Deer Dec. 18

Not trying to trump Sara's "Santa Came" Entry...been meaning to post this for the past week or so but kept putting it off. Shot a small deer Sat. Dec. 18, around 10 am, on Salt Fork Wildlife Area. Stayed at a camp adjacent to state property - cabin is owned by one of my buddy's buddy. Won't mention name here, but I'm grateful for his warm hospitality. It was an enjoyable trip.

A predicted 5-F overnight temp necessitated that we process the deer, at least partially, Saturday evening otherwise the meat would have frozen solid on the carcass overnight. I decided last year that I needed to learn to process deer myself to really make harvesting a deer economically superior over store meat prices. We decided to de-bone the meat that evening, bag it in freezer zip-lok bags, ans store in a cooler to prevent freezing and keep a constant (more-or-less) temp. Sara, Kenny, and I then trimmed, ground, and packaged the meat Tuesday evening in our kitchen - thanks for loaning the grinder Kenny!

Some might find these pics a bit squeamish, but if you think the meat you eat 'comes' from the grocery store cooler or freezer, think again. Hope you find it interesting. First step is skinning the deer. Notice the thickness of the hide and the thick layer of fat between the hide and meat - ready for winter!

Next, you cut the major muscle groups off the bone. This is easiest when it is hanging whole, not quartered. Here I'm cutting out the back-straps, or tenderloin. This is the same piece of meat as a pork tenderloin. These make steak medallions as tender as beef fillet-Mignon.

Ahh...the end product that night at camp. Only a small amount of this was actually my deer that evening. The rest was mostly moose.