It's All About the Process

Fully smoked ham

Early this winter our family processed our 6th or 7th pig. This is something that I never saw myself doing or getting in to. I am a "city boy" and knew little to nothing about most animals other than the way many of them taste. I have never hunted, but I have always been a bit fascinated by what people do. Pigs, while kind of a disgusting creature, produce some of my favorite foods to eat. But, in order to get the various cuts into something that is enjoyable, a fair amount of work has to take place. I am by no means an expert. But I have enjoyed getting to better understand the process and all that goes in to it. In order to have a beautiful ham like in the picture on the side, it takes a few weeks to get there.

First, let me better explain what processing means in my terms. There is no butcher shop involved. One of my good friends decided a few years ago that he wanted to start raising a couple of pigs per year so that he could add the meat to his freezer. After talking BBQ several times he asked me if I would like for him to raise a pig for me as well. Having no idea what that really meant, I agreed! Honestly, he does about 95% of the hard work and our family reaps the benefits. I am well aware of this fact. After the pig is sufficient in size, usually 250-300 pounds, I make the trek out to his house where the process begins. Over the years we have improved the process and have turned it in to one short evening followed by a short morning the next day.

As long as the weather is going to be cold enough, we dispatch of the pig in the evening and come back for processing the following morning. Much like processing a deer, after the animal has been shot we haul it out into a clearing, lift it off the ground via a hoist, wash it off, gut it, and leave it to hang upside down for the night. The next day the butchering really begins.

She enjoys it!

When Abby was 6 or 7 I asked her if she would be interested in learning about this whole process. She was interested and I lugged her out with me a few days later to get her first experience. We were doing things differently then and we did everything in one morning. She fed the pig a little something shortly after we arrived, my friend dispatched of the pig and the processing began immediately. Abby's first time we even went home and had ribs from our fresh pig that night! To my surprise, she loved it! She didn't necessarily enjoy being a part of the killing process, but I believe it gave her a much better understanding of the circle of life. Shortly after the pig was shot she said, "Poor piggy.........I sure do like bacon though." And, like that, her love of pig processing was born!

Also to my surprise, her favorite part is really skinning the pig. She is pretty good with the knife and is meticulous about getting the skin off with just the right amount of fat still attached. Once the skin is off and we are ready to start making the primal cuts, she doesn't really care to be a part of all of that. She is fine running off to feed the chickens, play with the cats, or even tend to the garden if the time of year is appropriate.

Ham in the brine

Once we make all of the primal cuts, then we bag things up and take them home to be prepared, packaged and frozen. One of the more time consuming cuts is the ham. The ham that so many of us love, actually comes from the rear end of the pig. The term "pork butt" has many people confused. The "butt" of the pig actually produces the ham. The picture on the left is a raw ham that is curing in a food grade bucket. If you have ever wanted to do something like this, you can find out how to do it here. For the most part, the ham sits in that curing brine for about 2 weeks and then it is ready to be smoked or frozen. The end result of smoking this same ham is in the first picture on this post. It turned out awesome and VERY tasty.

35 pounds of raw bacon

One of the other time consuming processes is curing and making bacon. Bacon, as we all know it, doesn't come off the pig in its ready to eat form like so many assume. In order to get the more red meat coloring it is imperative to cure the bacon as well. These are smaller cuts of meat and don't require quite as long of a curing time. Generally these sit in the cure for 3-5 days and are ready to be smoked. Interested in trying this yourself? You can see the recipes I used this time here.We make a combination of "regular" bacon and maple bacon. With a smaller piece of pork belly that I had, I also made some Asian bacon.

Smoked with Apple Wood

 This is all a bit different than store bought bacon. Because of the lack of sodium nitrate, the bacon is never quite as crispy as you get it from a store. I prefer a chewier bacon, so this is just fine with me!

Honing her skills

I am fortunate to have a smoker with a large enough chamber to easily handle 30+ pounds of bacon. The finished product is usually quite beautiful and tasty straight off the smoker.

We slice it all up and vacuum seal it into roughly 1 pound packages. The boss is usually the master slicer and does a better job of getting our slices pretty even. It takes practice. Over time we have found that an electric knife with a slicing guide doesn't pretty well for us. We should maybe upgrade to a better slicer, but this works sufficiently for our needs.

Grinding it up

The other real time consuming process is grinding pork and making various sausages. We have experimented with several different things over the years and think we have this process down decently as well. Just this year I bought my own meat grinder. It makes pretty quick work of large volumes of leftover meat. Once I have cut up the large primal cuts into roasts, bacon, chops, ribs, etc. there is always a bit of leftover meat that doesn't form anything great on its own. Rather than waste any of it, this can all be ground up and turned in to something. It can be just ground pork, or turned into various sausages.

It's cold!

Some of our favorites are breakfast sausage, Italian sausage, and summer sausage. All of this gets vacuum sealed and frozen for future use as well. The last two years we have made 30 pounds of summer sausage each year. That will generally get us through lots of pool gatherings during those warmer months. We even enlisted the help of one of Abby's friends in our sausage making day this year. It was a LONG day, but we accomplished a lot.

We have learned a lot over the past several years. Processing the pig has become a family affair. Finding room for 175ish pounds of meat once things are finished is always a bit of a game of Tetris as well, but we make it work. For now we enjoy the fruits of our labor and look forward to the next processing in the early winter of next year. My shirt below was perfect (but unplanned) for this day. "When in doubt add bacon." Fitting for my family and I both.

Beautiful isn't it?