August 16, 2006
Blogging You Into Vegetarianism One Photo At A Time
As others around the blogosphere wax nostalgic about the arrival of fall and how it elicits fond, back-to-school memories, we here at Little House on the Outpost look forward to the end of summer for a different reason: butchering time.
Our local traveling meat carver arrived this afternoon to dispatch The Outpost pigs to the great smokehouse in the sky. Denny is our butcher, and I owe him a heartfelt thanks for allowing me to pester him with questions while he worked.
Here are the pigs having their final meal while Denny loads the rifle:
Denny went in the pen shortly after this photo and asked for volunteers. I felt a small tinge of sorrow as they ran up to him, looking for food. But after Denny nailed the closest one and slit its throat...the other pigs gathered round their fallen comrade and lapped up blood like Michael Moore in a frosting factory. Sick bastards. Kill 'em, Denny, kill 'em all.
Denny got to work. After dragging the dead hog out of the pen, he cuts the skin away from the rear legs so he can hook the carcass to the truck. And he rapidly goes from this:
to this:
to this:
to this:
to this:
Denny was kind enough to let me try the meat saw. I wasn't very proficient, but he assured me it doesn't take long to get the hang of it. He also has a chainsaw in case his rotator cuff is giving him trouble.
Since this was the last job of the day, Denny also spared a little time to educate me on pig anatomy. I got an up close and personal look at most of the internal organs. The liver and heart he saves, the rest goes into the barrel o' guts that is sent to the rendering plant.
Would you like to see the barrel? Thought you'd never ask.
The barrel also gets the skin, head, and hooves. Like this one:
I never got a decent shot of the head with the hide attached, but I have a cute one where the snout is sticking out from beneath a rumpled pile of skin. Maybe I'll save that one for tomorrow.
And speaking of tomorrow, it's almost here. Time for bed.
One last note for those of you feeling sorry for the pigs. You're probably the same kind of people who believe in karma, so you will feel very self-righteous when you learn I stepped in pig excrement while I was opening and shutting the gate to the pen and didn't realize it until I was on my way to my soccer game. Sixty miles in the car with the windows down and the air-conditioning on full force and I still almost threw my shoes out onto the highway.
The ride home was just as wretched. But when the bacon arrives in a couple of weeks, I'll have forgotten all about it.
Mmmmmm. Bacon.
Posted by Cathy at August 16, 2006 11:25 PMYeah. We did our own butchering one year on the Farm, made head cheese and soap as well as chops and sausage. Grandpa decided it wasn't as much fun as he remembered it and trucked the hogs and cattle to the local slaughterhouse from then on. Still did deer in the backyard though, as well as rabbits, quail and pheasants.
Grandma never bothered with a knife for her chickens, just snapped their heads off with a flick of her wrist. Creeped me out, I did not have a problem with killing with a gun or knife, but...
JD
I like bacon. And pork chops. I guess I just wouldn't look 'em in the eye before. Karma is a bitch and you paid your price. Enjoy!
Posted by: CrazyRideLady at August 17, 2006 10:45 AMI think I'm gonna puke.
Not that I don't like bacon, or anything...
Posted by: Mall Diva at August 17, 2006 11:27 AMGreetings Cathy; this is kingdavid from The Far Wright; I just read your nice greeting on one of my posts, and came over to yours to say hi back. I've been following yours for awhile, but never commented until now, since I recently became a full-fledged member of the MOB. I love this, you should be put in the hall of fame on the PETA site, not the nutcase PETAns, but the People Eating Tasty Animals site. Hopefully we'll stay in touch.
Posted by: kingdavid at August 17, 2006 12:02 PMMerciful Gott im Himmel...
ok, enough of that. Let's smoke them chops!
Posted by: Jeff at August 17, 2006 12:21 PMMmmmm...bacon. I like bacon wrapped in ... more bacon. Not that I'd want to look it in the eye, first, but then I think it's gross looking a potato in the eye.
Also, aren't you supposed to scald the hair off their hides after the bleeding but before the eviscerating?
Posted by: Night Writer at August 17, 2006 03:17 PMYou know, looking at the picture of Denny, I would have envisioned him being a little more buff than he is. You would think manhandling a couple of hundred pounds of hog and hanging them on the hooks like that would put a little more beef (or bacon) on his frame. It's gotta be a little more strenuous than a Jane Fonda workout.
Posted by: kingdavid at August 17, 2006 03:26 PMCathy, that was awesome! I think I'll show my kids when they get home from school.
Posted by: Joan at August 18, 2006 10:29 AMwhy did you feed them first? Is that some kind of butchering ritual, like the last meal of the condemned? Then your barrel o' guts has so much more ...gut stuff.
Sweet!!! Can I attend the next one!??!
I've gutted my deer but we always have someone butcher them for us. I've been meaning to do it myself one of these years. I can't imagine a pig is all that different, so I'd love to see how a pro does it.
It is kinda fun though. Actually took a date to the Body Worlds exhibit at the Science Museum. Was pointing out a couple things to her on one of them. She asks how I knew that much about anatomy. Felt kind of weird pointing out that deer anatomy isn't all that different in size or layout from a human.
Posted by: Kevin at August 19, 2006 01:30 AMI, too, went to see Body Worlds. (You took a *date*, Kevin?? Daring.)
Anyway, after seeing that exhibit, I have a question, if mammal anatomy is roughly the same.
I wonder if in pigs the, uh, male gonads attach up around the neck, as they do in humans.
Posted by: Jeff at August 22, 2006 12:11 PM