Great Venison Butchering and Processing Videos and Info!!!

[tallbm]

I promised I would do this post as a result of a conversation in another thread where the info was asked for.  So here it is!

If you've ever looked for a youtube video on butchering a Deer or a Wild Hog you will know how hard it is to find a decent video containing any quality information and practices.

Well your search is over :)

The following video's are the best (by a mile) Deer butchering and processing video's I have ever come across.  The guy seems like a legitimate butcher, using legitimate equipment, tools, and practices and explains while showing you how/why to break down the deer.  He also clearly explains and shows how to go about identifying and carving out specific cuts of meat from the animal.

I agree with about 99% of what he says and does. I only sorta disagree with him mentioning that the shanks and heal "can" be used for grind or jerky.  Yes it can be used for grind but I personally wouldn't recommend it if you want good sausage or pure grind.  I would also never jerky any of that meat due to the tough connective tissues. Again, he is just saying what you can do and is not insisting that you do grind or make jerky.

Also know that about 90%+ of the information in the video's applies to butchering and processing wild/feral hogs, so it is great info.

Excellent Deer Butchering Videos:

• Video 1 segmenting the upper half of deer deer once skinned and extracting tenderloins. 
• Video 2 backstraps, segmenting lower half of deer, removing lower pelvic bone from hind leg, removing Top Round  cut 
• Video 3 (very good) deboning hind leg (removing Sirloin, Lower Round, Chuck Roast, Heel and Shank meat) and front leg 
• Video 4 finishes other front and hind leg, shows how to cut steaks, and does ribs and discusses blood shot areas. Video opens with a slide saying Part 3 but it is an error in video production, the video is really part 4 of the series 

I hunt, bring home, butcher/process 5-7 animals a year to fill my freezer.  I have used these video's from day one of my personal processing journey and wow it is so amazing how well the video's explain and show everything compared to how I have seen family and friends butcher/process animals.

On a final note, wild game is almost always extremely lean so when making sausage I buy and add trimmed pork back fat.  I learned a good lesson that you never grind any tissue or meat you wouldn't throw into a skillet and then immediately eat after a quick fry.  If you wouldn't fry and eat it then don't put it in your grind!  

This is why I would not grind shanks and the heal and such.  Those cuts are best used for low and slow cooking where all of that connective tissue can melt and enhance the flavor of the dish.

So the best practice is to clean the meat of any undesirable tissue and grind what you would plainly eat.  When making sausage the ratio of 80% meat and 20% added fat makes perfect sausage every time!  

The math is simple 10 pounds of sausage is 8 pounds of meat, 2 pounds of fat.  5 pounds of sausage is 4 pounds of meat and 1 pound of fat.  Easy math, accurate, and consistently perfect sausage every time... unless you cook it poorly :P

I hope this info is helpful.  Enjoy!!!

 

[mowin]

Nice videos. I agree some of the best I've seen.
I also butcher all my own venison. In nearly 40 yrs of hunting, I've only once had a commercial butcher process my deer.

I agree that the shanks and heals are best for grind up, but never jerky.

Everyone has there own methods. I personally use the entire shoulder and neck for burger and sausage. It's what I do, but others I know break then down.

 

[tallbm]

Nice videos. I agree some of the best I've seen.
I also butcher all my own venison. In nearly 40 yrs of hunting, I've only once had a commercial butcher process my deer.

I agree that the shanks and heals are best for grind up, but never jerky.

Everyone has there own methods. I personally use the entire shoulder and neck for burger and sausage. It's what I do, but others I know break then down.

I leave the heals on my shanks and I braise my shanks or I slow cooked them in the oven with BBQ sauce for some awesome pulled venison BBQ for tacos and sandwiches.

I meat hunt does and spikes and they are rarely much heavier than 90 pounds here in TX so no real neck roast meat other than what is attached to the backstrap.

I use the entire shoulder for sausage grind along with the good scraps I get while deboning.

I use tenderloins, backstrap, and the hind leg roasts for my pure purger grind and to supplement my sausage grind to hit my sausage grind weights.

My process is to figure out how much sausage and pure venison burger grind I want then I weigh the deboned meat to hit that weight number.  I keep the bests roasts out of the grind.

As I said above I then use the front leg meat and good scrap meat for the sausage grind.  

I use the smallest/ugliest roasts as grind to help hit my sausage weight.  

I use the rest of the grinding roasts along with tenderloins and backstraps to hit my pure venison burger grind weight.  Yep I grind the backstrap

.

