Poll: Have you ever processed venison at home?

[HUNTER61358]

Deer processing at home is alot of hard work, but the rewards are many. I process every deer and turkey I take. If you want to do it right get the right tools.First something like a hanging gallows for skinning and bonning. A meat cooler (old refridgeator) works well.Cutting board, several butcher knives, knife sharpener, containers to put boned meat in, vacum sealer, meat grinder, meat mixer, sausage stuffer, smoker. You can find sausage mixes and other suplies at your local butcher suply shop. I make Breakfast sausage, Summer sausage, Italian sausage, Smoked Polish Kielbassa, Bratwurst, Deer and Turkey burger. For Wild Turkey burger use breast scraps and bone out dark meat its great. It did take several years to get everything I use now but I HAVE IT DOWN TO AN ART. I have processed over 100 deer and 40 turkeys. The best reward is when I sit down to eat what I made.................................   

[DeerCamp]

We make mostly burger.. I have made steaks and jerky tho.. I love the jerky but it goes really quick and it takes forever to make.. I herd you can make it in the oven..? How would I go about making it that way? I use a smoker and that takes a VERY long time. Its just a two rack smoker and if I can use the oven and the smoker I would be pleased to do that.

[Woods Walker]

I was taught how to butcher deer when I was 16, and have done all my own, and many of my friends since then.
 
Over the years I have modified my methods, to where I now pretty much bone everything. I also grind my own burger too. I  don't make sausage (that's next) but I do make extruded (from ground meat) jerky and snack sticks, which I can't keep around long because my daughter and her friends eat it as fast as I can make it!
 
I wouldn't do it any other way. I get MY meat, the way I like it, and I KNOW how it's been handled and what's in it!

[Woods Walker]

ORIGINAL: DeerCamp

We make mostly burger.. I have made steaks and jerky tho.. I love the jerky but it goes really quick and it takes forever to make.. I herd you can make it in the oven..? How would I go about making it that way? I use a smoker and that takes a VERY long time. Its just a two rack smoker and if I can use the oven and the smoker I would be pleased to do that.

 
I make it from ground meat with the "Jerky Shooter". I have drying racks that I put right in the oven, and it takes about 90 minutes or so to dry to the point that I like it. I can make 4 pounds of meat at a time, which yields about 1 pound of finished jerky.

[HUNTER61358]

To add to what I listed yesterday you do need a bone saw and meat hooks. Make a rack at top cooler for hanging back strips and leg quarters. I DO WRAP IN SARAN WRAP to keep the meat from drying out. AGE BACKSTRIPS two weeks this will make them very tender and tasty. Keep cooler temp between 32 and 36 F. I also age a rump or two for B.B.Q. and water smoke for about 10 to 12 hours then bone out to put in a crock pot for 8 hours on low till tender. I add K C Masterpiece sauce and its great. But back to processing. After skinning remove front shoulders wrap and hang in cooler. Remove all outer rib meat. Make a slit where backstrip meets rump working all around end of backstrip with knife. Stay along ribs and seperate between muscle on spine. Work all the way down spine to end of neck. Then seperate  the backstrip from other muscles, wrap backstrip and hang in cooler. Repeat for other backstrip. Remove the tenderloins, clean and freeze. Remove all meat with a boneing knife that you want. This takes time to get at all the meat on neck, spine, and ribs. With saw cut off neck, then ribcage, lower spine. Split pelvic bone with saw wrap and hang. This will let you process boned out meat first and leg quarters later. I process on average six deer a year. I bulk pack and freeze most of the meat till I need to make something. I do wrap and freeze whole rumps after ageing. Remove all deer fat is a must or it will give the meat a waxy taste. You can make many things out of deer meat and I am still trying new things. Any questions please notify me? 

