Do you process your own deer?

[Buckmaster]

Joe has a good tip there also that he slipped in. If you have some grind that you are trying to make into patties and a bit of water and bread crumbs or crackers.

Try a half to a quarter grated raw potato sometime in your burger. It adds a lot of moisture to your burger. They come out nice and juicy, sometimes too juicy. Try it, it works.

 

[steveOh]

Nope, take mine to a processor near Yellow Springs.

 

[cotty16]

I took Kody's deer to my cousin (cynergy's dad). He does great work and works cheaply... For beer!

 

[dante322]

Man, if it's cold enough out, I may try it. I already bought the leg spreader/hanging device and my dad gave me a vintage hoist. My fear would be fugging up the cuts. A tutorial would be ideal! Curran, that would be over the top for her. Bloody meat all over the kitchen.

I processed my doe myself last year, it isnt too hard.

The Cuts are easy enough.

I like to use a fillet knife because it is flexable enough to slide along the edges of the bones and sharpens easily

The shoulders come off easy, just start your cut at the armpit and cut along the ribcage all the way around to the back. there isnt any knd of a joint holding it on, just cut it away from the ribcage. They can be a little tricky to debone though. the shoulder blade has a flat side and a side with a raised ridge that runs from the bottom to the top, you can feel it just under the surface. lay the shoulder down so the ridge side is facing up. make a slice down either side of the ridge and the turn the blade, under the muscle, at a 90 degree angle outward. and follow the flat part of the shoulder blade. dont cut all the way out, just until you get to the edge of the shoulder blade. after that take the knife down the length of the leg, exposing the bone, cut along both sides of the bone. Next, use the exposed leg bone like a handle, hold it up, and slice down the backside of the leg seperating the meat from the bone. once you reach the shoulder blade all you need to do is slice it free from the meat, there is no ridge on this side.

the upper part of the shoulder is good for roasts. get some bitchers string and tie it up. anything from the elbow down is shank. (burger, jerky, stew meat.)
You can cut some steaks out of the shoulders but they will be smaller and the better steaks come from the inner loins, backstraps (loins) and the rear legs (rounds).

After the shoulders you can easily get the backstraps out by making a cut along either side of the spine all the way down to the ribcage, and then along the top of the ribcage at basicaly a 90 degree angle to the first cut. pretty much like filleting a fish. remove the silver skin and cut the backstrap into portions or leave whole as a roast.

The inner loins are located inside the body cavity where the spine meets the pelvis. they run length wise on either side of the spine. basically just a miniature backstrap, with no silverskin. They dont look like much but this is probably the tenderest part of the deer.

Any rib meat, flanks, briskit or neck meat is ground for burger.

The hind quarters can be seperated by taking the knife along the inside of the pelvis until you find the ball and socket joint that attaches the leg to the pelvis, usually a good pop will seperate the joint but you might need to cut it with the knife. Again, lay the leg on a table and follow the contour of the bone with the blade, use the bone as a handle and slice the meat away. You want to try to keep the meat in one piece and just kinda slice the bone out of it.

Once the bone is out you can do one of two things, you can seperate the large quad muscle (knuckle) and slice it into chops, or you can just take off the top three or four inches and tie it into a roast (top round) and then slice the whole upper leg, across the grain, into steaks (round) These steaks are kinda like a ribeye, again anything from the knee down is shank.

Ribs arent worth the effort but if you can trim anything else off the carcass it goes into the burger trimming pile.

As fars as packaging goes I like to double wrap.
wrap whatever portions you want in plastic, and then wrap it in butchers paper or freezer paper. It will last for a long time with no freezer burn and you can write on the paper what is in the package and the date it was processed.

Its hard to describe some of the beboning steps but there is an awsome vide called "deer masters home deer processing" www.homedeerprocessing.com. It shows how to field dress a buck and a doe, how to skin a trophy keeping the cape intact, and not only how they process in their shop but they also do one at home. I followed the steps in the video and had no trouble getting my doe in the freezer last year.

I did make my own jerkey, but i am really wanting to try making my own summer sausage or snack sticks this year.

 

[Derek j]

I process all of our deer. Steaks, burger, jerky, sausage, and I can up around 7-14 quarts a year. I make a lot of goose jerky, so I have around 30lbs of sticks made by a place in fredericksburg every year. It makes enough to get me through till next fall. I don't have a stuffer, so I let them make the sticks. Well worth the money. When I buy my stuffer next year, I will make my own sticks TOO. I actually enjoy cutting them up.

 

[dante322]

one button buck ready to go.

top left, chops, next to that are steaks. pan to the top right, both tenderloins, and both backstraps,
lower left, 2 nice shoulder roasts. and the bucket of grinds and jerkey meat.

ready for the freezer

all total took about 2 to 2 1/2 hours including skinning. the grind packages will go to the processer after season. hopefully I've got more to add to it.:smiley_clap:

 

[saddlepants]

I do it all. The loins and the roasts ( I usually make three roasts from the hindquarters, deboned) get vac packed and the rest goes to the butcher for grinding. I would do it but I dont have the great mixer as of yet and I really really Likes the italian sausage and trail bologna up at Perfects in Johnstown. Met Gary Levox up there one day pickin up my meat...kinda funny...so was he.

 

[Beentown]

Good job Dante.