HOWTHORNE HOMESTEAD REVISITED
(Page 4 of 5)
March/April 1975
By Jane Musser
The pig was then dragged to a work area, where a 55 gallon barrel had been tilted on an angle against a makeshift table. The steaming hot water was poured into the barrel and our old time hog slaughterer determined when the water temperature was right for scalding the hair off the pig by adding fresh blood to the water. (The rate at which the blood went into solution indicated the liquid's readiness.)
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Chancy as it may seem, the method worked just fine. When the water reached the correct temperature, the hind end of the hog was dipped in until its hair came off easily when scraped. Then, of course, the procedure was repeated with the front end. The remaining hairs were, then shaved with razor sharp knives. By this time, the pig was white and cleaner than he had ever been while alive.
Dragging the carcass into the barn at that point for gutting would have gotten the animal dirty all over again so instead, the skin on its hind hocks was split and the tendons separated from the bone. A gambrel rod (a slightly curved, notched stick) was then inserted between the tendons and the bone of both legs and the hog was hoisted and carried into the barn. There he was hung from a big beam with a block and tackle his head was removed, and he was gutted. The carcass was then allowed to hang overnight to cool.
The next day was reserved for butchering. Mick and I decided to do that job ourselves with a little help from the Morton Salt Company's book on butchering and curing. (This book, serialized in MOTHER NOS. 17 21 by the way, proved to be invaluable.) Mick began the process by splitting the carcass in half with a saw and carrying each piece into the house. .(The meat weighed out to 145 pounds not bad, considering we had bought only 400 pounds of feed for the pig all summer!)
I read instructions from the Morton book while Mick did the cutting and he did a darn good job, too. Everything was recognizable when he finished hams, bacon, pork chops, tenderloin, fatback, and more. The first half took about four hours to cut the second only two and next year we figure we'll be able to do the whole job in half the time. We wrapped the chops and some loin roasts for the freezer and sent the hams, bacon, and fatback out to be cured. The trimmings and leaf lard were put on our cook stove and rendered into pure white lard. Then we relaxed over four of the thickest, juiciest, tenderest pork chops we had ever eaten!
The entire endeavor was a good and enjoyable experience especially the economics of it all. Everything considered including the original cost of the pig, as well as feed, slaughtering, and curing the meat cost us only 550 per pound!.
HONEYBEES
We'd had a hive of bees in the wall of one of our upstairs bedrooms since the day we moved in. They were never any trouble, but since we lost our domestic bees last winter and were unable to obtain any the following spring, Mick decided he's try to get the wild ones living in the wall into his hive and collect the honey left behind. He was successful on both counts.
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