Thinking about finally doing it all myself this year. When killing 5 deer a year, the processor bill adds up.

Obviously Backstrap and Tenderloin will be made to steaks. Also a lot will be ground.

I normally get it done by Hudson's Meat Market in Austin. The best thing they do is Bacon Wrapped Chop Steaks. They are about as good as it gets when using ground deer meat. I get at least 50 of these things every year. Anyone know the best way to do this? They are basically thick ground salsbury steaks wrapped in bacon. I wonder if I would need to add anything to get them to stay together? Maybe egg? Add pork fat? Picture below has them on the right.

Also get a few lbs of jalepeno sausage, summer sausage and snack sticks. Any one have a good recipe?

What grinder, casing and suffers do yall recommend?

I keep it pretty simple - backstrap gets cut into steaks, tenderloin gets fried that night and pretty much the rest goes into grind.

Typically with grid I do the following:

• Pan/breakfast sausage grind. Mix with pork butt, season, run through coarse grind plate (3/8"), let it set in the fridge for a few hours so seasonings can meld in well, throw in the freezer to firm up to almost frozen and then grind through the small (1/4") plate.
• Sausage grind. Mix with brisket or pork butt, season, run through coarse (3/8") grind plate. Let sit in fridge, toss in freezer to firm up, run through same coarse plate again. I prefer my sausage to be a little coarser than what the fine plate produces. Personal preference
• Summer sausage grind. Same as sausage, but I run it through the fine plate on the second grind instead.
• Burger grind. Mix with brisket or other beef cuts, run through coarse plate then fine plate
• Chili grind. Mix with brisket or other beef cuts, run through coarse plate 2x

As far as grinding equipment, I've had great luck with LEM. In fact, I have a LEM grinder that I'd sell for a really good price. Another poster here was going to take it but we kind of lost touch and it just never happened.

It's a LEM 1/3 HP unit, 2 grinding plates and a sausage stuffer plate (I've never tried it as a stuffer).

https://instagr.am/p/Cnnxc6Au2ed

Biggest grinder you can afford to cut down on processing time/how warm your batches get between grinds.

my plan lately…. take the backstraps whole for stuffing and smoking…. can reduce them to steaks later if needed….. grind the rest to burger. i know i know…. im turning great steaks into burger…. but im making burger meat for my mom, 2 adult sons and me and wife….
Im sure it isnt for everyone but its working for me at this point.

I also keep backstrap and tenderloin for steaks. I separate large muscles and freeze labeled as roast. Everything smaller gets labeled as grind. The roasts may end up as roasts, chicken fried or other uses that need a larger piece. The grind gets used in stews, stir fry, coarse chopped for chili. Ocassionally I will grind some. And I have had good luck with my LEM grinder, but I don't use it that much. I provide venison for three generations and we love it without the need to try to hide the flavor by grinding and mixing. I plan every year to grind some with my brisket trimmings I save, but rarely find the time.

Something that may be unique is we mix ground chuck or brisket 50/50 with deer, no seasoning, and package it in flat 1lb packages with the vacuum sealer. Completely replaces ground meat for the year for our family.

Aside from the backstrap and tenderloins, everything else gets ground. Sometimes my dad will keep ribs or a hindquarter and smoke them. They can be hit or miss, usually more of a hit.

Neck meat goes to chili grind, once through the 3/8 plate. Backstrap is steakettes, and left whole for grilling. Hams are separated by groups, and the top and bottom rounds are either saved for roasts, or sliced into steakettes. Everything else, heart, ribs, trimmings, is sausage, pan, link, and summer.

The pan and link sausage I make with salt, pepper, granulated garlic, ground sage, and lots and lots of mustard seeds. I have never measured the spices, after so long, you can judge pretty well. Season what you think looks right (it always takes more than you think) then grind a bit, fry it up see what you think. Reseason till you get what you like. As far as summer sausage, I always went to Hess meat market and got their spice blend and casings, and used it, plus lots and lots of mustard seeds. Smoke with peach about 2 hours, and then straight heat in my homemade smoker up to 145/155. Hang outside, and rinse with cold water till around 100/90. Rest them in the fridge overnight, then vacuum pack. But do yourself a favor, and have a few slices that night before you put them in the fridge. It will never taste better than right then.

A friend turned me on to this and we love it. Only difference is I package in 1 kg flat vac bags rather than 1 lb.

Typical backstrap steaks, jerky strips from a part of the hams, seasoned deer/pork mix (aka pan sausage), but my bride excels at using it for spaghetti sauce, meatloaf, gumbo, taco/nacho use. Straight ground deer for chili, or extruded jerky.

I've switch largely to ~1" chunks for most of 'my' chili cooks. Crowd pleasers are more often ground. A venison/beef mix works well in both cases and is another easy cut to put in the freezer without investing in a sausage stuffer.

We butcher a pig and make sausage with usually two deer, or maybe one if it's big enough. You can buy them already butchered too.

We eat it at least once a week. My kids don't like regular store bought sausage anymore

alvtimes said:

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my plan lately…. take the backstraps whole for stuffing and smoking…. can reduce them to steaks later if needed….. grind the rest to burger. i know i know…. im turning great steaks into burger…. but im making burger meat for my mom, 2 adult sons and me and wife….
Im sure it isnt for everyone but its working for me at this point.

