Butchering a Hog
 

When butchering a hog, do you leave the fat on or remove it as you would on a whitetail? Can you remove unwanted fat and add it to your trimmings to make sausage or do you have to buy it from a store from farmed pigs? Thanks in advance.

I guess you could save the fat. I don't grind my hogs so I trim as much of the fat off as I can.

I've made sausage once, combining some feral hog and venison. It turned out okay, but not really all that special. So, I haven't made any in the past couple of years. I trim off as much fat as I can from the hogs, and only grind the meat if it's too tough for other use.

Having said that, even a boar the size of the one SWT recently shot makes good ground meat. I usually cook it in something that has a sauce, like spaghetti, but I've also used the meat to make hamburgers which I grilled, and they were quite good.

Yeah, that big boy was really tough. Like rubber.

Do you grind anything in to your hog meat? Like spices?

That's why I only harvest pigs under a hundred pounds. Those are great for the pit, or quarter them up for smaller bar-b-que's. I leave the large pigs for my buddy Rowel..

IMO, the fat (what little there is) seems to contain more of the 'gamey' punch. So I trim most of it off. Escpecially on the chops. After smoking them, the fat is like a bicycle tire.

I agree!:cool2:

Most wild game fat will have flavor of whatever the critter has eaten,so it all comes off for me! As far as size of hog...large hog BANG deadflop,small pig,same result! I want as much fat and sinue and membrane out of my wild meat as possible.I have heard of folks adding store bought fat when grinding and maybe a small amount of domestic meat.