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Hog breaking demo at the county fair changed my whole process, but is it actually better?
Back in April I watched this older guy break down a whole hog at the Greene County fair in about 40 minutes. He did everything with a curved boning knife and no saw at all. Ive always used a bandsaw for ribs and chops, but he just worked around the bone with that knife. It looked smoother and there was way less waste. I tried it on a 180 lb pig last Saturday. Took me almost 2 hours but I did not lose a single scrap to sawdust or bone fragments. My question is, for those of you who do it pure knife style, is the time cost worth it for a busy shop? Or is the bandsaw just practical and I should stick with it?
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charles6401mo ago
I switched over about three years ago after watching a guy at the Ozark Mountain Fair do a 200 pounder with nothing but a stiff fillet knife. First time I tried it, took me over two and a half hours and my hand cramped up something fierce. But I kept at it every other weekend on smaller hogs, and now I'm down to about 50 minutes on a good day. The real difference is I stopped fighting the bone and started feeling for the joints with my fingers, that's the trick. For a busy shop, I'd say keep the bandsaw for your big volume days, but do one pig a week by hand to build that skill. It will save you a ton of meat in the long run, and honestly, the chops you cut yourself sell better cause they're thicker and cleaner. Time cost is real, but you can make it up by charging a little more for the hand cut stuff, people notice.
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