Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Butchering/Slaughtering Hogs-More questions

Couple years ago I asked for advice on this and got good advice, and ended up having the deal fall through. This April we're getting 10-15 guys together and going to slaughter/butcher a hog and make cracklins, carnitas, tripas/tripitas, ribs, chorizo etc. All day event.

I'm good with killing/bleeding. My next questions are:

1. Scraping. I have a 55 gal drum. Build fire around-check. Do we dunk the hog or just heat the water and pour it on?

2. Preparing the skin. Once we scrape the hair off, we gut and skin like normal? Is the skin then ready to cut and make cracklins with? Do I need to skin it a special way or is there a good fat layer built into the skin?

3. Weight. What is the smallest sized hog that will yield enough fat to make good cracklins and have enough to grind into excess meat for chorizo etc? Figuring we don't need a large hog to feed 15 people for a day/next morning although we do want the fatty parts to be good so my thought was a 180-225lb hog and just butcher/freeze a large portion of it but to cut cost if a 150lb pig will be adequate then we'll just go that route.

4. Are there parts of the hog where the skin is better for eating?

Thanks in advance.

Dunk the hog and water must be scalding hot....but don't let it cook the hog. A hog scraper is handy.

I never made cracklins and will leave that for others.

You're OK on hog weight.

Dennis, you lost me at scraping and then skinning. Never seen that done. As a kid we would set the barrel in at an angle probably near 45 deg. but could have been steeper. Dunk one end for a few minutes and then pull out and dunk the other end. You will lose lots of your water and should have extra. We had an old wash pot for that. Do you have a bell scraper or just be using knives? A bell scraper works great. To hot will set the hair, so as you are dunking, pull on the hair to see if it is coming loose or needs more time. Around the feet and ankles are harder to free up hair, so that is a good place to test. Cracklings were made from fat trimmings as lard was rendered, not just from the skin. As soon as you gut the hog, you can pull up from the bottom the kidney fat and more along the back bone known as leaf lard. Easier to do right after gutting. Not sure what else your are planning as we always cured the Bacon, Hams and Shoulders. Mostly ate the chops pretty quick and made sausage with the trimmings. Should add the we cured the jowls too and made head cheese with the rest of the head. Boiled tongue and tail is good with horseradish dip. Most hogs get the tail cut when castrated, so not much there anymore. miles

We would have two ropes layed in before we drop the pig in to roll the pig in the hot water. It since rotted away, we had a wooden trough just for cleaning hair off.

Don't do this on your lawn. The hot water will nicely kill the grass.

#1,
dunking is easier if you have hoist/tractor (something to get it in and out of the barrel). water should be 140-170 degrees. Cooler will take forever to scald and hotter will set the hair and it will never scrape. it takes 3-5minutes submersion at 140 and only one minute or less at 170. Put some dish soap and tsp in the water to help cut the fat and grease on the skin.
If you can't easily get the hog into and out of the barrel put it on a table put some towels or burlap sacs on an area and pour the water on that- keep checking and adding water until hair pulls.

#2- scald, scrape, gut,split then in the cooler is our normal procedure.

we usually hang with the skin on. Skin is then removed as the hog is butchered.
There will be fat attached to the skin no matter how tight you try and skin it- they don't skin like a deer or a rabbit...

Leave as much fat and meat attached to the skin as you like- it's your cracklins, there's really no wrong way to do it.

#3- all hogs are different for fat cover, I'm assuming your talking about a domestic hog?
You for sure don't need a 225lb hog to feed 15 people. Rule of thumb for a hog roast is 1lb per person make a big feed...

The big advantage to scalding is if you plan to bbq the pig whole or if you're using the hide for something like the cracklings. If you're going to cut it up and not use the skin, skinning is much quicker and easier.

Yes domestic hog, was told we can get any size.


Was gonna use knives and maybe some drywall blades.



We want the cracklins/chicharrones



I was told we'll have a tractor



Yeah I know there will be a lot (most) of the hog left over which is why I'd prefer to go small, I just want to make sure there will be enough fat on the hog. More of a meat/fat ratio question. Wasn't sure if too small a pig wouldn't typically have much fat and if that's the case we'll go with one that will yield enough. If young hogs under 150lb will be proportionally fat enough then we'll get a smaller one. Guess it depends, I guess we can go 150lb or lighter but try to pick one that doesn't look too lean?

To whet your appetite son James just finished this batch of bacon yesterday!!!!!!!


Had it for breakfast yesterday before we hung pasture gates. It was superb!!!

Then you don't havta mow it!!!!

Truth be known, one time will probably be enough for you and your buds..

BTDT

😜

G

Damn Kaywoodie, looking fine...

GeoW yeah you may be right. I've slaughtered sheep and goats, but pigs are admittedly different.

I would just skin the hog. You will save money doing this...........one less trip to the cardiologist. Cooking with pure lard was ok if you spent the day walking behind a team of mules, your body could burn it out.........not so much now.

As to the desired cracklin's, generally speaking, the heavier the (domestic) hog, the more fat vs lean it will have.
The more fat you have to render, the more cracklin's (and good pure lard) you'll get.

Except for bacon and fat for mixing with sausage we trimmed all the fat off the the lean we could, within reason.

(For a real treat leave a little bit of lean on the fat and eat the cracklin's while still good and warm from the rendering kettle.)

IIRC, very little, if any, of the hog's skin was intentionally left on anything other than parts to be cured (hams/bacon/etc.) and feet and head if you intend to use them too.

Man, buzzkill.

I'm gonna spend the day butchering and eating hog fat. Also drinking and probably smoking a pipe. I figure it will even out.



Yes, this is pretty aligned with what I was planning.

Lard is not nearly as bad for you as lots of people would make it out to be. A lot of them in other oil type industries. Ya got to have a good lobbyist. miles

If lard is wrong then I don't want to be right!

seems as it's domestic just have the farmer pick out a fat one- todays hogs are very lean compared to the pigs of yesteryear- it's easy to have a very lean 250lb hog or a fat 150lb'r. Personally I prefer a gilt as well.

think about people- some are 5ft tall couch potatoes that weigh 150 lbs and some are 6'3" beanpoles that weigh 150lbs too.... you want the couch potato for your cracklins.

if you tell whoever is picking the hog to get a chubby one you shouldn't have any problem with a 150lb'r and there is no possible way that 15 guys are gonna consume it in a day or 2

Gotcha yeah good idea.

And again, it is understood we ain't gonna eat the whole sumbitch in a day. The bulk of it will be butchered and frozen.