Sanitation, Cold, and the Rules

A clean site

Spoilage and illness start with dirt and warmth. The USDA bulletins set up the day so neither gets a foothold ¹:

• Rake the site so leaves and dirt don’t blow onto the carcass; outdoors, spread straw where it will hang ¹.
• Wash floors and every piece of equipment with plenty of soap and water, then rinse thoroughly: sanitizer left on surfaces can discolor meat and cause off-flavors ¹.
• Keep plenty of cold, clean water for hands, tools, carcass, and organs ¹.
• Don’t let blood and dirt on outer clothes get onto the washed carcass ¹.
• Open hides from the inside out and tie off the bung so hair and intestinal contents stay off the meat ¹.
• Dispose of waste so blood doesn’t run into streams and animals can’t dig up viscera ¹.

Avoid slaughtering in high wind, which blows dirt onto the carcass ¹.

Keep it cold

“The surfaces of freshly slaughtered … carcasses are contaminated with bacteria that can spoil the meat unless their growth is promptly checked,” as all three bulletins put it ^{1 2 3}.

• Chill at 28 to 35°F, wrapped in a clean sheet in a ventilated shed if the weather allows ¹.
• Get the carcass below 40°F; if you can’t on the farm, take it to a locker plant ¹.
• Don’t let it freeze the first day: freezing within a day of death can toughen the meat ¹.
• In hot weather, slaughter in the cool of early morning or evening; below 30°F, any time ¹.

Wrap and freeze

Right after cutting, wrap, freeze fast, and store cold ²:

• Use moisture-vapor-proof wrap such as heavily waxed or laminated freezer paper.
• Wrap tightly, pressing out the air; air causes freezer burn and rancidity.
• Label every package with contents and date.
• Freeze at -10°F or below, and only as much as will freeze in 24 hours; pack about 2 to 3 pounds per cubic foot and leave room for air to circulate. Store at 0°F or below ².

Wrapping and freezing “does not improve quality but maintains original quality” ³.

Freezer life for best quality: pork chops 3 to 4 months, pork roasts 4 to 8, fresh sausage 1 to 2, cured ham 1 to 2 ¹; lamb cuts 6 to 9 months, ground lamb 3 to 4 ³. Salted and cured meats keep the shortest because salt speeds rancidity.

Thawing: in the refrigerator, in the package, about 3 hours per pound for small roasts and chops, never on the counter. Meat thawed below 40°F can be refrozen safely, with some loss of quality ^{1 3}. Cooking from frozen takes up to a third longer ¹.

What can be sold

Federally, meat from an animal slaughtered outside an inspected plant can be used only by the owner, the household, nonpaying guests, and employees ¹. Wisconsin’s DATCP spells out the same rule for selling ⁴:

• Livestock (cattle, hogs, sheep, goats, bison, rabbits, and others): all meat sold to consumers must be slaughtered and processed at a state or USDA inspected meat establishment and labeled there, with the inspection mark, safe handling instructions, and a net weight.
• Meat slaughtered by the producer, by a registered mobile slaughterer, or custom exempt (processed without inspection for the owner) cannot be sold ⁴.
• Selling inspected meat from the farm needs a retail food license and a freezer used only for that meat, kept separate from living quarters; farmers markets need a mobile or transient license ⁴.
• Poultry has its own small-producer exemption, covered in the Poultry module ⁴.

Try it

Before your first butchering day, check your freezer with a thermometer (it should read 0°F or colder), estimate how much space the meat will need at 2 to 3 pounds per cubic foot, and buy freezer paper, tape, and a marker. Write a one-page plan: where the carcass will chill, how you’ll keep it between 28 and 40°F, and who will take the waste.

What to take from this

Clean the site and tools, rinse sanitizers off, and keep hair, dirt, and gut contents off the meat. Chill carcasses at 28 to 35°F, below 40°F, but don’t freeze them the first day. Wrap tightly in freezer paper, label, freeze at -10°F no more than will freeze in a day, and store at 0°F. Thaw in the refrigerator. In Wisconsin, livestock meat that’s sold must come from an inspected plant; home-slaughtered and custom-exempt meat is for your household only.