Recently a friend and I were emailing back and forth about canning and chili and ground meat. He’s a friend from years and years and years back and he cans a lot of food . . way more than I ever thought about canning. He was telling me that he grinds his own hamburger meat. We discussed his concerns about storebought ground meat and his reasons for grinding his own meat. I have the attachment to my Kitchen Aid to grind meat but he was grinding fairly large quantities — to make gallons and gallons of chili at one time so I doubted he was using a Kitchen Aid attachment. He told me that he uses a grinder from Cabelas. You know where this is going, don’t you?
Yep, I got it. I’m pretty sure it’s the same one Amazon sells that’s made by Waring but it actually cost less at Cabelas.
And then I got meat that was on sale at the grocery store.
And then I chopped it into chunks that would go through the grinder. And then I put it all in the freezer til it was nice and cold but not frozen.
And then it went through the grinder.
The bowl in the back is ground for hamburgers and meatballs. The bowl in the front is ground for chili. Both are a mixture of pork and beef – about 3/4 beef and 1/4 pork.
I froze it — 2 pounds of meat per bag for chili, 2 pounds per bag for meatballs and 3/4 pounds per bag for hamburgers.
The meat grinder worked like a charm and clean up was a breeze. I wouldn’t want to get it out and use it to grind just enough for one meal but once I get my big freezer over here and have time to can chili, I’ll probably grind at least 20 pounds of meat at a time. It’s really quick. The one word of caution — it’s loud! I used hearing protection — the same hearing protection muffs I use for shooting. I do believe the grinder is loud enough that I wouldn’t use it without hearing protection. It also came with two sizes of tools to use for stuffing sausage. I ordered casing and will start experimenting with making sausage. For now I can smoke them on my small smoker but eventually, Vince is going to build a smokehouse.
It’s really nice to know where my ground meat came from . . not that I have total control since I’m buying the roasts to grind, but way more control than buying ground meat that could consist of meat and products from several places and several countries.
We grilled some burgers made from the meat and it was good — probably if you didn’t know it had been ground at home, you wouldn’t notice but as the grocery-buying-researching-too-much wife, I know it’s home ground and I felt a whole lot better about it.
I haven’t used a meat grinder in ages, but I’ve recently been thinking I’d like to have one again. Now I’m really excited about it! It’s too late for Christmas though…perhaps an anniversary gift?! LOL!
We buy beef from a friend, but there are portions we would like to grind too…thanks for the “how to.” My husband is going down to start now.
I’ve been thinking about grinding our own hamburger lately and you may have pushed me over the edge.
Smokehouse?! Wow! this dream home/property just keeps getting better and better! I am so glad your property situation was resolved so you can have the merriest of Christmases!
And so starts another adventure in the ever changing lives of Judy and Vince!! Now they are adding sausage making!! We have good friends in MO who make all their own sausage. Yum, good and good to know where it came from.
Oh, dear….you are forever making me feel inadequate!!! (NAH….just kidding….but keep up the good work!!!)
Heck, you’ve got space to raise a beef now! We ranch so we’re kind of baised, but not much beats ranch raised beef. We head the Cabela’s fan club. If you ave their VISA, you can earn points that come in mighty handy!
We have that same grinder. I use it to grind DEER MEAT. We REALLY know where our meat has come from! (Like, just across our bottom land.) You know, if you could just get Vince to set up a deer stand on your land… but I know that is not going to happen.
I don’t want to HEAR the hunting stories, I don’t want to THINK about the shooting, but when it comes to EATING… venison is mighty good. I use it just as I would beef. It sure saves on the meat bill!
Merry Christmas!
KAT in Tamale Land
We use our grinder alot….
great price on that grinder – and I am in the market for one too – I loaned mine to someone a while back and now I can’t remember WHO I loaned it to! And, it hasn’t been returned
If we get a deer, I’ll definitely need one!
Maybe some day I will get one! For now, I use my food processor to do something similar (not quite the same as ground), but I do like the freshness and quality. Will this be something you can store above the sewing area?
