Thread: Processing game to avoid food poisoning

There is nothing really different between skinning and butchering small game from large game its all the same thing your doing. What you might do to a deer, you will do to a rabbit. Except rabbits are more fragile and so easier to process in general. You can dismantle them all the same way.


The important thing is to cool the meat as soon as possible. So cut or butcher it after you shoot it, dont leave them lying around for hours before you get to processing them. Cool the meat down while keeping flies off, which is why you put them in old cotton pillow cases. Keep in the shade until you can take it home and don't put it in a plastic bag until it is actually cold.

While your cutting it up keep grass and dirt and hairs off the meat. It doesnt really make much difference, Ive eaten it all, but your family wont like it. Often if I want to take a whole rabbit, I will skin him first then gut him, then cut him up, then you dont get fur on everything. If you get any of the gut contents onto the meat or urine etc, then just cut that bit of meat off. Cut around and take off all of the bloodshot meat from the shot. This is not edible and will go off immediately as well and taint any meat nearby.


I have tried cooling meat and then putting them into plastic bags once cold, and then putting the bag into a creek in the water. But eels are my mortal enemy, and can chew into the plastic bags. Then I put stones all around it and build a wall, and then the eels will sometimes go over the top. They are my nemesis.

Get the meat home and into the fridge or freezer that night. I would not use the meat from an animal that has laid out all night that has not been gutted except when it's real cold. Certainly not in summer.


Then at home I will freeze it all, I find freezing meat for a while will tenderise nearly anything.
I also tend to soak rabbit and hare meat in salt water for a few hours if I am going to cook it. Gets rid of a lot of the gamey taste of hares. If you dont have salt - a pinch of msg (!) will do it!


There is no critical danger to be afraid off. Have been eating wild meats since I was a child and no one has ever had any food poisoning. Cooking food kills germs thats why we do it. (But you may adopt a simple general rule - when in doubt, don't eat it. Give it to your neighbour.)