Canning meat

[sumi]

In S.A. meat get turned into what we know as "biltong" (jerky) and "droë wors" (dried sausage) for preserving, but nowadays it's more a snack than necessity. Delicious and a bit of a luxury item nowadays, as it's fair expensive.

In the Western Cape province especially you will find smoked snoek (type of fish) and "bokkoms" (dried fish). Sardines, tuna, salmon and curried fish in tins. Sometimes sardines in tomato sauce. Canned meat there is corned beef and spaghetti and meat balls in tins.

Electricity is still a fairly "new" concept over there, both my parents grew up without and my father told me he remembered watering the mesh and stone contraption they used to keep things cool, before fridges became common…

Chicken… well, I must confess I haven't eaten ANY chicken since I started keeping my own flock about 10 years ago! But I have decided recently that once I start breeding on a large scale, to eat of my own. In S.A. there were many willing to take the extra cockerels and spent hens off our hands, but here it's different and I decided a. I miss eating chicken and b. it's time to be practical. I will not eat commercially raised broilers though. No way! The conditions they are raised in on the farms I've seen is haunting and seeing those bags of frozen "Walkie talkies" (often infected or chemical burnt) feet aka "runaways" and heads in supermarket freezers… No. No. No. No. Just no.

Welcome to Africa

 

[NH Homesteader]

Wow you're doing the impossible here... Making me lose interest in your beautiful country!

Seriously I'm curious what you find out. We would never live where we couldn't butcher our own meat at home.

 

[Beekissed]

That's happening right here in the US, sad to say. There are cities and suburbs where folks cannot kill their own chickens or rabbits at home without getting fined and their animals removed. And it has nothing to do with food purity or anything to do with environmental issues...it has to do with stupid people who think it's cruel to kill your food animals. The land of the free is quickly becoming the land of the "your business is my business if it has anything to do with furry animals" .

Thank you to all the bleeding heart nincompoops who want to eat the meat but never want to know that it has to die first.

 

[Hinotori]

Chicken isn't my favorite meat. I do eat my extra cockerels though. Anymore that's silkies. One of them is just enough for a soup dinner for the two of us. You have to be able to get past the black color to eat silkie meat though.

 

[sumi]

NH Homesteader, I will let you all know what I find out here. I discussed this some with friends who live down in Cork, but it was more than a year ago and I forgot much of the conversation now, except that they warned me there are LOTS of regulations. But it's for safety. Not to be difficult, the EU is careful with food, diseases etc and Ireland is very careful with safety on farms. The dead animal etc disposal I believe is they don't want people to bury animals as a lot of houses and farms are reliant on well water and they want to keep the water clean for human consumption. With the amount of rain we get here, it's understandable that they don't want yucky things potentially polluting it, as it seeps through the ground.

Beekissed, there are people out there who believe cows get killed for their milk too…

A few years ago we raised a chick after it's mom abandoned it. We took the little thing everywhere with us and I mean everywhere. We bumped into a few (adult) people who really should've known better, who cooed over him as a chick and asked me "What kind of birdy is this?" Seriously?!? When I told them it's a CHICKEN, I could almost see their heads spinning. City people are so far removed from their food nowadays, it's unreal?

 

[sumi]

Hinotori, chicken was probably my favourite meat, until I raised my own and saw where the "shop bought" chicken came from. I found duck meat to be a good substitute, but $$$$. Expect to pay up to 5x as much for a duck than a whole chicken in S.A. Makes wonderful pies though!

 

[Hinotori]

I don't care for chicken or turkey breast.

I like duck fried in the Chinese way. I do occasionally bake one up here. I've thought about getting ducks but with the huge pond here and bird flu, I don't want to risk the chickens.

 

[NH Homesteader]

I am also not a huge fan of chicken. My husband is though. I have finally convinced him to stop raising Cornish X and will only be eating cull cockerels from our small flock.

No I am sure there are valid reasons for not wanting people to butcher their own animals. I just know a lot of people who do it with no issues... And I am very American in the sense that I don't like the government telling me what to do, especially regarding my food!

 

[Beekissed]

Me too. It's just basic survival and natural independence to not want to depend on the store for our meat proteins. I can't imagine trusting other people to raise, kill and process meat for me. I'm not a huge meat eater, but when I do eat it, I like it to be good for me and of good quality.

 

[sumi]

I'm not opposed to buying meat from the supermarket, since I moved here it was that or go vegetarian! Back in S.A. we raised and butchered pigs and a sheep. All of which were absolutely wonderful and not least because we could control what went into the meat, the butchering process, how the animals were handled etc. That was really great.

I prefer to raise my own animals and would love to do so again as soon as possible. Definitely a pig or two and if I can and have enough space, a sheep. I'm not a huge fan of beef and to be honest, the quality of beef here leaves a lot to be desired. Deer, if I can get some, would be great! Chances are, if I look I'll probably find some in a bigger town, actually now that I think about it, I saw Kangaroo steaks in a supermarket a few months ago I'll probably find deer!