NRA4LIFE
WKR
Geez, if any of you around the Seattle area need help butchering an animal, contact me. I love it.
Meat color and smell is wrong.
- Thread starter Jakey_boy001
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Jakey_boy001
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This is the first elk I’ve had processed by someone else I’ve never weighed anything till this one. It doesn’t matter what it weighs when you are not paying for it. I used to live close to my dad’s house and had space to hang an elk and process it, now I live in a city and I don’t have room. And the invoice from the butcher only has the hanging weight because that’s what the price you pay is based off of.
I killed a mule deer a month later and I did that one myself and I got almost as much as the elk (comparing the stack sizes in my freezer I didn’t weigh it.)
Cordell Walker
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If you’re hanging weight of 198 was deboned meat/quarters, I’d say 75lbs is a little light. Hauled 200lbs of deboned hind quarters and bone in front quarters plus scrape meat from an elk out of the woods last year and yielded 143lbs of finished meat. This years bull yielded 175lbs of finished meat from 225lbs of deboned quarters/scrape.
Montana Slim
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Sure looks like it had some water contact somewhere along the way... not ideal
KsRancher
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This is the first time I have seen anyone with an experience like mine when it comes to the texture of the meat when cutting it with a knife. But all of ours taste fine. I noticed it right off with the first elk I shot. Several of the cuts felt like I was cutting sandpaper. Other cuts the knife went thru smooth. Never felt it in deer or antelope. But every elk I have noticed it. I dont think that has anything to do with the color or taste issues you have
Fireflyfishing
WKR
This
Coveyleader
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The meat soured is my guess. It doesn’t matter how it was handled in the field if the butcher doesn’t handle it properly.
trying cooking a steak and then save a portion for the next day. It’s normally twice as bad.
Sounds like a mess, been there with a butcher who was simply hanging my quarters in a meat locker for a couple days until we finished hunting. The cooler was warm for days, all of it was exactly how you described.
You can put as much seasoning in it as you want, it’s still shit. I’d toss it as that taste will stick with you forever.
If there is a positive, if you or a friend ever kills an elk and the recovery took longer than expected and you’re wondering about the meat, you, you alone will be able to tell as that off smell is forever stamped in your olfactory senses!
trying cooking a steak and then save a portion for the next day. It’s normally twice as bad.
Sounds like a mess, been there with a butcher who was simply hanging my quarters in a meat locker for a couple days until we finished hunting. The cooler was warm for days, all of it was exactly how you described.
You can put as much seasoning in it as you want, it’s still shit. I’d toss it as that taste will stick with you forever.
If there is a positive, if you or a friend ever kills an elk and the recovery took longer than expected and you’re wondering about the meat, you, you alone will be able to tell as that off smell is forever stamped in your olfactory senses!
Couple years ago a local guy had a freezer go down. Spoiled a bunch of meat. Instead of manning up he tried to hide it by spread loading what he could salvage. Everybody ended up with rotten meat. Fortunately mine was a rutty old buck. A friend had to trash his first ever elk.
Chris in TN
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I’ve seen that and I’ve also seen cuts mislabeled. I’ve thawed stew meat thinking it was back strap and vice-versa.
It ruined me on processors. The last elk I shot went to a clean and organized processor who did everything well and I could see it just by looking at his process while dropping off and picking up. But the mislabeled packs of meat were the last straw for me.
If you want it done right, do it yourself. We went last year prepared to bring meat home deboned and that’s how I will operate in the future.
butcherboy
WKR
I don’t trust hunters. I’ll never process wildgame for hunters again. They always say it’s clean and never is. Say they quartered their elk and it’s just wacked up into unknown chunks and pieces. Have to put 3 shots all within 2”-3” of each other ruining more meat. Always gut shooting them or spine shots. Letting animals sit all night and longer with the hide on and guts in them. Always expecting more meat back than there actually is. I think all hunters are liars. So yeah, I agree, all hunters should process their own animals. 
We shot a couple bulls a few years ago in a nasty canyon. One of the bulls died hanging almost completely upside-down by its back leg/hoof at the edge of a drop off. . We didn't get to it for a few hours. Not 100% sure when it actually died, I don't know if it hung upside down alive or not or just after it died. The meat from that upside down bull looked very similar to the picture you posted. We boned out both bulls and it was very evident which bull was which by the pink color like yours. There seemed to be no blood left at all in the meat. It tasted ok but was tough. Maybe you got some meat from an animal that had something similar happen.???
beesting
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The meat from my bull i got this fall looked like your meat in the picture. I was also concerned about the color. I processed the bull when I got home. It smelled and tasted great.
jferre4842
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Im going with whoever processed that elk mixed in another. I wouldnt chance based on the smell.
This is what I thought at first looking at the pics but it shouldn't change the flavor.
Anybody know if a sickness or infection could cause something like this? The grainy/sandy texture cutting through it is super weird.
I think there are a few possibilities as to what happened. But unless the butcher remembers and tells the OP, we will never know.
I suspect the butcher mixed some meat with the OPS when it comes to burger specifically. I used to use a butcher until I found out they would grind multiple animals at one time when making burger. No thanks.
As far as the bad steaks, how on earth did that butcher not notice that when they were packaging them? Any good butcher would notice the texture, color and smell and throw it away.
It's possibly it got warm waiting to be butchered and the butcher threw a bunch out but missed a bunch.
But IMO, the butcher was lazy and cute corners and didn't really care what his customers got.
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I suspect the butcher mixed some meat with the OPS when it comes to burger specifically. I used to use a butcher until I found out they would grind multiple animals at one time when making burger. No thanks.
As far as the bad steaks, how on earth did that butcher not notice that when they were packaging them? Any good butcher would notice the texture, color and smell and throw it away.
It's possibly it got warm waiting to be butchered and the butcher threw a bunch out but missed a bunch.
But IMO, the butcher was lazy and cute corners and didn't really care what his customers got.
Sent from my SM-S938U using Tapatalk
I stopped using what I thought was a straight up butcher when I stopped by to pick up a friends Elk sausage. His son told me just to walk in, I did and seen about 25 Elk hanging in what was suppose to be his cooler. It was like 70 degree's in there with 5 or six guys cutting green meat off the carcasses to ready them for processing. The smell was pretty bad. That's the last time I used him. In his defense, he made great sausage.
butcherboy
WKR
If anyone is ever in northwest NM stop by my plant and I’ll show you what a clean and honest meat processing plant looks like and how it operates.
Hopefully someday when I draw a tag
