Might be getting a Hog, help me pick the cuts!!!!

Hmm, just curious what your total cost was for live hog, slaughter, and cutting. We have a local place we have beef done, and dad raises pigs and I keep thinking about buying one (I get market price) and getting it cut up. I know I can do a whole hog for about $1.00 per pound live weight , so probably $1.70 pound prepared. I'm curious what they are for those not as lucky as I.

As far as cuts go, if you want a really long smoke get the picnic and butt in one piece, but that may (probably won't) fit the ECB. At the least get those two whole. Get the hams sliced about 3/4 inch thick and you will be happy with the result, unless you want to try your hand at smoking one, in which case I'd get the ham halved to cut down on time and fit the ECB.

Get all the ribs and loin cuts. After that, I think we usually did the rest as sausage. Been a while though. I'd split the loin into chops and roasts just because that's the way I like it. Oy, and I almost forgot the bacon and sidemeat, with skin on if possible because man, it's good we can talk you through the way mom salted and dried the side in the refrigerator.

If the butcher you use gives you the fat, we can talk cracklins too. God, that takes me back, and I'm only 27. The cold winter days (or as cold as NC gets anyway) cooking cracklins and straining lard out of a massive cast iron pot. (massive meaning maaaaasive).

I got a whole hog last year...300lb live weight. It was Butchered up here in Amish country by a local guy with a shop. Paid $225.00 after everything was said and done. That price included the pig and the processing. Less than 90 cents per pound, needless to say I was thrilled, and will be purchasing one again as soon as I get my new freezer.

Best meat i had ever tasted, and the amish scrapple was quite tasty after being smoked.

The hog was fed a steady diet of donuts from what I was told. Got quite a bit of bacon, sausage, and pork roll, in addition to the usual sought after cuts...ribs, chops, butts...etc.

I think I'd go with the usual cuts with one exception. I'd like to get a fresh ham or two and cure/smoke them myself.

Holy crap, 300lbs? That's a big hog. Last I heard, smithfield packing didn't want a load averaging over 240 or they docked the price. 300 is just huge. I would believe he was eatin doughnuts. Course, bet you didnt' have a problem with dry meat

The season before last we were offered to come out shoot, gut and take home to debone as we do our venison for $120 a pig. These were good size pigs, I saw them and it was a bargain; but it was about a week and a half after we had finished our venison sausage for the year. I would really like to get a couple right before deer season so I could take advantage of some pork bellys and hams for smoking; save the trimmings for venison sausage !!!

Hi- new guy here...just got done doing the pig thing. We ended up doing 15 hogs the last two weekends (live weight range from 250-425...most closer to 300). Did all the processing ourselves- there was 6 of us. I just finished my first batch of bacon, using some tips that I picked up from lurking on here. We bought the hogs for 50 dollars apiece, did all the work, and with the spices and casings and packaging,I figure that we are around a quarter a pound or a little less. Saved several hams of varying sizes, the side pork, the backstraps and the tenders. Everything else we ground. Made bratwurst, polish, itailian, maple breakfast, sage breakfast, 50/50 mix with deer on some of it. I'm going to try to cure some of the hams here in the coming days. Right now though, after the last two weeks, I am completely tired of pig. Nasty, smelly, good tasting things...

Jesus, where are you folks getting pigs this big? Are they the ones referred to as bacon pigs? (baconers I think I've heard them called)

BTW, do you happen to know the breed? I'd be curious to do blind taste testing between some of the older european breeds, but they are hard to find in East NC.

We got ours from a guy who has 25,000 head on hand any given day...he has some that get too big to sell (they'll dock him on the whole load if he has some that are overweight), or some sows (some of those will weigh upwards of 600 lbs). Rather than sell them for that price to the locker, he'll sell them to friends for the 50 bucks. Those big ones are great for bacon, we got some pieces of side pork that weighed over 20lbs apiece (40lbs for the hog).

Slaughtered 3 hogs last weekend. They weighed 235 240 240. We paid .35 per lb live weight. I have my own processing room in my shop. Meat saw, grinder, cuber, slicer, lard press-saugage press and I made my first batch of lard and cracklins two days ago and they turned out great. Have not done the lard thing since I was a kid.....may moons ago! If you get the chance to get a hog I would go for it . Just my 2cents