Memories of Butchering on the Farm

Sometime between Thanksgiving and New Years Day, aunts, uncles, and cousins would gather at my grandfather Raymond and Grandmother Rebecca’s farm to complete the annual task of butchering 2 hogs and a bull. The decision to butcher depended on the weather. It was the food my grandparents needed for the winter months. Everyone that was old enough had a job to do to complete the tasks at hand. As with most old time farmers, very little went to waste. Sausage and hamburger were made from the bits of meat and fat cut and scraped from the animal’s bones. Later, as I grew older, I helped with this process with one of my uncles.

At one time, before they had a freezer, the meat was canned and stored in a section of their dark, cobwebbed basement on homemade, rough sawn board shelves. It was a dingy area that had a single light bulb hanging from the ceiling from a wire. The jars of beef had metal canning lids while the pork sausage has a thick layer of fatty grease to seal the jars.

When I was very young, I tore off strips of adhesive tape for my mom Sybil to fasten the freezer paper after it was folded around steaks of beef or pork. Instead of using the serrated edge of the freezer paper box, she used a butcher knife to slice through the thick white paper with the aplomb of a Samurai Warrior with the blade flashing in the light. After she’d cut a stack of papers, she’d use a long handled fork to arrange the meat, then fold the paper to make an enveloping package with the skill of an skilled Origami master. My job was to tear adhesive tape into length and place them on the edge of my grandma’s white and red granite topped kitchen table ready for my mom when she reached for a piece.

As I readied some meat for the freezer yesterday, I tore the tape into useable strips as I sealed the venison into the folded freezer paper envelopes. The feel of the adhesive transported me back to that time sixty plus years ago. I could remember how sore my young fingers became as the tape tugged at my tender fingers, but the important thing is that I have those memories. My hands are now roughened and calloused, but those recollections still remain fresh and tender.