Wet aging game meat

[chorizo]

Where I live Fed manure means nothing

Mine varies from yours for Shure. 40 plus years has not changed old NH much at all.

Maybe if the Feds started enforcing their rules on New Hampshire as they do everyone else, then the residents would vote out the idiotic liberal Senators and congressman from NH that help make and enable those rules that are jammed down everyone else's throats.

 

[Billy Boy]

I am posting this here as it seems the most appropriate place to get the most circulation among people who will be harvesting game.

I have been processing meat, (lamb, beef, pig) both on the ranch and working in packing houses. I have also processed game meat, mostly my own, for over 50 years. We used to "dry age" our meat in walk-ins, but having moved out of the livestock business, I no longer had a walk-in available to me. Used to keep a spare fridge for it, but again, really not big enough for a good size deer and definitely not an elk. Commercially about 8-10 years ago "cry" packs (short for cryogenic) for large cuts of meat came onto the market. A few years back, "wet aging" came into vogue with the ready availability of consumer vacuum sealers.

I have been using it for several years and as long as you keep your meat clean and debris free, it works extremely well. On my latest elk kill, I packaged my meat and made lots of steaks out of the hind quarters and they now have 18 days of wet aging on them. I cooked one at 9 days and another today (18 days) and the difference in tenderness is notable.

It still requires a spare fridge maintained at ideally 34-36 degrees.

I will freeze the loin roasts and steaks at 21 days as they are inherently more tender by nature, let the hindquarter steaks go to 25 days then freeze them.

Here is the process as described by the "Meateater" bunch.

How to Wet Age Meat | MeatEater Wild Foods
How to Wet Age MeatView attachment 166473

I’m letting mine age in the hide another year. Hope to get a shot at him this year…

 

[chorizo]

I’m letting mine age in the hide another year. Hope to get a shot at him this year…

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA....the prior two years I did the same....I was letting her grow up some.

I was forced to eat tag sandwiches.

 

[nhmoose]

Maybe if the Feds started enforcing their rules on New Hampshire as they do everyone else, then the residents would vote out the idiotic liberal Senators and congressman from NH that help make and enable those rules that are jammed down everyone else's throats.

Moved in liberal MAholes voted them in. We who have lived here sure didn't we hate them more than you do.

 

[chorizo]

Last update on wet aging elk leg steaks. Today is day 24. I let it go a few more days than normal to see if there was any difference. I had an elk leg steak for dinner. It was exceptionally tender. Flavor was good...no metallic taste normally associated will "fresh" 7 day aged meat. Notable difference between the last sampling of a week ago and today. I think the magic number for leg steaks is around the 24/25 day mark.

All the meat moved to the freezer. Now if fall and a freeze will hold off, I have a few more tomatoes that may make!

 

[chorizo]

I had elk ribs for dinner tonight...5 hours in slow cooker on high with dry rub, 20 minutes slow cooking on BBQ with hickory chips and thne another 5 with a coat of BBQ sauce.

Very tasty BUT still tough and stringy....HAHAHAHA didn't help the ribs much to age 21 days. That meat should have gone into the grinder!

 

[DuncNZ]

Do not wash meat , water can carry all sorts of contaminants . If you gut your kill carefully and correctly you won't have any fecal contamination to deal with , if you do just cut it off and dispose of it , dog food . Washing will spread fecal contamination rather than removing it .

 

[chorizo]

Do not wash meat , water can carry all sorts of contaminants . If you gut your kill carefully and correctly you won't have any fecal contamination to deal with , if you do just cut it off and dispose of it , dog food . Washing will spread fecal contamination rather than removing it .

First, there was no fecal contamination, but there was hair, leaves, grasses and some dirt. Killing large game with several hundred pounds of meat miles from a road, packing it out and field dressing will get foreign material on it. I will wash them off, as I have always done. Washing is done extensively at packing houses.

You may do as you please, but after over 50 plus years of experience in the meat industry, I am washing mine.

 

[DuncNZ]

Watch this , you may be interested .

 

[appalichian hunter]

First, there was no fecal contamination, but there was hair, leaves, grasses and some dirt. Killing large game with several hundred pounds of meat miles from a road, packing it out and field dressing will get foreign material on it. I will wash them off, as I have always done. Washing is done extensively at packing houses.

You may do as you please, but after over 50 plus years of experience in the meat industry, I am washing mine.

Yep, I always wash down deer after skinning with very cold water then hang to cool, let hang 4-5 days max, never worried about all the aging stuff, if I want aged meat I will buy beef from my local butcher.