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Whatever works for you is what you need to do. I do the same - still have steaks from several years ago in the freezer that we just never really eat. But we go through ground venison with regularity, so most gets ground up for things we actually eat.

This year most of the old steaks are going into the sausage pile. Better than them staying in the freezer.

aggiebrad16 said:

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Something that may be unique is we mix ground chuck or brisket 50/50 with deer, no seasoning, and package it in flat 1lb packages with the vacuum sealer. Completely replaces ground meat for the year for our family.

Aside from the backstrap and tenderloins, everything else gets ground. Sometimes my dad will keep ribs or a hindquarter and smoke them. They can be hit or miss, usually more of a hit.

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Yup. Grind gets put into quart sized vacuum bags in 1 lb increments, flattened so they stack and thaw easier and put in the freezer. No seasoning on normal grid that would replace ground beef.

Breakfast sausage gets seasoned, then ground. Let the grinder to the work, and it does a lot better job than mixing after the fact. The meat also retains a much better texture. Same thing - flattened, frozen in 1 lb weights.

Sausage trimmings are just cubed up into 1"-1-1/2" chunks, sealed and frozen. That way I can use the grinder to mix the seasonings right before we stuff and smoke. The only time I mix any seasonings after for sausage is when i make my German coarse sausage, because it takes a bull flour binder that I have to use my meat mixer for.

Most of the time sausage is mixed with a good fatty cut of pork or beef to keep it from being too dry, but last year I tested a batch that was about 75/15 venison to beef and 10% pork fat that I picked up at the slaughter house. I liked it, though next time I would back the pure fat content down a little, maybe to about 7%-ish.

I freeze the deer whole and cut off meat slivers as I need them

I'm interested if it's still available. Shoot me an email and we can discuss.

username at gmail

TreeAg14 said:

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I'm interested if it's still available. Shoot me an email and we can discuss.

username at gmail

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Sent

I've really enjoyed using recipes from Hank Shaw (his book Buck Buck Moose has plenty), Steve Rinella, and Danielle Prewett. You can find a lot online and on YouTube, but their actual cookbooks are incredibly useful.

I agree with the idea of leaving larger muscles whole because you maximize optionality. You can cook it as a roast, cut it into steaks, coarse grind it if you want chili, or fine grind it if you want burger. But you can't go from ground back into steaks or roast. One modification I have made though, is to mark my roasts as either "grill" or "braise." My "grill" roasts are lean with very little silver skin and are great roasted/grilled whole to medium rare but can also be cooked low and slow. The "braise" roasts, like neck roasts and shoulder roasts, really need to be cooked low and slow in moisture to break down the connective tissue. Finally, if I have good sinew-free meat in smaller pieces, I'll chop it fine for taco meat or into larger chunks for stew meat or carne guisada. I grind my own meat for chili and burgers, but I leave sausage-making to the professionals.

I could go on for hours about this topic!

As the poster above me said, Hank Shaw and the Meateater books are great resources. I mainly rely on Hank's recipes, both his website (honest-food.net) and books. If you google a wild game recipe, you'll get either his or MeatEater as the first hit.

I'll add another:
If you're taking stuff to Hudson's, I assume you're in the Austin area. Go eat at Dai Due and buy a copy of Jesse Griffith's book Afield while you're there. It's another great resource.

I like to go a little nuts on how I use my game meat.

I've made numerous different types of sausage, both cased and uncased. My favorites are probably chorizo, andouille, and, merguez. Hank's recipe for red wisconsin brats is really good as well. I don't think that a cased sausage with less than 20% fat is worth making. I prefer to buy pork fat from a meat market or Fiesta, and just add that to the venison, rather than cutting with pork shoulder. For a 5# batch, use 1# fat, 4# venison (though I usually make 10# batches)

I tend to keep at least a couple of shoulders and most shanks I get bone-in, and make braised recipes like barbacoa or birria. Again, look to the Hank Shaw site for shank recipes. I keep neck roasts bone-in for smaller deer, and debone for larger ones, to keep them manageable.

I also keep roasts whole, and may decide to grind them or make stew. For chili, I dice the meat into 1/4" pieces. I label the roasts by the cut.

I'll do charcuterie occasionally. A fun use for the top and bottom round is corning it. Again, Hank's recipe. Makes a really good Reuben or breakfast hash with sweet potatoes.

Eye of round is good for stir fry. The sirloin tip, aka football roast, I usually cook as a roast. Cut the top round into steaks and pound it out for cutlets.

Going to try stuffing and braising the flank this year. Recipe from Afield.

Try brining and smoking a deboned ham for the holidays! Great recipe in the MeatEater cookbook. I have 2 pig hams and 1 blackbuck ham brining in my fridge right now, to smoke this weekend. Plus, the loins from said pig are curing for lonza, and the belly is curing for pancetta.

Nice. I have the Meat Eater book. I'll have to check out Hank Shaw.

Eye of round also makes good Fajitas. Slice horizontally to make one flat 1/2in slab, fajita seasoning, then I hit it with a blade tenderizer. Let it sit in the fridge (in a ziploc) for a day to let the fajita seasoning further tenderize the meat.