Venison

[bvanzalen]

Not sure if this is the right forum but...

I need some ideas on how to have my deer butchered.

Steaks, burger, sausage?

What is the best was to have the back straps packaged? Whole?

[KEN C]

I do all of mine myself? I debone all of the meat and cut off all of the fat? I make all burger (with a little pork in it) The rest I make into steaks. No roasts or chops? I also save some of the scrap cut offs to make jerky. 5 lbs meat soak in salt and brown sugar for 24 hrs min. and smoke (mesquite or hickory)at 170 deg for 2-3 hours? yummy stuff

[Salmonsmoker]

We do all of our own butchering - bone the meat and cut into large roast-size peices that will serve two.

The large pieces can then be cut into whatever size we want for a recipe. The advantage to the large sice - it is much quicker to do at the time of butchering, and if you have any freezer-burn, it is easily trimmed off while the meat is still slightly frozen. I recently found some round roast that had been in our freezer for 4 years. It was a little dark on the outside and had some freezer burn. I put it in the micro for 60 seconds which softened the ice. Then trimmed off about 1/16th inch (back to the red meat on the inside) and it was as fresh as any other meat in the freezer.

All of our trimmings go into a bag for burger meat. We freeze it in portions for two. Then, when we want ground meat, we get out an amount of the packges that will make the number of servings that we need, give them 60 seconds in the micro, then grind them... very fresh burger - well worth the trouble of getting the grinder out and only takes a few minutes longer.

Another use for the trimmings - when we want BBQ, take a sufficient number of packages of meat out to fill the need, put them in a pan of water and cook them till it falls apart. Drain, pick out any silver skin and grissle, and add BBQ sauce.

Another use for shoulder or rump meat is to cut into chunks to use as shish ka bobs.

Bottom round makes good stew meat.

Other round makes good swiss steak.

Sirloin makes good steak for grilling,

The backstrap - excellent on the grill when sliced and cooked on the ends of the muscle grain - so tender you don't need a knife. We cut one backstrap into 3 or 4 pieces and freeze. Again, the slicing is done (1" slices) while the meat is still partially frozen. Then, a liberal application of garlic powder is added and the meat is set aside while it thaws and comes up to room temp. Then I use a hot grill and sear the meat, cooking it to a medium rare.

Round roasts are excellent when cooked in a Dutch Oven as a pot roast with vegies. I put the DO into my stone-pit oven and bury it. 3 hours later, we dig up a fork-tender meal that has a wonderful flavor and will feed a large group (depending on how much meat and vegies you put in the pit.) It always surprises our guests when we set up an outdoor dinning area, then ask them to join us while we go "dig up our dinner." Add some homemade bread (see Irish Soda Bread recipe in the Others forum, and you have a feast.)

Hope this helps.

Salmonsmoker