I rarely fry food in oil and that happens to be the best way I have ever had venison backstrap and tenderloins.  I have tried to cook them so many different ways and they just didn't stack up to the fried method so one year in order to speed up my processing time I just cleaned them and hesitantly ground them.  WOW, best pure venison burger grind ever!  I will never hesitate to grind a backstrap a gain lol

Another thing I do that others might find odd is I DON'T add fat to my pure venison burger grind.  Most of my grind is not used for making burgers so no need for the fat to help it hold together.

Contrary to what many say about the NEED to add fat, I have found that the pure venison burger grind (no fat added) has behaved perfectly as a beef burger substitute.  Hell you cant notice any difference between beef grind and my venison grind other than my venison grind is leaner!  I also don't have issues when I DO make venison burgers.  I find that if I mix in my burger seasoning (salt, pepper, garlic, onion) into the meat and then make patties, the seasonings actually bind the meat together.  This is how I make regular burgers as well so that every part of the patty is full of flavor.  I often make special types of burgers when I make venison burgers anyhow (mixed with olive tapenade, cheese and sun dried tomato, etc. etc.).

I can talk about processing and cooking for hours so I better stop here or else this post is going to be like 12 pages long :P

I would love to hear more feedback and what other's do :)  

 

[mowin]

I cannot grind a backstrap... That's just criminal. Lol

Smoked low and slow, stuffed and broiled, SV then under the broiler to sear.. well you get the idea. Don't need to fry them to get great tasting grub.

You and I must have gone to different high schools together.. I NEVER add fat to my VB.
I've never had a issue with my burgers falling apart. I grill 'em, fry 'em and they stay in one piece. I want to taste venison, not beef. The key is they can't be over cooked, or you might as well try eating a hockey puck.

I seperate my hinds into the 3 cuts, sirloin, top and bottom round.
I remove the eye of round from the bottom round, as it's almost as tender as the inner loins. Steaks get cut from the top/bottom round. Sirloin jerky or burger.

I'll also save a few of each cut for venison pastrami. Absolutely love that stuff.

Not big on pulled pork, so pulled venison wouldn't be on the top of my list, so the only logical thing for me to do with the shanks and hocks is to remove as much silver skin, a PITA, but makes for a much better finished product.

I enjoy butchering my own venison. I'm in control of the finished product, and don't have to worry about if I'm getting all of my meat back of even if it's my deer.

Few of us guys have made our own butcher shop. We converted a small barn and over the yrs have equiped it with commercial equipment. We've got 2 Hobart #22 grinders, globe band saw( more for the pigs or occasional beef), cuber/tenderizer, hollymatic patty machine, chamber vac sealer, couple of fridges to cool stuff off, and a gas stove to sample as we cut up. Oh ya,. A 14' bar and dishnetwork TV so we can watch hunting shows. During hunting season, If I'm not home, my wife knows where to find me, lol

 

[tallbm]

I cannot grind a backstrap... That's just criminal. Lol

Smoked low and slow, stuffed and broiled, SV then under the broiler to sear.. well you get the idea. Don't need to fry them to get great tasting grub.

You and I must have gone to different high schools together.. I NEVER add fat to my VB.
I've never had a issue with my burgers falling apart. I grill 'em, fry 'em and they stay in one piece. I want to taste venison, not beef. The key is they can't be over cooked, or you might as well try eating a hockey puck.

I seperate my hinds into the 3 cuts, sirloin, top and bottom round.
I remove the eye of round from the bottom round, as it's almost as tender as the inner loins. Steaks get cut from the top/bottom round. Sirloin jerky or burger.

I'll also save a few of each cut for venison pastrami. Absolutely love that stuff.

Not big on pulled pork, so pulled venison wouldn't be on the top of my list, so the only logical thing for me to do with the shanks and hocks is to remove as much silver skin, a PITA, but makes for a much better finished product.

I enjoy butchering my own venison. I'm in control of the finished product, and don't have to worry about if I'm getting all of my meat back of even if it's my deer.

Few of us guys have made our own butcher shop. We converted a small barn and over the yrs have equiped it with commercial equipment. We've got 2 Hobart #22 grinders, globe band saw( more for the pigs or occasional beef), cuber/tenderizer, hollymatic patty machine, chamber vac sealer, couple of fridges to cool stuff off, and a gas stove to sample as we cut up. Oh ya,. A 14' bar and dishnetwork TV so we can watch hunting shows. During hunting season, If I'm not home, my wife knows where to find me, lol

Hahahaha I understand the horror someone would encounter when they hear I grind my backstrap :)

I just started smoking this year and I have about 3-4 pounds of backstrap in the freezer so I will give a smoked venison backstrap a try.  I was thinking of doing Venison pops with it (bacon, onion, jalapeno, then finished with BBQ sauce).

