The Deer Aging Thread

[Cascade340]

After reading through this thread I decided to give it a try myself this year. This is my first time aging meat this long so hopefully it turns out good. I framed off a little area in one of my small outbuildings. It ended up being about 6x12. I only added 1/2” of foam board as I live in Montana where it’s pretty cold this time of the year already. I put in a 12k btu air conditioner and used two ink bird thermostat to control it. It did warm up to about 65 outside when I started the hanging and it was able to stay below 40 degrees in the cooler. Although if it was any warmer for a longer period of time I would have to add more insulation. I aged the meat a total of 27 days. I ended up freezing the quarters and will cut up later this week.

 

[robby denning]

After reading through this thread I decided to give it a try myself this year. This is my first time aging meat this long so hopefully it turns out good. I framed off a little area in one of my small outbuildings. It ended up being about 6x12. I only added 1/2” of foam board as I live in Montana where it’s pretty cold this time of the year already. I put in a 12k btu air conditioner and used two ink bird thermostat to control it. It did warm up to about 65 outside when I started the hanging and it was able to stay below 40 degrees in the cooler. Although if it was any warmer for a longer period of time I would have to add more insulation. I aged the meat a total of 27 days. I ended up freezing the quarters and will cut up later this week.


View attachment 356060View attachment 356061View attachment 356062View attachment 356059

Nice work. I’ll wait to hear your taste results but will offer that your meat looks great. Your humiduty must’ve been in the sweet spot as you don’t have much mold compared to mine.

Let us know.

 

[Jn78]

Robby, I am my giving this a shot with a couple of elk rear quarters. My garage gets up to about 45 by the end of the day. By the evening, the meat gets up to 41 degrees half an inch deep into the meat. It stays below 40 degrees a couple inches deep. Should I try to keep the meat a couple degrees colder? I assume I should be more concerned about the meat temp than the air temp. Is that correct or do i want the air temp below 40? Thanks

 

[robby denning]

No it’s meat temp that matters, but you’re right at the line and what I’ve done in those cases is pop a window open at night and run a fan in it during the night. Then during the day I wrap the quarters in an all sleeping bag.

Good job keeping a close eye on it, that’s what it takes


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[HuntInWild88]

Ok any thoughts on this.. I let the humidity get too high with out enough air circulation. I never had an issue with my deer. But I this is elk and it takes up more room in the fridge. The fluids that are still dripping are still nice and red. I'm somewhere around day 40 as I kind of called it at day thirty but left them hanging until I had time to dispose of the meat. You can see the different colors of molds.

 

[HuntInWild88]

What meat looks like under. Unfortunately due to covid last year I lost my smell and it never really came back.

 

[HuntInWild88]

Ok so took a peice I'm for the wife to smell(she hates the smell of meat) she said it smells like seasoning not something rotting.. so I think I have my answer..

 

[bcblacktail]

Anyone try ice aging in coolers?

 

[Azone]

Just cut up a deer that I let go 30 days. Taste test coming sometime in the next couple days. Some little patches of white and green mold between the hind quarters and some mold around the entrance and exit wound. Walk in cooler had a bit of a funk in the air smell wise but nothing off putting.

 

[riversidejeep]

While I haven't tried ageing venison, I have experimented with beef. We buy our steaks in the whole roast form and I cut them myself, Either ribeye or Newyork strip, In the heavy cyro pack plastic. I started with 2 weeks past the PACK date, on the bottom shelve in the rear of the refrigerator. I just left it in the sealed cyro pack and wrote the cut up date on the calendar, and at the end of 2 weeks cut them up , vacuum sealed and froze. Then it was 3 weeks, 4 weeks ,5 weeks and 6 weeks. 2 weeks I thought it was a little more tender, flavor the same as fresh. 3 weeks was a little more tender and flavorful, 4 weeks about the same as 3 week. 5 weeks was like wow! this is so tender , juicy, flavorful!!!. 6 weeks started to get a funky flavor I didn't care for and was too tender and starting to get a mushy texture. So 5 weeks it is for beef until I cut one up and when I opened the bag you could smell it wasn't good. I'm assuming that it got packaged with some bacteria. I had to throw $200 in the garbage.

