goosifer

For the dry sausage you have, here are some ideas on what to do with it: 1. brown it and add to pasta sauce 2. cook it confit method (poached in pure pork fat) see link 3. make chili with it For figuring out fat ratios, I made a little spreadsheet I use. It's useful to tweak the mix based on what you have on hand. The target fat ratio doesn't move all that much. I don't know how to upload a spreadsheet, but here is a screenshot of a sample sausage mix for now. Inputs are in blue text in the # column Item Contains Item Contains item # %meat %fat #meat #fat %ofTotal venison 2.5 100% 0% 2.5 - 50% pork fat 1.0 0% 100% - 1.0 20% beef fat - 0% 100% - - 0% pork shoulder 1.5 80% 20% 1.2 0.3 30% Total 5.0 26.0% 3.7 1.3 100% Here is a link to the spreadsheet: venison sausage fat % calculator

Yeah, you used the good stuff, pork loin, instead of pork shoulder/picnic/boston butt. When you buy ground pork from the store, this is the cut where it comes from. This cut from the pig is approximately 20% fat. Pork loin, depending on how its trimmed, has a lot less. In addition to using ground pork, I like to use pork fat to boost up my fat %. I go to stores that have a butcher department and that make their own sausage and ask for pork fat or "pork trimmings". Depending on when they made their last batch of sausage, they may have some, may not. Sometimes they charge me, sometimes they don't. The answer seems to vary by who I ask. It is definitely a PITA. Sometimes, they will have beef fat, and I might through a little in the sausage, but I'd rather save that for venison used like ground beef. For disc size, the recipe will usually give you a hole diameter. For Italian sausage, I like a bigger diameter, like 3/16" or 1/4". Sometimes a recipe will specify a bigger hole size for the fat, but at around 3/16" or 1/4", I don't think it matters. If you use your grinder to stuff, once everything is mixed, they usually give you a flat "peace sign" blade that just helps move the sausage mix along, rather that grind it. Or do like you did with the largest hole plate you have. (more coming in next post)

I'll bite. Recipe please, Rob... My wife's family is Polish and make perogies. I don't think they've ever seasoned the dough. Your recipe sounds great.

How much fat as a % of total weight did you put in your recipe, crappyice? I went with 15% last year and it was too dry. This year I went to 30% fat. It looks much better. I haven't eaten any yet, but suspect I can cut back to 25% next time. Also, what size grind on the fat did you do. Sometimes if the grind plate size is too small and or the fat is not cold enough, it melts in the grinder, and you loose the distinct blobs of fat in the sausage. Hope you don't mind my interjecting. Just trying to help.

Tommy, you were missing the dot "." between the "u" and the "b"

The link is "https://youtu.be/1M0GhHN6CHU"

I had a polish sausage soup earlier this week that was good. It as half creamy, half brothy. Pretty good. I will try to replicate it at some point.

Made sweet and sour chicken. Also make Philly Cheese Steak Soup and Venison Chili with some leftover venison hot dogs from last year.

crappyice, I think what 4SW is saying (my interpretation; not meaning to put words in anyone's mouth) is that the raison d'etre of "deer hunting" or the "deer hunting industry" is the pursuit and harvest of big bucks. That's his thesis, as I understand it. Where I think things get controversial is if one interprets his position as saying the raison d'etre of "each and every deer hunter" is the pursuit and harvest of big bucks. While an argument can be made for the first statement, I think the second statement is not true and the underlying basis for all of the back and forth that's been going on (if one takes that interpretation).

Well, it's good we were able to flesh that out and make some clarifications/distinctions on what was being communicated. Nothing wrong with the pursuit of big antlers. I don't have any numbers to quote, but I would imagine it's taken the hunting industry to a whole other level than what it was in years past. Nothing wrong with those who, for whatever reason, pursue or harvest not so big antlers. All good. Enough room for everyone to enjoy hunting and be happy.

I can go look in the harvest threads on this site and see lots of "lesser" bucks next to hunters with big smiles on their faces. What about a kid who harvests his first buck and its a fork horn, but the kid is happy as can be. That kid isn't thinking "Man, I should have held out for the eight pointer". Or adult hunters next to a four pointers or six pointers. If they are happy and it was a legal harvest, let them be happy. Let the "serious" hunters spend their time and their money going after the big boys. And let them be happy. It's all good.

