How warm/hot a temperature are you talking about? Many times we hang our moose or caribou under tarps or lay on top of cribbing or a small foldable ladder for up to 5-7 days. Not constant but temps sometimes get into the upper 60's towards 70's in the day. temps in the AM usually 20-45. Always have meat in game bags and Always under a tarp to keep the meat in the shade and cool.
If we get the meat home in only 1-5 days after the kill we hang it in a 40 degree garage (or as close to 40 as we can get it) for 5-10 days before processing/packaging.
In 26 years of doing this we have never had any meat spoil, even with a few 75-80 degree days before getting it home.
One guy in our camp got a moose and we had it in camp on cribbing and folding ladder under a tarp for 5 days and 2 of those were the sunny hot days. Decided on the 6th day to run it home.....6 hour drive one way and throw it in the freezer. After the hunt, hung and thawed it out, and left it to hang/age for another 5 days. No spoilage.
If you have the space and a generator, you can do like some people and buy a chest freezer, put it on your trailer and freeze the meat right where you have parked and then continue hunting. Just lock the freezer closed and lock it to the trailer so it is still there when you get back.
I know we hung moose for days in the shade and easily a week in the garage but that's in October with frosty nights. I haven't hung in hot weather and would be leery of it.
Coolers here will hang your meat for real cheap. Cutting isn't cheap and I'm fussy so I do all that myself.
Craig
That's if I bring the whole carcass home and have to debone.
If I've already deboned in the hills then half the time listed above.
Once meat is cooled out in the hills it stays pretty cool for quite some time. For example, if you get an elk broke down to hanging "quarters" and let it sit over night before packing out and it gets down to 40 deg that night, the internal temp will stay like that for several hours without a cooler.
You can fit an elk in a 5 cubic foot chest freezer...you will need to bone out the fronts and cut some bone off the hind quarters (to get the height down). Used 5 cubic foot chest freezer can be had for $50 -$80 (new is ~$200). Go bigger if you think you need to (the 8.4 cubic feet ones are a nice size). I bring a 5 cu.ft. freezer and a generator when I go elk hunting from the truck...just let it run at night.
If you are routinely shooting game each year this makes more sense to me than renting space, as long as you have someplace to put it. Can always put it in a back shed and run an extension cord for a few weeks a year if that is what you need.
I usually do my deer over 2 evenings after a day of work. That includes cutting all fat off, grinding, and vacuum sealing. There is additional time when I make jerky and sausage.
Helps when your family owns a meat processing business ; - )
That's magician's work if your watch keeps proper time. 1hr, 15 min to trim, cut and wrap an entire deboned elk by yourself? Do you work with knives in both hands and one taped to each foot? I spent the better part of two full days last weekend. Wish you'd been around to show me how to turn a 16 hour job into 75 minutes. Would love to learn that trick.
9-10 days total aging this season for me - 4 days in mother nature's cooler on the mountain then another 5 or so in a walk-in while I worked my way through five 50 pound game bags full of boned out meat. Still processing the jerky in the new dehydrator.
It's not a magician's trick. HDE said his family owns a meat processing business. So I'm pretty sure he can cut up an elk pretty darn quick. I know because I watched him process his deboned elk just the other day. I can cut an elk, wrap and grind in 2 1/2 hours piece of cake. I have been a commercial processor for about 23 years now and trim everything nice and clean. No "silverskin" on steaks or roasts and no fat either. We have two big grinders that will grind 100 lbs of hb in about 10 minutes or less. It then goes into a hydraulic stuffer. If I was doing it at home I could still cut an elk this fast and wrap it. It would take a little longer to grind the hamburger with the kind of grinder most people have.
No, I don't work with a knife in both hands either but I do have a deboning hook in one hand and a knife in the other if that counts! LOL
how "clean" is the meat you put into the grinder? I try to clean it almost as much as steak meat but last year I asked a game-butcher friend to help with my bull and he threw all kinds of trash in the grinder and said it would be fine. well it ended up making a tender young elk taste like roadkilled squirrel feet marinated in beef fat. anybody have any good links to where i could source a 5qt (or slightly larger) chest freezer for under 100 to missoula mt? I like your idea mike lawrence!
Deboned, cleaned (All silver skin off and ready to cook), packaged and in the freezer, knives washed.
I do save all my meat for grinding until after the season. Packaged in one gallon zip lock freezer bags and frozen. That way I only have to mess with the grinder 1 time. Or take it frozen to have summer sausage made. My local sausage guy will do a "private" batch if I bring him 50 plus pounds of meat at a time. That way ALL the sausage meat is mine. I am very picky!
bullnbow - It's pretty clean meat that goes in the grinder. No fat, bloodshot, dried meat, dirty etc goes in. Beef fat is only good kidney fat that is added. Sometimes bacon ends and pieces, pork shoulder or beef brisket if it is requested.
the trick to processing your meat at home yourself and making it taste good on the table is what you do to it in the field.
