So quick question thats been bothering me for ages and never seems to be answered in any books:
Should you gut your rabbits, pigeons, pheasants, before hanging them?
Should you gut your rabbits, pigeons, pheasants, before hanging them?
Gutting and hanging?
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Rabbits and pigeons are eaten fresh and pheasant should be unless you enjoy the partly rotted additional flavour. Either way take out non edibles as soon as.
Only pheasants are hung undressed but unless you like eating carrion.....draw, gut & gralloch ya game then get it into the oven or the freezer.
hares and pheasants are hung without being gutted, rabbits are gutted immediately they have cooled and lost their body tempaerature, deer are gutted immediately they have been killed as their stomach bloats up quickly, not sure on pigeons as when i have seen them hanging in the shops they have been intact, all that being said hanging game is supposed to make the meat tender and add taste but i personally don't like the taste of hung game at all and find it much more to my own taste if eaten fresh without any hanging time at all, when game is hung the temperature at which it is hung is important and must be below 5 degrees centrigade (just above freezing temperature) to stop blowfly, beef is hung for a considerable period i believe for tenderness and flavour.
Some meat needs to be hung (properly) to break down larger muscle fibres that make the meat tough. For smaller game (e.g. pheasant) its a matter of flavour - chicken is not hung as an example and is comparable in size. I don't hang pheasant - its usually plucked or skinned, drawn and cooked within an hour of being shot. Rabbit needs to be paunched as soon as the fleas jump ship. Hare can be different - it can be a tougher more fibrous meat - you need to find what suits you.
i allways eat mine fresh but i have allways gone with the idea of fowl hangs intact mammals gut asap. did you know woodcock are actually cooked whith guts in and even eaten that way?
btw chicken is traditionally hung for 3 days,try it its a whole better flavour.
btw chicken is traditionally hung for 3 days,try it its a whole better flavour.
all my game is hung with guts in apart from rabbit and deer although the deer are still hung in the chiller then butchered like the other poster it breaks down the fibres and tastes great, another tip if you have tough meat use a couple of kiwi fruit to marinade the meat this really softens the meat up we cooked an old cow in nz whilst i was out hunting it was an old beast that wouldnt sell on but we used it and i can honestly say that it was the nicest steaks i have ever had sat on a mountain eating steaks done in kiwi and a nice bottle of pinot noir ,happy days.
my father in law is an old farmer and his pheasants was hung till it fell off the string ,now that must have been rank but its the way he liked it, atb wayne
my father in law is an old farmer and his pheasants was hung till it fell off the string ,now that must have been rank but its the way he liked it, atb wayne
I do that with an old bird but haven't found it necessary with a young meat bird. Each to their own
I've never been one to hang meat. To do it right, you need a consistent temperature in a narrow temperature band, generally under 40*F and above 32*F. The most people here who I know who have hung game is when they hang a deer, a tough old buck, and often they will do it when they drop it off at a butcher shop to be processed. The butcher will have a walk in cooler which maintains the proper temperature.
In the US we have tons of pheasants, and there are plenty of ways to cook them and other game where you don't need to hang them. An example is cacciatore style, or in a pressure cooker or a dutch oven. Cacciatore style, where you lightly brown the meat and then steam cook it in hot vinegar, is fast and simple, and works on almost anything.
In the US we have tons of pheasants, and there are plenty of ways to cook them and other game where you don't need to hang them. An example is cacciatore style, or in a pressure cooker or a dutch oven. Cacciatore style, where you lightly brown the meat and then steam cook it in hot vinegar, is fast and simple, and works on almost anything.
Mammals and fish should be in my opinion gralloched or gutted as soon as possible, mammals ideally bled as soon as possible after being killed for best meat quality. I break with tradition however in that I hand deer for under a week, without it's jacket. You lose some meat to drying but I think the jacket of the average deer contributes more to the flavour than the hanging and not in an entirely pleasant way.
Fowl are as mentioned traditionally hung with the guts in, something I have always done but not really questioned until lately.
If a bird is smashed, say by a close range charge of pellets, then to salvage it you must gut and pluck immediately. In the case of well shot birds as long as you can cool them down fast enough, you can leave the guts in until the meat has relaxed in the cold store or a couple of days with no detriment to flavour and better texture to the meat.
All meat benefits from a period of hanging in my opinion, How long and in what condition is a matter of personal taste.
Fowl are as mentioned traditionally hung with the guts in, something I have always done but not really questioned until lately.
If a bird is smashed, say by a close range charge of pellets, then to salvage it you must gut and pluck immediately. In the case of well shot birds as long as you can cool them down fast enough, you can leave the guts in until the meat has relaxed in the cold store or a couple of days with no detriment to flavour and better texture to the meat.
All meat benefits from a period of hanging in my opinion, How long and in what condition is a matter of personal taste.
Elen Sentier
Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
I remember that from childhood in the 50s. Will try it again with the Yuletide poultry this year as I'll be getting it fresh-killed on 23rd Dec.
i and a number of folks i know prefer poultry hung 3 days,turkey benifits from it,remember though that the birds in the shops have been efectively that long in transit and sat in the fridges. when i worked at sainsburys as a butcher the birds were some times 4 days old before they got on the shelf/counter.
I know most chickens in the supermarket have been effectively hung before sale. But most other birds over here are processed and frozen before shipment (turkeys, ducks, quail, geese, etc.) In any case with any wild bird I've shot myself I'd prefer to cook it the same day I kill it. Just don't like rotten meat.
Hanging is not to "rot" the meat, it is of course possible to hang for long enough to rot meat but that is not the purpose.
No point typing it all out but there is a good precis here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_(meat)
No point typing it all out but there is a good precis here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_(meat)
I know it's not the purpose; but to me if it's been more than a day since it was killed (unless it's been refrigerated, or frozen, or cured) it just tastes rotten to me. I always have and always will prefer fresh meat.
Hanging is a refrigeration process.
So hanging is relatively new? Refrigeration's only been common about 100 years. And even at that, I don't know many farmers today that have fridges big enough to hang a cow or pig.
