all about keeping product and equipment clean.
 
Interesting input! All these "lose half your meat" and "don't know what you're getting" comments are kinda scary. We watch the whole process; our guy insists. No other meat is ever in the same room as ours. Cost is also not really a big factor..I don't hunt because I think it's a cheap source of food. (I'll have to do the rough math one day on how much I'd have to harvest before the cost per kg of wild game is close to the cost of store-bought. I'm sure it's staggering.)

The concept of being skilled at this part of the process is appealing. Many of my interests get justified by telling myself that I'd be decently prepared when civilization collapses; this fits right in there.
 
For under $100 I made my own cooler.
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With some racking inside I can take my sweet ass time cutting whatever my hunting group happens to find.

After years of s**tty cutters and all the good ones retiring, I thought it was time to do my own. For near 6 years now, that's just what I've been doing.

Even if you make a complete mess of the first few critters, you'll just have tons of burger, and unless you get an electric grinder, you'll huge forearms LOL
 
I cut all my deer these days. Hauled my first ever moose to a butcher I trust, because I was not certain of the process for a larger critter, or certain that I would have the space or time to do it. It was worth the drive.

A good meat cutter is worth paying whatever he charges. His experience allows him to get as much meat off the carcass, in as little time as is possible. The butcher I use, has told folks that if they wanted their meat hung in his cooler, that they had best take it home and clean it before returning. He is proud of his facility, too.

Can't hardly find a fella that cuts game around here anymore, so I started cutting my own deer. A couple times through the vids online as a refresher, a roll of butcher paper to cover the work surface, as well as to be used as storage space for meat cut, but not yet wrapped, and a large steel bowl for the grind meat.

Lose 50 percent at the butcher? Yep. If he's trimming out the stuff you don't want to eat, anyways. I figure I come close to that when I cut and trim, and there isn't enough meat in my garbage to make a decent bowl of soup out of, but there is a lot of tendon, fat, bones, etc.

Unless I have a whole day set aside, I usually have been doing the front half in the first evening, starting with stripping off the backstraps, stripping the foreleg and shoulders, then picking over the rest of the front. The hind gets done last. Bigger chunks, less trim more larger bones in the back end. Easier to deal with when I've already had a long day or two.
I try to get the grind meat all cooling off while I package the rest, then grind, then package that, then wash up.

Cheers
Trev
 
I wouldn't give my deer or other hunted critter to a butcher. No butcher can afford to be as careful deboning and cleaning of the cuts as I am.
Get better meat that way in my opinion.

I sometimes have sausage made by a butcher, if I don't have the time. I have tow butchers around here I trust for that.

Deboning deer is easy, can do it in the garage. Moose or similar size I usually debone on the spot and just clean up the cuts at home.
Last year I had a bison, that was interesting.:eek: A bit more work than a deer.
 
Agreed. I've seen one too many butchers combine all wild meet together they receive and then give you your preweighed amount. You take time to care for your animal and it gets mixed with meat from some bozo that dragged his through the mud and left it in the back of his truck for a few days.


Do things yourself. it is time well spent and IMHO produces better results. Do not be scared to get into making sausage and jerky as well. Experiment with small batches to work out any problems and you are set. Go in with some friends to buy some gear ( grinder, smoker etc... )


A big plus is getting together with friends to process your animals together. You can BS, drink a bit of your buddies home made beer and fill the freezers. Processing an animal is as much a part of hunting as going out and filling the tag.
 
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