[Rebecca]

I have just applied for my CPh number and I'm starting to turn the dream of keeping pigs in to reality! I understand that you keep the pigs till different ages for pork or bacon, so is all the pig used to make bacon? Which group do you get ham from?
Thanks

[bloomer]

i don't keep pigs except by proxy (i buy direct from happyhippy on here)


my family like sausages bacon ham/gammons far more than roast pork, so the pig she is keeping for me currently is being run on an extra month or so after a porker to hopefully get a bigger eye in the back bacon...


Am very excited as piggy is getting big and will be in my freezer soon...

[hughesy]

Get yourself on google and search for pork cuts a good place to start would be the BPEX website. Basically ham and/or gammon comes from the leg, bacon from the loin (or streaky bacon from the belly). Each part of a pig can be used for a number of different things, for instance the loin could be bacon, pork chops, boneless steaks or good roasting joints. Regarding weight or size of finished pigs 70kg liveweight is considered a porker and maybe 100kg a baconer but there aren't any hard rules on this.
Try here http://www.lovepork.co.uk/prime-cuts

[Dan]

You might find our Pig articles helpful.

Start here:

http://www.accidentalsmallholder.net/livestock/pigs/

And there's a page about butchering and cuts here:

http://www.accidentalsmallholder.net/livestock/pigs/butchering-pigs/

And if you want to have a go at making your own bacon:

http://www.accidentalsmallholder.net/food/food-processing/making-bacon/

HTH. 

Dan

[VSS]

In theory you can cure any of the meat as if it was bacon. You just need to adjust the length of time need for it to take up the cure on how thick the piece of meat is.

So long as you don't mind if it can't be cut into rashers - it will be fine for cooking etc.

[Tamsaddle]

The best bits for bacon are all of the loin (back) and belly (streaky).   The leg makes excellent ham, either wet brined for turning into a gammon, or dry cured for turning into a parma ham, because the red meat area is large with a thin strip of fat around the perimeter.  You can make bacon out of the shoulder, but it looks very uneven and blobby in terms of meat and fat, so that might be better used for two delicious slow roasting joints.   The hand and spring could be roasted, or more commonly, is used for sausage meat.    Tamsaddle

[FiB]

In theory you can cure any of the meat as if it was bacon. You just need to adjust the length of time need for it to take up the cure on how thick the piece of meat is.

So long as you don't mind if it can't be cut into rashers - it will be fine for cooking etc.

interesting thanks - I always wondered if it was just shape, or a difference in taste/texture.  We had way too little bacon and way too much pork (we have about 10 joints left and I can hardly face them after a year of roast pork at the weekends!) so I will be stretching the bacon boudary next time.  We have been delving into sweet ad sour and tagines etc recently, but I am just fed up of pork! 

[Rosemary]

We have the whole of the back and almost all the belly made into bacon. We have the legs cut for a few joints and we have huge amounts of sausages made. With lamb, beef and poultry also in the freezer, even though we have a roast dinner every Sunday, we only need 13 joints of each (in theory). We're not big eaters of pork chops, steaks, dice etc so sausages and bacon are best for us.

[MAK]

I can see why you ask about using more the animal for bacon and ham. The temptation is to go for roasting joints but like others we found we had too many. We did defrost some joints and cured them into hams that we then cooked and sliced.
This year I have cut far fewer chops and we have made twice as much bacon, 3 full leg hams and 4 different sausages plus rosette ( salami).  We also diced and sliced more bits - such as the tenderloin for more complex dishes rather than a chunk to roast or fry.

[SallyintNorth]

We're bigger fans of bacon / gammon than pork, too, so last pig got grown on to 100kg+ and butcher's instructions were:

• bellies whole for me to stuff and roll (this is my fave pork joint, and BH isn't a fan of streaky bacon)
• a few small joints from the legs and everything else that could be cured, cured
• anything else, sausagemeat

We've just about polished off all the 'normal' back bacon from one side and all the 'collar' bacon, and are a good way through the oddly-shaped and -looking shoulder bacon.  I've a whole side wrapped in muslin - must get a good knife as we'll be wanting to get stuck into that in a few weeks.

The sausagemeat gets used for stuffing - the family raved about the stuffing in the Christmas turkey  - and meatballs / sausageburgers etc.  (I was expecting one of the other pigs to be sausages, hence didn't need any from the bacon pig.)

I had 6 small rolled leg joints, which was just about the right number.  A few to give away, a few to have ourselves (we like roast pork, just not too often.)

Personally I think the slow-roast shoulder idea reads better than it tastes and isn't a patch on slow-roast stuffed belly.  Having had it done 'my' way round I will definitely do the same again; the 'shoulder bacon' isn't pretty but it tastes just grand, and slow-roast stuffed belly knocks slow-roast shoulder, and.streaky bacon, into a cocked hat. 

And the only other thing to say is - it's your pig, you have it butchered how you want it!   

[Tudful Tamworths]

Can I just add one thing? If you have some spare joints in the freezer, try home-curing. Buy a ready-made cure from www.sausagemaking.org or Weschenfelder, etc and have a go. You can always add your own extra bits and pieces to tailor the flavour once you have got the hang of curing.
I often cure the odd spare shoulder joint. The bone comes out quite easily, leaving two roughly triangular bits of meat to cure, but no rind. Works really well.

[kja]

once or twice a year we send a whole pig for bacon the additional cost on top of slaughter is just £96 this covers the curing,smoking if required, netting the joints, slicing and vac packing in half kilo packs. imo well worth the money.

shoulder joints
leg joints
collar bacon
back bacon
streaky
bacon
tender loins (come back frozen)
offal (comes back frozen)
bacon trimmings (ideal for baking)

[Tamsaddle]

Wish our abattoir offered this service too, sounds a very good deal to me.   Particularly for the slicing and vac packing, the two jobs I hate doing the most, takes us ages as we don't have the most high powered slicer or vac-packer, and would be brilliant for anyone who doesn't possess a slicer at all.   Will look around and see if I can find something similar.   Incidentally, where are you located?   Tamsaddle

[kja]

hi we are in cambridgeshire

i also do some home cure but at that price i have a 101 other jobs that i can be getting on with.

[MAK]

Yes = that price sounds good to what others pay and when you proportion out the cost to all the finished products you have it is less significant. I agree that for those with a large set up or simply little time then let someone else do it for that price. But if you have time and just do a couple of pigs a year it is worth having a go. We have no paid work but plenty of time so I do not mind trying my hand at curing etc. Finished cutting all the bacon yesterday and celebrated with bacon and duck eggs --mmm