The Best Way To Process A Deer in 2024 & Beyond

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The Best Way To Process A Deer in 2024 & Beyond

Congrats! You simply harvested a deer! However now the laborious work begins. It’s time to discipline costume it, drag it to the truck, and course of the scrumptious venison. It feels like lots, however it’s not as difficult because it initially appears. So let’s get began with one of the simplest ways to course of a deer.

How To Course of A Deer

It’s necessary to notice that everybody has a barely totally different means of processing their deer. The one outlined under has labored nicely for my household and me for a number of years, however we’re continually attempting new strategies and methods to do it.

Processing a deer can take a few hours, so most individuals imagine taking it to a neighborhood meat processing plant is one of the simplest ways to course of a deer.

I’m not towards this, however I hardly ever take my deer to the processor for 3 causes. The primary is the expense. Taking a deer isn’t low-cost, costing round $100-$120, plus any extras you add (like grinding it or turning the venison into jerky). The second cause is as a result of I need to management what occurs to the meat. Lastly, I believe studying to course of a deer is a really priceless talent, beginning with discipline dressing it.

Useful Instruments

A number of sharp knives (one with a intestine hook is right)
Knife sharpener
Small butcher (bone) noticed
Rope/chain
Deer hanger
Vacuum sealer/freezer luggage
Meat grinder
Cooler
Desk
Water supply
Bucket

Discipline Dressing

Gutting or discipline dressing the deer helps cut back the chance of contaminating the venison with fecal matter, urine, and anything housed within the abdomen. You’ll typically obtain an additional cost if you happen to don’t field-dress the deer earlier than taking it to the processor, so it’s vital to understand how to do that as a hunter.

Discipline dressing is best when utilizing a knife with a intestine hook, however it’s not essential.

Step 1: Minimize via the pores and skin across the anus till the rectum is free.
Step 2: Minimize a 2-3 inch lengthy gap via the pores and skin just under the sternum (the place the ribs meet), then flip your blade over, utilizing the intestine hook (to keep away from piercing the stomach wall/membrane), and proceed chopping the pores and skin to the anus and as much as the neck.
Step 3: Now, it’s time to pierce the stomach wall just under the sternum. For those who don’t have a intestine hook in your blade, you should utilize two fingers to create a bit house between the stomach wall, abdomen, and intestines whereas chopping the pores and skin so that you don’t by chance reduce them (that’s a nasty day, belief me…).
Step 4: Minimize or noticed the pelvis, when you have a small hand noticed (butcher noticed) accessible, to permit the decrease gut to move via with out tearing.
Step 5: Noticed or reduce via the highest of the sternum, permitting for simpler entry to the guts and lungs.
Step 6: Minimize the diaphragm (skinny muscle/membrane) from the rib cage on each side.
Step 7: Rigorously reduce the esophagus and windpipe above the guts, as far up as you may go.
Step 8: Use the windpipe to drag the center from the carcass, saving the guts and liver (if you happen to or somebody you understand enjoys organ meat).

That’s it! It’s now time to take it dwelling and pores and skin it.

Skinning

Now that you simply’re dwelling, it’s good to pores and skin the deer. I’ve discovered it most accessible to do that whereas it’s hanging by the rear legs.

Step 1: Minimize a gap giant sufficient to slide the gamble (deer hanger) into between the bone and Achilles tendon on each legs. DO NOT reduce the tendon. Doing so will stop you from hanging the deer, making chopping the meat with out getting particles throughout it rather more difficult.
Step 2: Use a rope, cable, or chain over a limb or deer hoist to boost the deer off the bottom; the butt needs to be about eye degree or at the least till the top is off the bottom. Elevate and decrease the deer in line with what’s most comfy.
Step 3: Now that it’s off the bottom, reduce a skin-deep ring across the leg with the blade edge dealing with out (as a lot as potential after the preliminary reduce) to stop the hair from getting onto the meat.
Step 4: Now you can reduce the disguise from the anus to the ring you simply made, following the road the place the brown and white fur meet.
Step 5: Pull the pores and skin away from the meat and reduce the membrane between the pores and skin and the meat, from the again legs to the ribs. Watch out to chop the membrane and never into the muscle to maintain the meat as clear as potential. A really sharp knife helps greatest with this.
Step 6: All of the pores and skin across the stomach and again legs ought to now be free, and the tail is at the moment holding up progress. Press/pull out and down on the tail and reduce the disguise throughout it, then rapidly pull down/ pop the tail to separate the joints the place the tail and butt meet earlier than chopping via the tail.
Step 7: Transfer right down to the entrance legs and pores and skin them such as you did the again legs. You would possibly have to put the leg you’re chopping between your legs to maintain the deer from spinning. You possibly can pull the pores and skin off the again as soon as each entrance shoulders are uncovered as much as the neck. If you wish to preserve the disguise, it’s greatest to maintain chopping the membrane as an alternative of simply pulling it.

Now that the pores and skin not covers the meat, it’s greatest to let it age.

Getting old The Meat

Hanging a deer to let it age depends upon the surroundings, temperature, deer age, and private choice. Since my deer processing occurs within the storage, I hardly ever get to let the deer cling for so long as I’d like.

When you have a walk-in cooler that may preserve the meat above 32°F and under 40°F, you need to let it cling for five to 14 days. This enables the nice micro organism to interrupt down muscle fibers, tenderizing the meat and making it rather less gamey-tasting.

Nonetheless, for these of us who don’t have a walk-in cooler, let the deer cling for so long as potential (a few days is greatest), so long as the temperature is between 33°F and 40°F. This is likely to be in a single day, a number of days, or just some hours.