For an elk, we skin half of it while laying on the ground exposing the meat side up. We then "quarter" it and debone the ribs, neck, and [backstrap] then repeat the other side and hang the meat on a meatpole we make out in the field by tying a log between two trees and let it hang overnight. We then debone the quarters while they are hanging and put the very cooled out meat into large plastic bags - 10 to 20 gallon ziplocks work great for this - then place the plastic bags into sturdy game bags to pack out.
See the pics showing the quarters hanging and boned out.
It's only as tough as you want to make it. No reason to overwork something.
I wouldn't expect an infant to run until they could learn to crawl...
That said, HDE when you bone out meat do you trim off the brown oxidized portions when you are cutting/wrapping, or do you leave it? I (maybe needlessly so) trim the oxidized meat off along with the fascia, fat, and any connective tissue. Am I overdoing it here?
Maybe I am too picky, but I worked my butt off getting that meat out. It is my effort and sweat that went into getting that meat off the hill. I am not going to waste anything.
One of the best ways to process your meat if it's still on the bone is to first skin off all fat, dried tissue, and membrane before deboning. Then proceed to debone starting on the calf muscle and work your way up. the trick is to take the bone out of the meat and not the meat off the bone. You can either do this while it's hanging or laying on a table. I prefer it laying on the table. Next cut on a hind is to cut in straight to the bone just below the knee cap then up along the bone to the socket joint, then straight out. cut should resemble an upside down L or a shape like this [. Next cut along the other side of the bone just deep enough to expose the underside of the bone. You can either remove this muscle now or continue working around the bone and socket until the top and bottom round and sirloin is removed then separate the muscles.
I won't go into detail for the front shoulder just because it's just as easy as a hind leg. Always stay up next to the bone while deboning. I also recommend learning to use a deboning hook because it keeps your fingers away from the knife and it's easier to hold the meat and pull when you need to.
trim off all dry/oxidized skin off before you debone. It's easier and quicker to take off pieces as long as you can get them. I usually pull off strips that are about 2"-3" wide and as long as the leg is from the knee joint all the way to the end of the sirloin muscle. sometimes they are smaller just depending on how they come off. I also skin the calf muscle this way as well.
I get all the meat as I can possibly get off of each customer's animal. It's their meat and they earned every scrap of it. I will be honest here and say that a little more connective tissue will probably be in the hb. If you want every bit of meat then this is just something that has to be accepted. It doesn't affect the taste like most think it does. If you spend hours upon hours then you can remove it all and end up with 50 lbs instead of 100 lbs of trim. I cut my personal animals the same way. Hamburger is actually a kind of a trash cut if you think about it. It's the stuff that doesn't make good stew meat, sliced jerky, fajita's, etc but it's still good meat.
The amount of prime steaks you can expect on the average is around 30-50 lbs all trimmed up and pretty depending on the size of the elk. Hb can be 75- 150 lbs depending on the size and how it's cut like no roasts, stew, jerky meat, fajita meat, etc.
One more good idea here. Save the neck bones and backbone if you can. cut them into smaller pieces and then pressure cook them. the meat falls right off the bone and is extremely tender! Makes excellent tamales, shredded burritos or shredded bbq elk.
Sorry this is long but believe me, I could make it really long! LOL Good luck to all this season and keep those knives sharp!
Guess I'm confused at what oxidized meat is. Is it the rust formed from the iron in the blood when it's exposed to the open air? Never heard of it before. If that's the case then jerky is really just meat oxide, or MtO2. And what the heck is 'meat fascia'!?!? So, yes, you're overdoing it I guess...??
Q: On average how many pounds of meat do you get with a 1.5hr butcher job?
A: A bunch
Q: On average how many pounds of meat do you get with a 2.5hr butcher job?
A: A lot more than a bunch
Fascia = silverskin or the whitish tissue on the outsides of the muscles.
The oxidized meat is the brown/darkish colored meat where it's been exposed to air, i.e. the area where you cut out the femur bone and it turns a brownish color after a day or so.
This thread has been great.
Thank you so much for clearing that up for me. I always thought it was just "silverskin" or sinew and fascia was that covering on the edge of a roof that faces you.
I always thought the discoloration was from the absence of fluid in the muscle tissue (aka drying out) since the tissue already has air, or oxygen in it, from all that heart beating and breathing stuff happening when the animal was alive. So, does that mean that raisins are just oxidized grapes?
Good skill the rest of this fall - luck has nothing to do with it!!
Add your beef fat, pork fat, pork meat, or beef at the 1st grind. I also add the seasoning for basic sausages at the 1st grind. It will mix well and even better during the 2nd grind. If the meat gets too warm after the 1st grind then cool it off before you grind it again. It's harder to grind meat when it's warm. You can either refrigerate it or add ice to the hb. Refrigeration is usually better but takes longer to cool it down. The meat can also be quick chilled by placing in the freezer for a short period.
You're a funny guy. My apologies for inconveniencing you with a simple question.
Butcherboy,
Thank you for your responses.
Unfortunately, this means I must clean my grinder and wait another day or two between grinding. But, again, I think your insight is spot-on. Thanks!!