 

[Azone]

While I haven't tried ageing venison, I have experimented with beef. We buy our steaks in the whole roast form and I cut them myself, Either ribeye or Newyork strip, In the heavy cyro pack plastic. I started with 2 weeks past the PACK date, on the bottom shelve in the rear of the refrigerator. I just left it in the sealed cyro pack and wrote the cut up date on the calendar, and at the end of 2 weeks cut them up , vacuum sealed and froze. Then it was 3 weeks, 4 weeks ,5 weeks and 6 weeks. 2 weeks I thought it was a little more tender, flavor the same as fresh. 3 weeks was a little more tender and flavorful, 4 weeks about the same as 3 week. 5 weeks was like wow! this is so tender , juicy, flavorful!!!. 6 weeks started to get a funky flavor I didn't care for and was too tender and starting to get a mushy texture. So 5 weeks it is for beef until I cut one up and when I opened the bag you could smell it wasn't good. I'm assuming that it got packaged with some bacteria. I had to throw $200 in the garbage.

Wet aged beef in cryo packs is awesome and you don’t have all the waste from trimming off crust.

 

[hunterjmj]

Thank you for the write-up! For mule deer bucks I normally save the back straps for Pho and pressure can the rest for stew, tacos, nachos but I'd like to try this on a hind quarter or 2. I have my .30-30 in my shop in case I see a whitetail doe hanging around.
My dad always butchered our deer asap because that's what his dad did and what I've always done. Everyone does it different and it would be fun to try a few new things.

 

[Ike Carlson]

I have been experimenting with different aging times in our DIY walk in cooler. We started with 1 week and then 2, 3, 4, 1 month, then 2, etc... until we got to 5 1/2 months. We just ate some steak from a hind quarter that was aging since june 12. About 5 1/2 months. It was covered in mold and the smell of the mold was the only smell that was bad because I have a sensitivity to mold.

I wiped it down with a damp rag and then sliced off the outer layer. It looked amazing inside. We cooked up a few steaks last night and sampled the flavor and texture. It was very flavorful and had a sort of nutty/cheesy flavor. It had an afterflavor of cashews and fresh colby cheese. It was a real brain trip, but was pretty good. Actually, it was really good. I found myself licking my chops for almost an hour, trying to get any hind of flavor that was left. I even swizzled a piece of bread in the pan to soak up any juice and flavor that was left in there.

The only down side to aging for more than a month is the trim loss. You lose a lot of what would have been burger.

We have other carcasses in the cooler at the same time, and they got moldy much faster than normal because of all the spores from the aging quarter. I'm not worried about it, but it's something to note. If you want to age meat for over 2 months, have a dedicated aging cooler.

 

[Pn8hall]

I shot a nice mature buck on Nov 11th. It wet aged in cooler for a few days and got it hung up in frig to age on Nov 15 so only 10 days into dry age part. Super pumped to try it out down the road. This is my 1st attempt at it and am gonna go for 21 days on this one and see how it works. For those that asked about humidity we have 5 walk in coolers at work and they all sit at about 75% humidity so that I decided I would shoot for between 65% and 75%. I currently have my humidifier setup at 65% and initially the level was around 80% when compressor was off because it was at temp. It quickly drops once cooling cycle kicks back in but humidifier keeps it at 65% minimum. Now that they have been drying for a bit its running around 70% in there. Fingers crossed it all works out. Thanks for inspiration WKR’s!

 

[Jn78]

Ok any thoughts on this.. I let the humidity get too high with out enough air circulation. I never had an issue with my deer. But I this is elk and it takes up more room in the fridge. The fluids that are still dripping are still nice and red. I'm somewhere around day 40 as I kind of called it at day thirty but left them hanging until I had time to dispose of the meat. You can see the different colors of molds. View attachment 368270View attachment 368271

I know this is an old post, but how did it taste?

 

[HuntInWild88]

I know this is an old post, but how did it taste?

Terrible! I turned it all into Jerkey..it had a very pungent taste. I didn't get sick off of it. It didn't give me any issues come out the back end.. it just tasted terrible!!. Jerkey was the way to go to not let it go to waste.

 

[Jn78]

Terrible! I turned it all into Jerkey..it had a very pungent taste. I didn't get sick off of it. It didn't give me any issues come out the back end.. it just tasted terrible!!. Jerkey was the way to go to not let it go to waste.

Good for you for figuring out a way to eat it! It looked pretty gnarly.

 

[gtriple]

@robby denning or others - I've got a question regarding the breaking down of myofibrils (?) during the aging process. It was my (possibly incorrect) understanding that once you freeze the muscle, the initial breakdown of the myofibrils (?) that cause rigor mortis and a lot of the toughness in venison gets "stopped" and cannot be resumed.

Has anybody tested what meat is like when frozen immediately then thawing and aging vs allowing to age first, freezing, then thawing and aging?

Can you age, then freeze, then age some more?

 

[MallardSX2]

I just found this thread and I can’t believe you guys eat that crap. Lol

 

[robby denning]

I just found this thread and I can’t believe you guys eat that crap. Lol

We like mold.