De-Boning/Butchering

As soon as the deer has aged to your liking or the temperature has made that choice unviable, it’s time to take away the meat from the bone and place it in a cooler. It’s greatest to start with the tenderloins.

Step 1: Minimize away the flank meat (the skinny meat connecting the ribs to the hindquarters) to make the tenderloins extra accessible.
Step 2: With the deer hanging from the again legs, the tenderloins needs to be just under eye degree contained in the carcass. They need to come out simply by chopping close to the groin space and gently pulling (they have an inclination to go increased than most individuals assume). They’re concerning the dimension of a big fish fillet on most deer and among the best cuts of meat.
Step 3: Now, we are able to work on the hind quarters with out worrying about ruining the tenderloins. The hind quarters are excellent for jerky and roasts. It’s best to discover the place the muscle tissues overlap; that is the place you need to start chopping and separating the muscle tissues from one another.
Step 4: As soon as a few of them are separated, you may higher attain the bone and reduce it off the bones and joints. There’s not a fairly means of doing this in addition to following the bone.
Step 5. After eradicating the meat from a lot of the hind quarters (if you happen to take away all of it, the deer will not cling since you reduce the meat connected to the Achilles), it’s time to maneuver on to arguably the most effective meat on the deer: the backstraps. It goes up into the hind quarters, so now that they’re eliminated, you need to see precisely the place to make your reduce.
1. I prefer to run my knife down the spine, carefully following each vertebra to get as a lot meat as potential. Then, I reduce perpendicularly throughout the highest, pulling and chopping the backstrap off the bones till I reached the neck, the place I reduce perpendicularly throughout the underside to free the meat from the carcass. Set each apart for later processing (butterflying the backstrap).
Step 6: As soon as the backstraps are eliminated, you may reduce off the entrance shoulders (You possibly can technically take away the entrance shoulders at any level). That is fairly easy since pulling the entrance leg away from the physique creates an area your knife can naturally slice via. You don’t should be tremendous delicate with this piece, as most of it’s stew or scrap meat.
Step 7: Let’s transfer on to the ribs. You possibly can reduce the rib meat off the bone or reduce the rib bones (this takes up extra space in your freezer). There’s not a ton of rib meat, and it’s fairly robust, so most individuals grind or slow-cook it. For those who’re chopping the meat off the bone, begin on the prime of the ribs and work your means down; that means, gravity is working with you. Merely observe the bone together with your knife and slowly pull the meat from the bone. Repeat on the opposite aspect.
Step 8: When you’ve eliminated all of the rib meat, you may start butchering the neck. Start the place you narrow the backstrap and observe the backbone down and across the trachea.
Step 9: Take your time and end chopping off any chunks of meat you may need missed or initially neglected. Then, you may take the deer down and reduce the meat off the Achilles space.

Making ready the Meat

Now that a lot of the meat is off the bones (entrance shoulders nonetheless have bones), it’s time to arrange it for long-term storage. Once more, there are a number of methods of doing this, and my course of continually evolves. It usually begins with rinsing the meat.

Washing

Cleansing the meat is crucial. Nobody needs filth, grass, hair, or particles of their deer stew, burger, or steak. You’ll possible have to clean a few of it together with your fingers, as grass and hair are notoriously troublesome to take away as soon as they’ve caught to the membrane.

When you’ve completed the preliminary washing, you may start trimming and grinding the meat.

Trimming & Grinding

For those who’re not an enormous fan of wildgame, it’s most likely as a result of whoever processed the meat did a poor job trimming it. I choose to chop out as many tendons and connective tissue as potential; this contains the silvery membrane the place a lot of the wild recreation style comes from. It’s on the again straps and lots of different parts of the meat.

Take your time, and also you’ll thank your self later.

Talking of the backstrap, part it into two—to three-inch chunks earlier than slicing it almost in half. That is known as butterflying the backstrap, and it turns it right into a scrumptious steak. If you’d like a thicker steak, reduce the chunks a bit thicker, or don’t butterfly it.

As soon as as a lot of the membrane and tendons as potential are faraway from the grind meat, it’s time to plop it into the grinder. You’ll discover you may need missed a number of tendons; now’s the time to take away those you see.

I usually depart the entrance shoulder meat connected to the bone and smoke it, however that is very robust meat, so you can too reduce it off the bone and gradual cook dinner it or use it in a stew after eradicating as many tendons as potential.

If I discover quite a lot of particles, I choose to clean the meat one final time to make sure it’s clear earlier than flippantly drying it and putting it in a freezer bag or vacuum sealing it in parts my household usually eats.

Storing

When you’ve packaged all of the meat, it’s time to place it within the freezer. I all the time date it and write what it’s, resembling “In the present day’s Date—Stew Meat” or “In the present day’s Date—Backstrap.” This lets me know what I’m grabbing out of the freezer and the way lengthy it’s been there.

I’ve had deer meat keep good for a number of years, however I’ve had different venison get freezer-burned, and go unhealthy in a 12 months. All of it depends upon how nicely you package deal it.

Correctly Get rid of the Scraps

At this level, you need to have a carcass and scraps to eliminate; don’t be lazy and simply toss it within the ditch. As an alternative, learn your looking rules and eliminate it correctly. This typically entails burying it at a selected depth.

Parting Photographs: Finest Approach To Course of A Deer

Now you understand how to course of a deer. After a number of makes an attempt, it isn’t as difficult because it initially appeared.

I do know hunters who can course of a deer in below an hour and others who take a number of hours. All of it depends upon how meticulous you need to be and the way nicely you perceive deer anatomy. Having a pointy knife additionally helps a ton, too!

Whereas processing your deer is extra work than taking it to a butcher, growing this talent and figuring out you harvest the deer from discipline to desk is a sense you may’t put a worth on.