Have the same grinder. Was using the attachment for the Kitchen aide but when Galen started bringing home more game-we had elk a couple of years too. We bought this one and we have the slicer for when we make jerky! Since the one section of the toll opened up Cabela’s is way to close to us now. Don’t have to go through Austin on 35!
I got my grinder about 3 yrs. ago for making venison jerky with a jerky gun. I’ve always intended to make my own hamburger, even bought roasts on sale a time or two, but they always wind up in the freezer whole because life gets in the way.
Living in ranch country maybe you can buy a beef, or a half. and really know where your meat comes from.
Judy – not that I’m likely to ever want to cook enough to have a grinder or grind my own hamburger, but I’m curious….how do you calculate the percent of fat when you grind your own? I like certain percentages for certain things, like I don’t even try to make burgers out of ground beef that is less than 20% fat because they have no flavor. Just curious….
I was kind of wondering about that myself. I was at the grocery store today, and they had chuck roast on sale for $1.97 a pound. Haven’t seen ground beef that low in some time around here. Really is getting me to thinking. Would be a good investment.
DS#2 just got his grinder yesterday, so I will have access to a large grinder now. Do you pressure can your hamburger? I remember canned hamburger at home some 60 years ago, but if I remember right it was boiled in a huge water bath for around 5 hours. We didn’t have a pressure caner then. Really made the cook house warm as it was a wood cook stove. Was a pain to keep that thing burning for half a day. Plus we had to carry water from a well as there was no running water then either.
awesome!!! We are starting slower with the grinder on the KitchenAid and the sausage maker -but I can see where we are headed here, too…
Look in the current issue of Hobby Farm Home, they have some recipes and info on making your own sausages.
no meat grinder yet but did get a large pressure cooker for Christmas
now I can can my own veggies and jellies again!
Can’t wait to read about your sausage making!
Judy, Jim and I grind our own meat, we also make all our sausage. We use the LEM 1 hp:
http://www.lemproducts.com/product/lem_22_electric_grinder/electric_grinders
And this stuffer… which is TOTALLY awesome!:
http://www.butcher-packer.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=412
All metal gears, it’s a tank and works beautifully!
I would love to know more about your ideas for the smokehouse! Sounds like a fabulous project!
Also love the shout out Cabela’s having the cheaper bargain.
Anyone know good recipes for simple delicious meals?? Starting a new job this week and need recipes.
Thanks all,
Emily
I’ve considered buying the Kitchenaid meat grinder attachment because of the same concerns re:ground beef. I’d also be interested in grounding turkey or chicken… Did you find the kitchenaid attachment worked OK?
I bought the Kitchenaid ice-cream maker a few days ago and LOVE it! It takes a lot more prep than I expected, but it’s worth the efforts and planning.
We have an old glavanized hand grinder for meat that we have used for years. This year, because of my advanced pregnancy, we borrowed a friends kitchen-aid grinder attachment and thought it was great at saving the arm from fatigue; except it was LOUD! Since we process deer after the kids are in bed the noise was just too much and the speed between the kitchen-aid verses the hand crank just weren’t that different. So we probably won’t invest in an electric one unless we start getting more game and it becomes too unreasonable physically. My next “gadget” will be a dehydrater since we currently use the stove which is extremely unefficient! We also make our own jerky and sausage… I prefer the venison over beef so we don’t buy much storebought beef but I would love to find someone local who sells fresh pork!
If it’s hunting season there kill one of those deer and grind some venison for chili; it tastes wonderful!
i don’t know how blogs work. i was hoping to find a sausage recipe as we just got a grinder and i’m so excited! not sure if you will see this since this blog is from so long ago but if you do, and if you have a good recipe, i’d love to try it out. we are processing elk and pork on sunday (3 days from now) into sausage — i’m talking breakfast sausage, not italian.
we did get an italian sausage seasoning packet at cabella’s when we got the grinder (1 1/2 hp) but i’d much rather have a recipe that’s recommended than to just keep buying different ones to do 25 lb. hoping we’ll like it.