I would agree with the statement "to each their own" when it comes to what a hunter chooses to harvest, as long as it is legal and ethical, but that really wasn't the point I was trying to make in my post. In terms of your comments about the math, I assume that you are being facetious?

In terms of a "unit of measure", would it be fair to say that you are looking at it from the dollar economic activity/expenditures by hunters? That there are millions and millions of dollars spent each year by hunters on equipment, land, experiences, et al, and that these expenditures are motivated by a desire to get big bucks? And if so, I can see that. What if one looks at things from the perspective of number of hunters? I'd guess that 20% of the hunters account for 80% of the dollars spent on hunting/the pursuit of big bucks. I also get the feeling that there are a lot of hunters out there that due to time and or budget limitations, can't really pursue big bucks, or at least not "do it right", and have to settle for harvesting a lesser deer, especially if the venison is an important component of their food budget. So depending on what unit of measure ($'s spend on hunting vs number of hunters) one uses to look at the issue, one could say different things, and both "be true". There might be a way for both viewpoints to coexist without conflicting with each other. Just a thought.

I'm going to go out today to round up the seat cushions and trail cams with a hunting buddy. Also going to do some scouting before all the snow melts. I put on some of my hunting clothes for warmth and to stay dry . . . . they are a little tight

I just came across an interesting web site. It has consolidated GIS maps for the entire state, so you don't have to look for each county's GIS map. It also shows property boundaries, property owner name (address with "pro" version), soil types, soil quality rating, crops grown, and land utilization categories. It is aimed at farmland investors, I would suspect, but I think it is also a valuable tool for hunters, investors and farmers. I would encourage you to look up the land you hunt and or farm and comment on the info it provides. For my land, it was way off on the crops grown and % utilization. It was almost as if it was extrapolating or averaging from the surrounding farms. But the boundaries looked good. One quirk, it seemed to slightly overestimate acreage size for the parcels I checked out. Still, even if you just use it for parcel maps/boundaries lines, it's a nice one-stop shop. Check it out. https://www.acrevalue.com/map/NY/

gjs4, one other idea I forgot to mention before would be to brine the shanks for 24 hours prior to processing. This article talks about 2 TBL of salt per gallon of water (plus seasonings of your choice). I wasn't 100% satisfied with my osso buco efforts this weekend (link to recipe ) and will try this next time. Have you had a chance to look through Buck, Buck, Moose yet? Would you recommend it?

The website is now up. https://www.ganderoutdoors.com/?cID=YM-GO#topCat They are selling guns.

Yeah, that should be good out to 100 yards. See https://www.edgunwest.com/store/p10/EDgun_Matador_.25_Short.html at the 11:00 mark.

chas0218, what pellets are you using? Along with the pistol mentioned above, I recently bought a .22 Hatsan 95 Vortex QE. Haven't tried it tried it yet. It came with a Hatsan Optima 3-9x32 scope. I am not sure about putting on the scope. It sounds to be semi-decent based Amazon reviews.

Below is the link for my recipe for venison osso buco. It is on my wife's website. If you want to go straight to the recipe, and skip the commentary and the step by step, just scroll to the bottom of the page. https://www.annsentitledlife.com/recipes/venison-osso-buco-recipe-braised-venison-shanks/

Crawfish Etouffee

Happy birthday, Cabin Fever!

I bought the Hatsan 250XT Tac-Boss .177 cal Air Pistol the other day at fieldsupply.com for $40. Regularly $60. link Haven't tried it yet. I need to go buy a pellet trap so i can shoot in the basement. The BBs (zinc-coated only for this one) are cheap, the C02 cartridges aren't too bad either, like a penny a shot.

Hmmm. Yes, very little give/stretch in the lace. I will report on how they feel lacing them up and tying them. Yes, read good reviews on them. A good plan b at this point. Thanks.

I needed to buy replacement laces for my heavy snow/hunting boots. Saw some kevlar reinforced ones for ~$12, and then came across Rhino laces for ~$20 on Amazon. Made in USA, lifetime warranty, 8x stronger than steel, yadda yadda. Found a pair on ebay for $16, so thought I'd give them a try. Anyone have them? https://store.rhinolaces.com/