RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

DO NOT wash your deer with water after field dressing! This may promote bacteria growth. Take your time during gutting and take everything from the throat to the anus out. I like to take the hide off and slip a game bag over it while the carcass is still warm. Prop chest cavity open and cool down as soon as possible and let hang for 5-6 days if weather is below 40 degrees

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

After skining I have quartered some and put in a spare fridge, a cooler with ice will work, just don't let the meat sit in the blood water. I like the tub idea. Makes for easy clean-up.:)

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

KYDeerHunter03,

Have you thought about building a small shed? I always cut the deer up and soakit in the tub with vinegar and waterfor a few hours before I freeze it. I always eat it the next day and its very tender. Could be a Louisiana thing.

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

If you hunt them with a knife then you are halfway to the pit. Just keep them coals hot and ready. Tenders and backstraps don't get better then when someone is cooking next to the cleaning shed while your braking down the rest of the deer. Heck, you might even get someone to feed youwhile your hands are dirty. Kind of like cooking fish while some else is catching them. Doesn't get any fresher.

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

I bone mine out the day of the kill and sometimes have some that evening, since it doesn't go through rictus it's always been fairly tender. Freezing overnight will usually break down the tissues fairly well too, three months sounds a bit long though, the ice crystals that form in the cells break them down as soon as the meat freezes.

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

Deer meat can be eaten immediately after kill. But two butchers/meat inspectors taught me how to process deer. Skinkill as soon as possible. Weather permitting, let kill set up overnight. Do not age deer unless you can controll the temp at just above freezing. I use propane torch to get rid of stray hair. Bone the kill --- without cutting bones. Marrow is very fatty and spoils, even in freezer, when spread over meat with saw. Shrink-wrap, packaging according how it will be used: sausage trimmings, jerky, chops, etc. Freeze. Don't overcook wild meat (bear excepted, which can carry trichanosis like pork) medium rare steaks. Prolonged cooking just makes it tougher.

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

When you say backtraps are you refuring to the ribs.

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

No. Backstraps, or tenderloins as they are called around here, are two long but narrow sections of meat found on either side of the backbone that extend from the pelvis to almost the neck. Usually the premium meat on any animal (filet mignon on a cow:D)

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

Of course you can eat it immediately after the kill. Do it quick enough and you don't have to heat it up...it is already steaming hot and juicy. Mmmmm fresh venison over a gut pile.:D:D:D

RE: How soon can you eat deer meat?
 

There is no need to wait any time at all. I often eat it the same day as its killed.