The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Pigs => Topic started by: Simon O on October 11, 2012, 09:33:32 pm
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First lot of pork butchered on Sunday. 2 X 7 month old OSBs 66 and 62 kg deadweight - strangely the smaller of the 2 with with the thicker fat layer - it was not so long as the other. Estimated lean percentage from Wishaw abattoir was 69.13% and 69.72% (this seems to me surprisingly high and I wonder what thier method of estimation is - I thought usually it was around 60%) and they were called category G (no idea what this means and cannot find info on google - :idea: I suppose I could give them a phone). About 2 weeks before slaughter estimated weight by string method was around 160lb = 72 kg so this looks as if it underestimated the weight.
Photos of the pork:
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Looks good. Who did your butchering etc?
Beth
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By golly that looks good to me... :trophy: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :trophy: :pig: :pig: :pig:
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A friend who is a butcher in Glasgow did the butchering and showed me what to do. I tried a bit of sausage knitting (causing plenty of holes in the skins in the process) but otherwise stuck to weighing bagging up and labelling. He does not usually do private kills and hardly charged me anything so it would not seem fair for me to keep getting him to do it. It was a good day and I got lots of interesting info from him.
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Looks very good to me :love: well done you :thumbsup:
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Looks lovely to me , hope you enjoy it :thumbsup:
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Looks great :thumbsup: You'll never want shop-bought pork again :yum:
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Hi Simon :wave: . The pork looks lovely - not too fatty but enough to taste good :pig: :pig: Well done with your first pigs :thumbsup:
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That looks lovely!
I'm afraid mine will have a little too much fat on it at the moment. Your's looks perfect!!
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Looks good Simon :thumbsup: How does it taste ? :yum:
Are Wishaw leaving the skin on the carcasses now ? (or are my eyes needing tested :D) When I took my first pigs there they came back skinned :-\ but that could have been me not asking for the right thing :innocent:
Karen :wave:
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Yes shaved and cleaned (I think they called that 'plotted' ??- dipped in hot water), skin on, head on, tongue out, kept the offal for me (abattoir cost £19 a pig)- kept the pigs for 6 days and I arranged with Duff the wholesale butchers based at the abattoir to transport them (£10 a pig - my butcher felt this was a bit of a rip-off as he was delivering anyway) to my butcher in Glasgow, who kept them till we did the butchering the following Sunday, so they had hung 10 days. The private kill pigs are on a Thursday morning - not sure if this was always the case.
Butcher said the meat was firm compared to the usual commercial pigs he gets. Incidentally he said he buys his wholesale pigs for the same price as I reckon it took for me to buy the weaners and feed till killed - £160.
The plain sausages taste great - but they really just taste like my butcher's own sausages which I like anyway and he has fairly strongly spiced; I've not tried the herb and pork ones yet. We had a shoulder joint the other night and it roasted great with crunchy but soft (if you know what I mean) crackling, very tender meat. Too late we found the friend we were having to dinner does not really like pork! But she was converted; she thought it tasted more like lamb and I can see why she thought this. It was quite fine-grained and carved quite like lamb. I thought the meat had a sweet taste to it, so the edge bits were a bit like caramelised. Very tasty with bramley apple sauce. Good as cold with salad yesterday. Looking forward to the last of it in sandwiches at lunchtime today.
You are right Sally I never want shop bought again.
Sorry you can see I am a bit obsessed with my pork.
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Looks fab - well done! :thumbsup:
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looks great well done you :thumbsup:
Enjoy :yum:
Mandy :pig:
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Looks great to me :thumbsup:
Sally
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Simon, your descriptions are vivid - I can see, smell and taste your pork and it's fantastic! :yum: :D
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Simon, your descriptions are vivid - I can see, smell and taste your pork and it's fantastic! :yum: :D
Yeah ;D Me too (and I've just had lunch !) :yum:
You should be proud though - it's great looking pork :thumbsup:
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Brilliant job Simon! You've come away with far more information and knowledge than we did with our first pigs :P
The weights are pretty much spot on what we would expect at that age...we'll be keeping their siblings for another couple of months to a deadweight of around 80-85kg.
So when will you be wanting some more weaners? ;)
Enjoy!!!
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Thanks Gillian they are great, next 2 waiting to go mid-Nov (see fb for picture of them sunbathing!). Fed with feed from East Coast Viners, who delivered a ton free delivery and this has just about done the 4 of them, initially grower then finisher to max of 4lb per pig per day.By the way Category G at Wishaw just means gilt. They do not do fat thickness as they 'do not have the facilities'. The abattoir staff were very helpful and the girls on reception/email there have been great at finding things out for me. Not sure when I'll be getting more weaners - their paddock is pretty muddy and will be glad to get a rest over the winter months at least
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Glad you've found out so much. Personally I'm slightly disappointed, as I was thinking I could steal a shot of your butcher, but as it was a friend I guess not!
Enjoy all that pork!
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I will ask and see if he is at all interested in doing more private kills but I am doubtful as he already works 7 days a week, nearly every week of the year!