I’m interrupting my 31 days schedule because I have something to tell you.
My mom and I went in on a 1/2 a pig! We picked it up a few weeks ago and it’s fantastic. I’m in love. With a pig that was named Nikita.
Here’s the low down. My mom knows a guy (Joe) who raises pigs (among other animals) and when this one was ready, it was slaughtered and then taken to a meat packing and smoking facility in Gresham, OR called Shy Ann Meats, which was about 30 minutes away from Joe’s place.
The chickens at Joe’s
These piggies will be ready in 4 short months for feeding more hungry people.
Mom, at Joe’s seeing the babies. Joe on the left.
When it arrived at Shy Ann’s we got a call from them asking us what we wanted. They wanted to know:
- Do we want our ham and ham hocks smoked? (yes.)
- Do we want 2 chops to a package? (yes – though we ended up with 4/package….)
- Do we want the spare ribs? (yeaaaaa?! why would we say no?)
After that they asked us a series of questions based on what they offer. We picked out our bacon flavors (regular and black pepper) and our italian sausage flavors (mild) and then worked out what to do with the ham. Mom kinda wanted some ham steaks, but we also both wanted a ham. So, we had to forego the steaks and just do the two hams. Since this was our first time getting a large amount of pig, we weren’t really sure what was involved. The people from Shy Ann’s were super nice and explained things to us (when we had no idea what we were doing).
The Cost:
The Pig (Nikita): $380
The processing (smoking, curing, spiralizing ham, glazing ham, cutting and packing up everything): $116.87
So that came out to 248.44 each
So what did we get??
Here’s what we EACH got (so times everything by 2 if you are counting)
- Bacon (~1 lb packages) – 3 reg and 3 black pepper (I got one extra)
- Pork Chops (bone in, 1″ chops) – 3
- Pork Steaks – 2
- Pork shoulder roast – 1
- Ham (10lbs), cured, spiral and glazed
- Bratwrust links (3 large to a package) – 2 (mom got one extra)
- Spare ribs – 1 (I got those, only one package)
- Ham Hocks – 3
- Country Style Ribs – 1
All in all, my haul came out to about 40 pounds, 12 ounces.
My cooler, half full of my 1/4 pig. It was surprisingly compact!
That puts us in around $6.10/lb. Heck yes! This has so far been some of the tastiest pig Joel and I have eaten. We had a fabulous BLT (with arugula and avocado) the first night, and we had pork chops the next night.
Bacon, Arugula, Avocado, and Tomato Sandwich
Pork chops, ready for the frying pan
I loved the process, and we’ll be doing it again. I can’t wait to eat that ham!
A lovely setting at Joe’s place.
Resources:
Pig icon in main image from Free Pik.
Want to know more, or find your own Oregon-grown pig? Check out this article.