Man you are right we are almost the same with the rest of the processing and our reasons.  I will never be sold on adding fat to venison burger grind.  Plus you can always do that after the fact if you NEED it for some reason.  Just buy and mix a little lard with it and boom fat added.  

I love knowing what I am getting with my meat, producing the highest quality cuts possible, and knowing it was treated properly.

My favorite thing to do is to make Venison Fajitas out of bottom round roast.  Top round works very well for it also but the bottom round almost looks like a beef skirt or flank cut.  I will post this recipe some day, it is too good not to have in the back pocket.

Someday soon I'll post my Braised Venison Shank recipe.  It has turned the venison shank into possibly my favorite cut of the whole animal. Additionally if you love the dish (I'm sure you will, everyone does) you now spend even less time processing the shanks.  I just clean excess skin off the outside then I cut both ends of the bone (with a Fiskar geared tree limb lopper) and vacuum seal!  No spending ages on it for such little meat.

I am jealous of your butchering barn hahahha!  My setup is my garage with fold out blow molded plastic tables.  I have a 400watt Warring pro grinder that is very awesome!  It doesn't heat up at all, is all metal, and does the job with no issue.  I have a 10L/22pound verticle sausage stuffer I use for sausge and poly bag stuffing.  I use a Weston Pro-2100 for vac sealing.  I use a 7 gallon bucket, a chorded drill, and a super long stailness steel mud mixing paddle to mix my sausage.

Dexter russle super long fillet knife (more like boning knife though), victornix boning knife, sharpeners, LEM meat totes, some giant HDPE cutting boards, table cloths, hand meat hooks, lem tape machine, etc. etc. etc. for all of my other processing toys.

I have to haul it in and out of my storage closet as I need it :(    Your butchering barn would be much nicer hahahaha

 

[mowin]

My dad taught us kids how to hunt and the proper way to care for our game. We used to cut up in our basement. Very minimal equipment, but we did OK.

We were lucky my cousin had a small barn/garage he was willing to sacrifice for our butcher shop. We've been butchering there for around 20 yrs now. We definatly have a nice setup. Every yr we get people asking us to process their deer, but we decline. We like to hunt, and that would cut into our time in the woods. If we know the person well enough, we will offer to show/help them, but 95% of the time they take their deer somewhere else. Lol.

All this talk about venison has made me hungry. Think some smoked x-sharp cheddar slices wrapped around venison pastrami will help. :grilling_smilie:

 

[tallbm]

That's most humans for ya :) They want it they just don't want to work for it lol.

Venison pastrami sounds awesome, each year I wish I could bring home like 3 more animals to make stuff like that but 7 is my freezer space limit. 

I'm getting hungry for some venison as well.  Here soon I'm going to make an attempt to smoke some Venison shanks and experiment with smoking them.  I saw an amazing post online about indirect grilling venison shanks at low temps and I could have eaten the pictures they looked so good!

http://www.theblackpeppercorn.com/2014/06/bbq-venison-shanks/

BBQ-Venison-Shanks-4.jpg

• tallbm
• Mar 8, 2017

I've been wanting to give it a shot in the smoker.  Maybe within a month or two I'll take a stab at it.

I figure I'll brine them for 24 hours to help keep them from drying out. 

I'll cook at 275F until an IT of about 208F as shanks MUST be fall off the bone so that all the connective tissue has broken down.

I'll apply pecan wood somke for about 3 hours of the cook.

After the smoke has died I figure I will wrap them in foil so they don't loose moisture and let them finish to 208F.

I'll pull them from the smoker and sauce them when I have them inside resting for about 20 minutes.

I'll serve or pull apart at that point.  If they look like the pic above I'll serve as is.  If they don't I'll pull apart into big chunks and serve.

Basically I'm treating the shanks like fall off the bone ribs.  The difference is with shanks you WANT them to fall off the bone because all of that connective tissue must melt away or you will have some very heavy undesirable and extra chewy tissue if it isn't broke down properly.

I also want to do the same some day with a whole 8-10 pound beef shank.  That would be a total dinosaur looking cut!

roasted-beef-shank-1024x768.jpg

• tallbm
• Mar 8, 2017

 

[crazzycajun]

No grinding backstrap:police2:

 

[tallbm]

No grinding backstrap:police2:

Hahaha I understand the sentiment.  I was very unsure and hesitant when I first did it.  Now I don't give it a second thought.

Feel free to give it a shot with a pound or 2 of small or ugly backstrap and see how you feel about it.  I think you will be pleasantly surprised  :)

 

[mowin]

There another member on here that for some ungodly reason thinks it's OK to grind backstrap into burger because they love VB.:police2:

I told him if we lived closer I'd gladly trade 2 lbs of burger for every pound of backstrap. :drool.

