Buying Meat in Bulk: Personal Pork Harvest

Pure bred Glouchestershire Old Spot, our favored breed.

Hey farm friends, I wanted to give you a look at what our whole and half hog we harvested for personal use looked like. Buying in bulk is a great option to get your best price, stock up and be prepared, make meal planning easier, support local farms and try new cuts.

•Personal cuts from a whole and half hog, with video links.

•Costs of butchering, and how to save money.

•What our freezers look like.

This is our spring 2021 pork harvest. We kept a hog and a half back for ourselves, as we had been out of pork (and bacon!) for a long time.

Whole hog harvest, smallest hog.

Above is the results of our whole hog harvest. As per usual we keep the smallest of the herd (another reason we took an extra half this time around). This one is pretty typical of how we cut a whole hog for our use. There is fresh side pork (bacon), chops, roasts, hams, lard, hocks, ground pork, ribs and country style chops. (We have a back up of unused organs, so I did not keep any this time. We generally use the organs for the dogs.)

Video of our whole hog cuts.

Half hog harvest.

Above is the results of our half hog harvest. We occasionally process our pork like this, more specialty, focused on brats, bacon and ground pork. We have cured bacon, ground pork, fresh and cheddar brats, hocks and chops here.

Video of our half hog cuts.

Costs of Hog + Processing

Let's talk about costs a little bit. It's really interesting to look at how we process the whole hog versus the half hog. The whole hog had a hanging weight of 153lbs, it was a small hog. The half hog had a hanging weight of 92lbs (the whole would have been 184lbs). Because of how we chose to cut the half hogs, with more speciality and processed items (brats) the processing costs were actually higher for the half hog. The brats and the smoking both added cost.

So, another way to save money on a bulk meat order is by how you cut it. Your going to pay more money for brats, patties/burgers, sausages, etc. in your pork/beef/bulk animals processing. This may be worth it for a time aspect for you, but it's a personal choice to balance out!

This is also an opportunity to learn how to make your own specialty items! We have made brats and sausage before (links and patties). It's fun, and messy (and a little gross, in a good way?? lol) and it takes time, but it's very rewarding. Major benefit, you control the ingredients!

Back to that cost, if you zoom in you can see the whole hog had processing costs of $163 and the half hog cost $181. This will be on top of the price of the animal paid directly to us, the farmers, which is $3.25/lb hanging weight; for these two animals that would have broken down to $497 and $299, respectively.

Yield is 65%+/- of the hanging weight, plus bones, organs, lard.

Stocking the Freezer

Here's a rare look at our freezers post harvest. I ALWAYS make sure to clean the freezer and rotate our meat, to ensure nothing gets lost or goes to waste. Our meat generally gets used within 1-1.5 years, sometimes 2 years and it's just fine and dandy.

Our small chest freezer.

We have one large chest freezer - mainly for veggies, oats, etc. which serves for back up meat overflow/chickens; one small chest freezer - primarily for meat/beef; and one upright deep freezer - meat, wild game, pork, beef, organs. Then of course the kitchen fridge-freezer.

Upright deep freezer.

Upright deep freeze door.

Hope this helps give you a good idea of what to expect when buying in bulk! We harvest small herds twice per year, offering opportunities up first to returning customers and those who've expressed interest. Email us directly if you'd like to be on that shortlist. Join below if you'd like to follow all updates from the farm!

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