Saw wild oinkers at the farm twice this weekend. 7 or 8 right at dusk on Friday and 21 (several sows and boars and a bunch of piglets) trotting across the back of the Domain pasture in broad daylight Sunday morning.

This is getting to be a real problem....

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Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

Now if you have some deer you would have a few sows and bucks! A few thous-and-bucks Get it? Heh... someone send me back to fifth grade.

I'd start the fire going in your pit if I were you and invite a bunch of people over for some beer and boar.

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You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows - Robert A. Zimmerman

Good pun!

Catch the youngsters for some cochon de lait?

Those boars were definitely 'evil encarnate'...eeek!

I really want to pop a couple of the smaller ones every now and then for the pantry but, right now, I don't have a clue about what to do after you pull the trigger. One of these days I'll get some instruction...

Probably next weekend we're going to build a big trap. My neighbor to the north is in contact with a hunting ranch that's not too far away and they'll come get every pig you can trap.

sows and bucks...nice.

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Never a dull moment at Berry Hill Farm.

It's pretty much the wrong time of year to shoot swine. Parasites increase during the warm months and swine share many of their parasites and diseases with humans. So if you shoot one, even a baby, wear surgical gloves when dressing the animal if you have any wounds.

Here's what we used to do when we killed a hog. Several people worked on different parts of the process all at pretty much the same time after the first step.

Dig a deep hole wide and long enough to accommodate the animal you killed. If the swine you killed is an old wild boar, put that sucker into the hole and cover it up. You're done.

If the swine is a young boar, a sow of any age or any suckling pig, proceed.

Start a large fire using dry hardwood down in the pit. lay a couple of steel pipes across the hole and a sheet of expanded steel decking across that, unless you hate some sort of grate. Another good grate is a sizing grill thing 9whatever they call it) from a hydraulic dredge.... Put a large pot of water less than half full on the grate to heat covered. Put the usual spice suspects in the water: peppers, salt, garlic, rosemary. Maybe celery or whatever else you like. Go back to the pig.

Separetly from the above, boil a large volume of water. Gallons of water. Hoist the pig off the ground. Dip BOILING water with a large scoop and carefully pour the water hot onto the hog. Pour repeatedly over the whole animal. Scrape the skin to remove the hair and outter layer of skin. Everybody helps with this part. Get it done quickly but as thoroughly as possible as nobody really likes hairy cracklings. Do the head, too. Inside the ears, everywhere.

If the pig is a suckling (say, 20#-40#), wait for the fire to die down to coals only, no flame. Cut the pigs ribs along the inside of the cavity and spread the cavity wide with a stout couple of pieces of green wood. Rub that pig with coarse salt, cayenne, and rosemary and lay the pig on the grate

If the pig is large and you're going to make sausage with the pig you shot the old fashioned way, then you're in for a real treat.

Open the pin's cavity catching the offal in a large washtub. Separate the meaty internal organs (heart, kidneys, liver), clean and rinse in cold water and refrigerate quickly.

Separate the small intenstines and dump them in a tub of cold water. Turn the small intestives inside-out and gently scrape and rinse them as you trail them into another tub. Try not to let anything get into the second tub, but it will and you'll rinse and scrape that pile of intestine a couple more times.

Remove the skin together with the underlying fat and small amount of muscle tissue (it's the muscle that moves the skin, not the denser muscle for moving limbs and such). Cut the skin and fat into 1-2 inch squares (cubes with fat & muscle attached) and rinse the cracklings. Cooking cracklings is an art form so I'll leave that to a knowledgeable person.

Cut the carcass starting low down at the joints and take the joints to a separate table for processing into the familiar cuts. The tougher meat (lower leg joints, for example) maybe ground and used to make sausage patties or as part o fthe mix for stuffing the 'casings' (those cleaned intestines).

You know what to do with the ribs. That's why you started that fire. Other meaty parts as you may wish.

Rinse the head thoroughly and with a saw, remove the top of the skull and scoop the brain our and cut it into chunks and put it and the whole head into that large pot of water that you left on the grill, boiling with all those spices. You're making "head cheese." Cook it down until the meat and everything is falling from the bone. Cut the meat (skin the tongue and then cut the meat) into very small pieces Cook some more. Add more spices if you like spicey head cheese.

IIRC, the hogs head cheese is ready to pour into forms when it is thickened to a syrupy-lumpy consisntency. Refrigerate.

Just as a note, we put all of the meat into a chiller for a couple of days (I think that's right) before wrapping and freezing the meat. This allows the meat to begin the process of autolysis--the meat essentially begins to self-decompose (without aid of bacteria, etc) just by the breakdown of cellular membranes that release enzymes into the tissue.


C'est bon!

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...Tracy

'00 ML320 "Casper"
'92 400E "Stella"

R Leo- off the swine and wine path but did you get your tractor running yet?