The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1901-01-26
FARMER AND PLANTER.
HoG.KILLING TIME.
Meat Curing and the Saving
of the Bacon.

OF the Bacon.
First of all have your hogs well
iatted. The day before you slaughter
make all necessary preparations, such
as preparing your fuel, fix places to
hang the hogs, sharpen the knives.
set your scalding tank or tub, etc. In
the morning when you slaughter have
the water hot and everything in read
mess by the time it is light, if possi-
BILE. If in freezing and thawing
weather, by an early start you can
avoid working in the mud. If the wa
ter heated in kettles it would be we'll
to also have few hot castings to
increase the temperature should the
water get too cold during the scald-
ing process. / prefer shooting with a
rifle to any other mode of killing on
the farm. Care should be taken not
to have the water too hot in scalding
the hogs. The proper temperature Is
considerably below the boiling point.
ii the hair is set from the water be-
ing too hot, or the animal remaining
too long in the hot bath, then you
have tedious job on your hands, and
Ut best the hog will be imperfectly
cleaned. After hanging scrape down
first with warm water, then go over
again with clear, cool water. After
butting, rinse with clear, cold water,
having previously. cut across the
throat clear to the bone to allow the
blood to drain from the shoulders.
Or, better, still, take off the head as
soon as the dressing is over and hang
the head up unless you are able to
cut it up right away. Since 1 have
been taking off the heads at the close
of the killing have had no trouble
in keeping the shoulders. Unless the
weather is severe the hogs should
hang over night to get rid of the ami
NAL heat in cutting up. But hogs
should never be allowed to freeze as
by that manner the animal heat is
driven into the center of the joints,
where it can not escape, and by that
means the hams and shoulders be-
come badly tainted, if not spoiled. If
the hogs are large the cooling process
can be expedited by cutting the ribs
loose from the back bone, and spread
ing the sides well apart while hang
ing.
One common mistake among farm
ers is in leaving too much that prop
erly belongs to the middling to the
hams and shoulders. In cutting up the
carcass l use large cleaver, the
blade 80 inches long. The head being
removed when first hung, / cut off
the shoulders, leaving about an inch
of the point of the shoulder blade in
the middling then cut off the hams
little above the hip joint, and trim
the hams closely, leaving them in oval
shape. The feet should be cut OF
with saw well above the joints. In
sailing 1 prefer shelf or fiat sur
face, and resulting in two or three
weeks. The bottom of the shelf should
be wei! covered with salt, and the
joints should also be covered with
salt. The hams and shoulders of hogs
from two to three hundred should re-
main in salt three weeks in open
weather, and hogs from three to five
hundred four to five weeks. In smok- |
ing, the meat should be well warmed |
at least once, and then smoked until |
it was well colored, say seven or eight |
days at the outside. This idea of !
smoking meat for weeks is all wrong,
unless you want Kindred, rusty ba- |
con. This year / shall kill seven or |
eight hogs in December that will be |
fifteen months old, and by that time |
will weight from 400 to $50. Later in
the season will kill three 25O-pound |
hogs, and use the sides for picked |
meat. In killing large hogs there is |
more lard in one of them than is pro-
t;uced in four or five 225-pounds hogs,
and there will be more lean meat in |
one joint in one of those large hogs
than there is in an entire carcass of |
a well-fatted two hundred pound hog.
never have had any trouble in saving
the meat from large hogs, and once
killed 700-pound hog, and the hams
and shoulders took salt perfectly. /
cut the sides down to the ribs and got |
II gallons of lard, and had the hams
and shoulders left. The hams, when
sold, weighed over 60 pounds each.
il the meat, when hung, is well busted
with powdered borax, rubbing the
ends of the joints with the same, the
bugs will never bother it if left hang
ing all season.-H. F. Work, in Farm
ers' Home Journal.