Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire How does Wild Hog compare to domestic Pig meat wise

And there is your solution.

Here's a recipe of mine to try.Pecan smoked boneless wild boar ham.I used Morton's Tenderquick Curing Salt and let me tell you they came out awesome.I used 1/2 oz. per lb. of meat.Dissolved the salt cure in a cup of water,used an injection needle and injected the meat,this helps get the curing process started on the inside.I then put the meat in a large plastic bag and poured the cure solution on the meat.Make sure the meat gets mixed around good so the cure can go to work on the outside.I keep the meat iced down in the bags for 2-3 days,then I rinse the meat and let it soak for several hours in fresh water to help remove the excess salt.I repeat the fresh water rinse and soak three times and it's OK to let it soak overnight.I've found that soaking the meat three times gives me a light salt taste where soaking the meat twice will give you a fairly salty taste.So it's really a matter of how you like yours.When I get ready to smoke it,I take the meat out of the bags,run some butcher twine through the meat so I can hang it in the smoker,then sprinkle the outside of the meat with med. ground black pepper.I set my smoker temp at 130-140 degrees,hang the meat and smoke for two hours at this temp.After two hours I quit the smoke,but kick the temp up to around 160 degrees for two hours.Then after the two hours at 160 degrees,I kick the heat up to 180-185 degrees for around eight hours,depending on how thick your meat is(I use boneless meat around a couple of inches thick.What I do on the hindquarters is,break them down into the four large muscle groups).Anyway,just keep it at this temp till you reach your desired dryness.After your drying is complete,take meat out of the smoker and let it cool.Wrap the cooled meat in butcher paper and store in the refrigerator for a day or two if you have room,if not just go ahead and freeze what your not going to eat now.

As many have observed here, hogs can be either excellent table fare or absolutely terrible depending on all the factors mentioned, so I won't go over all of that again. I would only add that, assuming you've shot "tasty" versus "trophy," and field dressed/processed properly, I would almost always opt for a moist cooking method to prevent the lean meat from becoming dry or tough. I'm famous among my friends for my own "wine country boar roast" dinners. I won't give away ALL my secrets, but it involves slow cooking, completely submerged, in a crock pot... and served with a hearty, tangy gravy. (Think basic "hunter sauce" plus basalmic vinegar, white wine and herbs de provence in both the crock pot and sauce...) Get it right, and folks will be lining up at the door.

OK, one more trick for the roasts I mentioned above. Trim all fat and connective tissue the night before cooking. Coat in olive oil and hand rub chosen spices and quick-brown the roast in a skillet. Chill overnight in the fridge before crock-potting it the next day.

This thread is really making me question why I'm potentially paying almost 1k to go to TN and shoot something that I'm not going to eat when I can go to low country of SC and shoot all I want and donate to the locals.

I don't gnaw on them at all. Nasty bunch of eat everything in sight creatures.

BUT, they are fun too hunt!

'Cause it will be great fun aside from the hog huntin', I don't even hunt when I go to that one.

Yep, same here as they can really tear up a pasture of garden. Side's buzzards & worms need to eat too.

That's kind of where I am T. Just go, cook , drink, meet and watch you break down a 1911 in 5-10 seconds. Or so I heard!

Heh, heh, no big deal after ya been doing it for fifty or so years.

Story of my life.