You've got to love venison season

[johngaltsmotor]

I got a call the other afternoon that a former coworker had a nice white tail doe harvested for me to butcher. I don't have a hanging scale to know how big she is but I'd guess 3-4 years old based on size.
Now to refresh my memory on how I made the stellar ham-bi and doe-strami a few years back and get ready for some seriously good eating this winter. I'm not sure I have the patience to wait a month to freeze it to avoid any trichina so it'll be a hot smoked ham but should still be incredible. Then to start experimenting with other sausage recipes I haven't gotten around to trying. It's always nice to be able to say you HAD to make sausage because there was just so much meat.

But it's also a shame how many people grind an entire deer instead of taking a little extra time to try making something extraordinary. (pictures to follow if/when I remember...)

[johngaltsmotor]

Noooo.....

Well, after the fun of butchering and getting the forequarters and backstraps started as pastrami, and the tenderloin and leg pieces curing as corned venison, and stitch pumping and brining the hindquarters as 9lb hams... I am thinking i might have to bin the trim instead of making sausage. I picked up my laptop from having a second OS installed as a dualboot. And I started tweaking my notes as far as the pastrami dry cure and ham brine recipe. Then the next day I came down with the flu. It turns out the guy who worked on my laptop was sick. So I'm afraid that the trim meat without curing salt might be risky after sitting and possibly being exposed to my germs (I didn't have enough cure #1 or time to grind the trim into summer sausage that day).

I'm glad that I took the road less traveled and left so much of it as whole muscle to cure. With the big bones still in the fore- and hindquarters there was 55lb off the carcass. So I think I'll only have to bin about 3-4lb that was the fattier parts I was going to make dog snacks with and maybe 6-7lb of trim.

And I even tried to do the right thing by getting a flu vaccine in November...

[johngaltsmotor]

So a local guy says to go ahead and make summer sausage and the smoking and cooking will kill anything. But I've noticed that with all the views nobody here has stuck their neck out to comment (not that I can blame you)
I'm thinking I'll just bin this doe (moment of silence) and pull the last of the previous one of the freezer and go get a couple of beef roasts to supplement. A lot of people like the IDEA of venison sausage but aren't familiar enough to tell the difference over beef, especially if I add some extra heat/kick/punch to the sausage in the form of dried jalapeno and some high temp cheese.

[wheels]

Sorry not to have commented, but I know nothing of using US game.

If I read it correctly, you're asking whether to throw around 3 - 4 lbs of meat away that has possibly been in contact with flu virus? If there's any doubt as to it's suitability, I would chuck it away.

Hope this helps.

[This Little Piggy]

If I read you right, you're not selling this, just returning some of the meat to the person who harvested the doe.

Hope you didn't bin it! I'm far from being an expert, but I've never heard of germs being an issue. (Bacteria, yes!) Will consult with a colleague who's much more expert. But if the grind is going into a summer sausage that's getting cooked, no flu germs are gonna survive that.

[This Little Piggy]

My HACCP expert says that as long as you were careful to keep everything cold, refrigerate right after grinding, etc. everything should be fine. The concern is not the flu, but the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, which can be much more active in someone with another infection.

[johngaltsmotor]

I didn't have the energy to do anything so it all went into ziploc bags in the deep freeze for now. I figured I had the space so I could do some research and decide later. I'm fairly certain that all of the butchering was done before the source was contacted so it should be good, I just would rather err on the side of caution. I'm not sure if the same 30days that will kill trichina will do in any germs or viruses, but it might be that long before I feel like tending the smoker anyway.
Thanks for the feedback guys.

[Oddbod]

Flu virus can last at most 24 hours outside a host body, so there's no need to worry about transmitting it to others through meat.

[johngaltsmotor]

I tossed some of the corned venison neck roast in a pot with onions, cabbage and carrots over the weekend.
Then I smoked the forequarters and backstrap into some incredible pastrami. Man I love this hobby Only problem is it never lasts long enough....

[NCPaul]

Looks like you've recovered. Nice job.

[johngaltsmotor]

Yup, getting the flu vaccine in November had me strong enough that I wasn't even down for 2 days, it just happened to be the worst possible timing.
I'll wait for the next batch of nice weather to grind the trim into summer sausage and smoke that, but I wanted to get this out of cure and into the smoker.

[johngaltsmotor]

This was only my second attempt at a bone-in (venison) hams so not too shabby. I wasn't confident enough to dry cure them so after immersion I cooked them both. The one in the back was rubbed in a spice blend and then smoked while the one in front was boiled and simmered and then spiced and tossed in the smoker just to dry the surface. I could have done with a bit less paprika in the rub but all in all good stuff (but I still prefer the pastrami style).
This forum is great for maintaining the confidence to keep trying things that I might otherwise pass up as being outside my area of expertise.