[DennisWalrod]

A book I wrote in 2004 explains just about everything you can do with a deer carcass in addition to butchering and cooking the venison. The title is "MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR DEER" (retail $16.95, pub. by Stackpole Books, 252 pages, with many photographs and sketches.  You can order it at any bookstore, see it at www.amazon.com, or buy it direct from me. See details at www.denniswalrod.com in the My Books section. In addition to butchering and cooking, I tell how to mount antlers, tan hides, making sausage, antlercraft, making hand-soap from the tallow, tying fishing lures from the hair, and so on. I also wrote a book titled "ANTLERS: A GUIDE TO COLLECTING, SCORING, MOUNTING, AND CARVING" that is availble at the same sources shown above.

[Patriot]

ORIGINAL: Woods Walker

I was taught how to butcher deer when I was 16, and have done all my own, and many of my friends since then. 
  
I wouldn't do it any other way. I get MY meat, the way I like it, and I KNOW how it's been handled and what's in it!

 
I'm the same way.  We always did our own ever since I was a kid.  Now I'm doing all my own and passing on the skills to anyone who will let me. 

[shadow]

I process my own also, I started in the 2007 season, I had a buddy of mine show me how its done with a deer I brought him and I have done my last 3-deer at home.
I agree its time consuming but rewarding.  I also set up 2 tables and cover them with waxed freezer paper to keep the meat clean. I use one table for the meat after its cut from the deer, I clean off any hair that might have found its way onto the meat with a paper towel and water.
After that its on to the wrapping table where I first package the meat in plastic baggies pressing out any air and tieing them off with twist ties. It then gets wrapped in the freezer wrap.
Besides steaks and stew meat I'll also make jerky out of the meat, and use an electric grinder I have for ground venison. This also saves me well over 100 hundred dollars and I bone out the meat, its not just cut up with a large meat saw like I had been acustomed to before.

[Everyday Hunter]

ORIGINAL: Patriot

ORIGINAL: Woods Walker

[size="3"]I was taught how to butcher deer when I was 16, and have done all my own, and many of my friends since then. [/size]
[size="3"][/size]  
[size="3"]I wouldn't do it any other way. I get MY meat, the way I like it, and I KNOW how it's been handled and what's in it![/size]

I'm the same way.  We always did our own ever since I was a kid.  Now I'm doing all my own and passing on the skills to anyone who will let me. 

I began butchering my deer at age 15, and have never hired someone else to do it. Read about how I got started here:
http://everydayhunter.blogspot.com/2008/11/meat-inspectors-and-mrs-persnickety.html

Paul, good photos you've provided. Cutting up a deer is really very easy. I do it exactly the same way. Tenderloins, loins, front quarters boned, rib cage (and any remaining loin meat) boned, neck boned, hind quarters cut. I usually do it in about 4 hours, but have taken as little as 2 to do it. I never touch my meat with a saw, so there are no bone chips, and no bone marrow from a saw blade.

This year the only deer I shot was a small doe, and so far I've made half of it into jerky with the Cabela's Jerky Blaster and dehydrator I got for Christmas. I grind the meat with an old cast iron food chopper, season it, let it marinate, and shoot it through the tube onto the trays. I'm eating some right now.

No deer processor can do as good a job as I do, and I have had a couple of them tell me so. They couldn't afford to be as meticulous with the meat as I am. I remove all the silver skin from the meat, so nothing ends up on a the dinner plate that can't be eaten.

Somehow, I wouldn't feel right about it if I didn't do it myself.

Steve

P.S. Forgot to say that I also made some turkey jerky this year from the fall bird I got. I used a commercial seasoning with a hickory smoke flavoring, and added some homemade chunky applesauce to the ground meat. It turned out delicious. I'll be trying other fruit flavors. I drink mango juice for breakfast, so that will go into my next batch of turkey jerky.

[Hoosierbuck]

Another awesome use for neck roast, prepped almost the same way: fajitas!
Just put water and fajita spices in the crock pot, and then seperate the yuck from the meat, shred the meat and pack in meal-size portions. When you are ready to eat, thaw, then fry it up with onions and peppers in a tad of olive oil, YUM!
I have been processing my own deer for several years now, and have an open invite for anyone to come join in and learn how. I don't claim to be a pro, but I do it well enough and am willing to help others learn.

HB