 

[chorizo]

About the size of a german shepard or a small whitetail, not even the size of a red stag and certainly not an elk size. I have hunted Red Stag in Spain and they aren't close to an elk, they are weight size about the same as a large mule deer, except for the largest and most mature stags.

I have packed out CA coastal blacktail deer and whitetail deer using that method, but with the guts removed. You wouldn't even get Arnold to pack out an elk with that method. But thanks for the video.

As many of the deer here in the drier less humid zones can be covered with ticks, to avoid being covered with them and risk Rocky Mountain Spotted fever (and since I absolutely LOATH ticks and leeches) I peel the hide and piece them out to haul out.

As for aging, again each to their own and everyone's mileage will vary. I will age mine just as I have described in this video.

 

[Mad Professor]

Moved in liberal MAholes voted them in. We who have lived here sure didn't we hate them more than you do.

mASSholes tend to be from "Basstun" area and not in the hilltowns and western rural areas.

Same stuff happens everywhere, when the dirty birds soil their own nests, they don't clean up just move to make another chicken coop.

 

[Mad Professor]

As far as aging, if you are not going to freeze , I find an acidic marinade works good. Soy mixed with Worstershire (sp?) sauce. Will keep a long time in frig and tenderizes the meat.

 

[DuncNZ]

About the size of a german shepard or a small whitetail, not even the size of a red stag and certainly not an elk size. I have hunted Red Stag in Spain and they aren't close to an elk, they are weight size about the same as a large mule deer, except for the largest and most mature stags.

I have packed out blacktail deer and whitetail deer using that method, but with the guts removed. You wouldn't even get Arnold to pack out an elk with that method. But thanks for the video.

As for aging, again each to their own and everyone's mileage will vary. I will age mine just as I have described in this video.

A good New Zealand Red Stag will weigh 400 lbs or so , A Fallow Buck up to 190 lbs A Sika Stag 180 lbs .Here in NZ all the different deer species with the exception of whitetail are larger in both body and antler than their ancestors , The Wapiti we have here are now cross bred with Red's and are now a different animal to their US ancestors . Most of my hunting trips have lasted a week or more . Keeping venison from going off in the field for several days in the summer means hanging it in cool shade in a fly proof bag and I can assure you any wet/washed meat will be green before you know it .

 

[Kappa]

In hot weather, early archery, youth firearm etc we skin, scrape, rinse and trim any obviously fowled meat, quarter legs, remove loins and ribs. Then stick in ice to cool rapidly then have a chest freezer with a manual thermostat so it acts as a cooler. We hang for 10 days or so. Not a problem with rancid meat. In cool weather we just cover and hang in the barn.

 

[Kappa]

I forgot one thing, insta pots make ribs very tender in like 20-30 minutes and render off much of the chalky fat from whitetail deer

 

[chorizo]

That is definitely bigger than the European strain. The video of packing the "gamo" (that is what they are called in Spain don't know what they are called in English) looks about the size of a medium to small CA coastal blacktail.

The 3 year old elk cow I killed that is the subject of this thread yielded just shy of 250 lbs of packaged meat. 124 lbs of hamburger grind (I added another 50 lbs of porkbelly and bacon ends and pieces on top of the 124lbs for about a 90% hamburger mix) and another 118 of steaks, roasts ribs and shanks. The only bones were shank and ribs. Given a 50 % yield (which is way high.. More like 40 %) she weighed at least 500 lbs. She was still not fully mature.

This article just popped up. Timely.

How to Wet Age Venison - Petersen's Bowhunting
https://www.bowhuntingmag.com/editorial/how-to-wet-age-venison/465385

 

[Tenring]

I wash then let cool cut what I like then wrap date and freeze.

 

[chorizo]

For all you traditional ML bird hunters: You can also age game birds...Europeans tend to age their fowl several days BEFORE gutting and skinning.

https://magazine.outdoornebraska.gov/2014/01/hanging-pheasants-wild-fowl/
https://projectupland.com/wild-game-recipes/how-and-why-you-should-age-your-upland-birds/

 

[Buckskinn]

I'm going to try the wet aging process as described this year. I generally hang for up to 2 weeks if temps allow and then butcher and vac pack, if I remember ahead of time, I let thaw in fridge and sit for a week or so to age more. I've also had good luck with the dry aging bags, although I've frozen first and then dry aged ahead of eating. What you said about aging prior to freezing makes sense...

https://dryagingbags.com/