Well…I gave up on my freezer challenge. Â Not completely but it’s hard when this happened…
MEAT!!
Our freezer had really gotten to the point we had little beef left. Â Karl had gotten a pig from his employer around Christmas time so we had enough meat..just not beef.
I ended up messaging Hannah at the farm where Kramer used to work and told her if they had extra hamburger, I’d happily buy some and if they they were butchering anytime, I’d take a quarter beef. Â Well they had 30 pounds of extra hamburger so I bought it and then mid May, the quarter of beef came.
Well then…Karl’s work (he works for a LARGE pig farmer) was in jeopardy of having to  euthanize  hogs mid Covid when the packing plants were being shut down so they offered all employees a chance to purchase a pig for $20.  They secured local lockers to butcher the pigs and employees would have to pay the processing plus the $20 per pig.  Our family ended up reserving 3 pigs.  Kelli took one, Buck took one and Karl and I split one with Kalissa.
Karl and I really didn’t need anymore meat but with the scare on that meat might be really expensive at the grocery store and possibly could be limited on quantites to buy, we opted to take a half of pig, just in case.
About then my “using up things in the freezer” went into high gear. Â We ate everything and anything that took up lots of space. Â I made pies with the frozen fruits. Â I did really good and it’s a good thing I did as now both of the freezers are packed. Â Fingers crossed that we don’t have one go out as I’ve heard that getting a freezer is still a little bit hard.
For those of you curious. Â This is our receipt from the locker….
there was 191 pounds of meat. Â We opted to cure hams, hocks and bacon…and we got smoked sausage links. Â The total cost was $236.95 for processing plus the $20 for the pig.
That pencils out to be $1.34 per pound of pork. Â We’re really happy with that. Â We’ll some “good eatin'” for that amount of money.
I’m so happy I worked on the freezer challenge earlier in the year. Â It made us be able to have room for all of this…and it made it a whole lot easier to rotate what was in the bottom of the freezer to the top.
I’m really happy we can eat whatever we want for a little while. Â I still want to work to use up some of the things in the bigger freezer but that shouldn’t be a problem. Â It has a lot of fruits for pies in it and I never have a problem getting rid of pie.
Wow , what a good deal. My family wanted to do this also from local farmers but no butcher shop has any avilability. Enjoy all that need and pork.
so thankful for your bounty
How wonderful for you and your families. It was sad to hear about the steers had to be destroyed to Covid. I am so thankful some of you could benefit from this. If it gets to be too much I’m sure you will find pjj ok aces to donate done to. My parents always kept 2 freezers for our family of 7 but when it’s time to butcher better have room for the meat.
Great you can can meat in jars
That’s been one of the blessings for us this year, having a long term relationship with a local butcher. We eat grass fed angus beef and organic chicken broilers, all raised within miles of the house and all carefully processed by people we know and trust. I’m glad to know that it’s much the same for you and your kids. We raise our own veggies but supplement with farmer market produce, too. It’s a big deal to have such good food available because we all need to eat healthy now in order to stay healthy. Enjoy your holiday weekend! Probably going to grill some of that great meat, right?
I was wondering about your freezer challenge the other day and was going to ask you how you were doing. So happy you were able to get your freezer filled up again–and at a great price.
New photos, top and bottom! Very nice! Great meat deal. So glad to hear the hogs were not all euthanized and the meat wasted.
That’s a killer price for meat! Our Costco has been limiting pork, beef and chicken to a total of 3 packages per household. I noticed two days ago the limit signs were gone but the price of meats went up about 20-30%!!!
On another topic, I love your new header! Darling lil’ imp with the joy-ibdusing smile and your beautiful stitching!
I can not imagine hubs and me eating that much meat in the course of a year or even two! I have two shelves of meat in my 5′ tall upright freezer that includes beef, pork, chicken and venison and that will easily last four months. Then I have to remember your kids are all nearby and mine are hundreds of miles away! Looks like some good family meals.
Congrats on a great buy! Meat sure has gotten expensive.
Love and prayers
That is a great score on meat and you are so lucky to have a Locker that has the ability to process for you. Meat has gotten somewhat expensive here in TN but with only the two of us we can make it work. It looks like the clean out the freezer challenge is going to wait, lol
All I can say is WOW! We live so close to 2 groceries plus an AF commissary that it doesnt make sense to have a freezer. Just a quick trip of 2 miles gets us what we need. Out of something? Just run to the store. But you have a big family with big meals so why not? And the price is awesome! But the rest of the country is suffering. My husband paid $9 for a pound of hamburger recently but the price has gone down, thankfully.
That’s a LOT of meat! I usually only eat chicken and fish, so it would just set in the freezer here. Looks like you’ll be living “high on the hog (and cow)” for quite a while.
By the way, LOVE the new page design!!