#1 Deer Hunting & Processing/Butchering Thread

[Alex Linder]

Curious if any of you process your own deer. If so, I'd be interested in hearing your experience. Hope to be doing a poor-man's version of this this season. That is, I don't have the space or the tools, but I do have the will and the love of trying new things and getting better at them. Have eaten down all my crap carb stocks, getting ready for a paleo-variant diet, at least for 30 days. Probably 1/4 of all meat I eat is deer. Deer are obviously free range, apart from some on farms. Free range lacks the toxins that you get in the fat of factory meat, if you believe the alt-diet crowd.

I don't hunt, but my friends do, and relatives do, and they generally give me some. This year I'm going to, hopefully, process one myself. Have watched a number of videos, just now was reading up on how to freeze them. I don't have any grinder or fat to mix with ulta-lean venison as the professional processors do, just going to wing it. Anyway, interested in any thoughts people have. Even on sharpening knives. I've tried this and not really seen much success. Kind of makes me feel like an idiot, to be honest. I think I'm doing it the right way with the stone, but don't really see any results. D'oh. My expertise is wholly in cooking stuff, and I can make many good deer recipes, but nothing sophisticated. Deer tacos are and deer spaghetti are my favorite, along with deer chili, which is even better than beef chili when you get it right.

What I've read says you freeze stuff using either vacuum seal bags, or ziploc bags or freezer paper/butcher paper or plastic wrap, or some combination thereof. My freezer isn't huge, so will not be storing more than I can eat within a year. Interesting, although did not take specific note of how much deer I was given, let's say about 50 pounds, it lasted most of a year, from, say, december to about mid-september of next year. Makes me wonder how much meat the average man consumes in a year. Eating deer keeps food bills down, especially if you get it free or by barter, as I do. Processing runs a minimum 75 around here, usually somewhere over 100 to get one average deer processed, but that of course includes jerky and summer sausage and other speciality preparations that most people want. Just like the ground up venison myself, along with the tenderloin. If you process the deer yourself, then the whole cost is the state tag, which isn't much in Missouri, maybe $15-17. We have a lot of deer here, it's one of the top deer and turkey hunting locations in North America.

This is a good thread on wrapping/freezing venison cuts
http://www.archerytalk.com/vb/showthread.php?t=1069944