After last year's successful butchering, there was no doubt we wanted to do it again this year with double the fun. We raised 2 hogs this year. Litter mates, a male and female that ended up around 400lbs and 350lbs respectively. We didn't weigh them, only estimated.
As you guys know, there wasn't any hog killing weather in December and the first part of January. Finally, last Saturday, we decided it was time. We decided to do the larger of the two first.
Dispatched with a .22 rifle to the brain and a sharp knife to the throat, he bled out and we hooked him up to the gambrel. Even a clean pig is a dirty animal. So I gave him a bath.
After he's clean, it's time to swap ends on the gambrel and dip the hams. I guess if we knew we were going to dip the whole pig, we could avoid this step, but sometimes we make things up as we go.
After swapping ends, it's off to the scaulding pot, which in our case, is a 55 gallon drum about half full of water.
Gotta get the ramps aligned just right. This hog was around 6 feet long and getting him dipped in the barrel without overturning the barrel required a little care.
After making sure we could get the hog in the barrel, we had to keep a check on the temperature of the water. Our target temperature was 160 degrees. These things have really coarse hair and it takes a good soak to get it to turn loose.
This is something we include the whole family in. I want my kids to know they can be self sufficient in this world.
Waiting on the water to come up to temp. That's my brother in law Zach (some of y'all know him from the archery circuit) and that's my good buddy Cklem in the foreground. He's a pretty handy feller to have around.
Finally time to give him a soak. We couldn't even get half the hog in the barrel at one time.
After testing to see if the hair would pull, we jerked him out and went to work. It was a little breezy and the skin cooled quickly, making scraping difficult. Denny has modified some paint scrapers into a fantastic pig scraper.
After getting the hams scraped, it was time to swap ends and try to get the shoulders and the rest of the middlings soaked and scraped.
After almost all the hair was scraped, I took a torch to the skin and singed off any remaining stubborn hairs.
Then, out comes the saw and we unzip the hog into two halves.
With the sides separated, it's time to start breaking it into usable pieces. The hams are either trimmed for curing, or cut into muscle groups for roasts and steaks. The shoulders are trimmed for sausage and the backstrap and loins are removed. The side meat is separated from the ribs and set aside for making bacon. And I took the jowls for making a southern version of guanciale.
As you guys know, there wasn't any hog killing weather in December and the first part of January. Finally, last Saturday, we decided it was time. We decided to do the larger of the two first.
Dispatched with a .22 rifle to the brain and a sharp knife to the throat, he bled out and we hooked him up to the gambrel. Even a clean pig is a dirty animal. So I gave him a bath.
After he's clean, it's time to swap ends on the gambrel and dip the hams. I guess if we knew we were going to dip the whole pig, we could avoid this step, but sometimes we make things up as we go.
After swapping ends, it's off to the scaulding pot, which in our case, is a 55 gallon drum about half full of water.
Gotta get the ramps aligned just right. This hog was around 6 feet long and getting him dipped in the barrel without overturning the barrel required a little care.
After making sure we could get the hog in the barrel, we had to keep a check on the temperature of the water. Our target temperature was 160 degrees. These things have really coarse hair and it takes a good soak to get it to turn loose.
This is something we include the whole family in. I want my kids to know they can be self sufficient in this world.
Waiting on the water to come up to temp. That's my brother in law Zach (some of y'all know him from the archery circuit) and that's my good buddy Cklem in the foreground. He's a pretty handy feller to have around.
Finally time to give him a soak. We couldn't even get half the hog in the barrel at one time.
After testing to see if the hair would pull, we jerked him out and went to work. It was a little breezy and the skin cooled quickly, making scraping difficult. Denny has modified some paint scrapers into a fantastic pig scraper.
After getting the hams scraped, it was time to swap ends and try to get the shoulders and the rest of the middlings soaked and scraped.
After almost all the hair was scraped, I took a torch to the skin and singed off any remaining stubborn hairs.
Then, out comes the saw and we unzip the hog into two halves.
With the sides separated, it's time to start breaking it into usable pieces. The hams are either trimmed for curing, or cut into muscle groups for roasts and steaks. The shoulders are trimmed for sausage and the backstrap and loins are removed. The side meat is separated from the ribs and set aside for making bacon. And I took the jowls for making a southern version of guanciale.
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I love that canned sausage, has a special flavor that no other sausage has. We used to can it the same way, but we formed it into smaller balls instead of patties, browned it, and put it in the jars with the hot lard poured over it.