My thoughts, if you ONLY use the backstrap in the grind, you MIGHT be able to tell the difference. But when the shoulders, neck, scraps from the hinds from seperating the muscles, and the hocks, shanks are mixed into the relatively small percentage the backstraps add to the overall weight, your not going to notice a dam thing.

I know your my brother from another mother, but we're gonna have to disagree on this one. Lol.

I guarantee you, no backstrap of mine will ever see the throat of a grinder. :68:

 

[johnh12]

Great videos. Thanks for posting the links.

 

[tallbm]

There another member on here that for some ungodly reason thinks it's OK to grind backstrap into burger because they love VB.

I told him if we lived closer I'd gladly trade 2 lbs of burger for every pound of backstrap.

.

My thoughts, if you ONLY use the backstrap in the grind, you MIGHT be able to tell the difference. But when the shoulders, neck, scraps from the hinds from seperating the muscles, and the hocks, shanks are mixed into the relatively small percentage the backstraps add to the overall weight, your not going to notice a dam thing.

I know your my brother from another mother, but we're gonna have to disagree on this one. Lol.

I guarantee you, no backstrap of mine will ever see the throat of a grinder.

Yeah grinding backstrap only makes sense if you can keep it separate from the other meat.

Over the past couple of years I have been able to reduce my processing time 2-6 hours by giving my brother his portion of the meat from our hunt all as backstrap and tenderloins but he has to clean them, I don't do it.

When you process 5-7 animals by yourself (well about 90% solo) the time savings is huge!

So if it helps know that very little has gotten ground over the past 2 years and if I want some I can call him up and say "hey why don't you cook up some backstrap and I'll come over and watch the game." hahahahaha!

 
Great videos. Thanks for posting the links.

No problem John.  I found them super helpful and they gave me the confidence to begin processing my own animals.  It was the right way to go for me!

 

[mowin]

Yeah grinding backstrap only makes sense if you can keep it separate from the other meat.

Over the past couple of years I have been able to reduce my processing time 2-6 hours by giving my brother his portion of the meat from our hunt all as backstrap and tenderloins but he has to clean them, I don't do it.

When you process 5-7 animals by yourself (well about 90% solo) the time savings is huge!

So if it helps know that very little has gotten ground over the past 2 years and if I want some I can call him up and say "hey why don't you cook up some backstrap and I'll come over and watch the game." hahahahaha!

Oh I here you on the time savings. My nephew is allergic to deer fur. He can shoot the critter, but can't go near it untill it basically hits the fry pan.
My brother worked odd hrs, so it usually just me to process there deer as well as mine. Usually 10 -12 a season.

I used to cut the backstraps into madelions and package, but I now cut them into 6" lengths then package. Def saves time.

 

[tallbm]

Oh I here you on the time savings. My nephew is allergic to deer fur. He can shoot the critter, but can't go near it untill it basically hits the fry pan.
My brother worked odd hrs, so it usually just me to process there deer as well as mine. Usually 10 -12 a season.

I used to cut the backstraps into madelions and package, but I now cut them into 6" lengths then package. Def saves time.

Another huge time saver is simply buying 8x12 inch pre-made vac bags!  No spending hours making a 150 bags and sealing one end hahaha.

Every year I end up speeding things up a little more.  Last couple of years moving to a 10L/22 pound sausage stuffer and using pre-tubed natural hog castings was a big help!  

Now I'm just down to trying to figure out how I can stuff sausage alone but outside of 1 or 2 small ideas I'm going to try, an electric stuffer is all I can come up with for doing the volume I do each year :(

 

[mowin]

My neighbor has the Cabela's 20# stuffer w the motor. Hasn't used it yet, but he's planning on making a batch or two of SS soon. I'll let you know how it works.

 

[tallbm]

My neighbor has the Cabela's 20# stuffer w the motor. Hasn't used it yet, but he's planning on making a batch or two of SS soon. I'll let you know how it works.

Please feel free to share what he finds about it.  

For now I'm just going to try and keep enlisting people to help on sausage day.

One idea I had was to find a water valve wheel that would replace the stuffer crank handle.  This way I could pull on the wheel with one hand to push the meat through the tube while sitting down and feeding the sausage and casing with the other hand.  It would be slower going but at least it would be a 1 one man job.

I still have my 5 pound Lem stuffer that  i think I could use for a 1 man job BUT stuffing 100 pounds of sausage 4 pounds at a time would bake FOREVER lol.