Well the time has finally come in SE Wisconsin that my garage which I have been referring to as my walk in cooler is no longer safe temps for aging meat. That means its time to deal with the domestic boar I harvested around Christmas time. I didn’t take any pics because I was sure it was going to turn into dog food or varmint bait.
Cut the fat and funky bits off and mostly deboned. (The scraps are in a separate freezer and will be composted on farm when the ground is thawed enough. Hate to waste valuable nutrients.) Took a few chunks of meat and fried them up. A couple days later I’m still alive, no sickness as of yet.
After aging for a few months, the meat tasted like normal farm raised heritage pork. Back on day 1 when it was fresh, that was some nasty smelling stuff.
So we got about 20lb of belly that I put on salt to make some bacon, 1 picnic ham for smoking, and about 30-40 lb of everything else that I cut up to grind and make pepperoni.
Ridley Acres - A friend of mine shot one in Texas last fall. He made a bunch of it in to brats mixed with some pork butt. I was a little skeptical but they were really good.
Ridley Acres
Curious what temperature you age it at? I was not aware fresh pork could be aged like fresh beef.
When you say Domestic Boar, do you mean just a male hog you let get up in age? Or are you talking about a feral hog?
Dave in AZ This was an American Guinea Hog that was about 18 months old.
processhead It was just in my garage from 12/25/21 until 3/15/22. Temps went well into negative at times, but never went over 40 until the day I finished cutting him up. The day I slaughtered I sprayed the whole carcass with 1:1 vinegar/water and repeated daily for 3 days so there wouldn’t be as much bad bacteria. Anything off colored was discarded.
Visit waltons.com to find everything for meat processing.
Walton's - Everything But The Meat!
