Have you replaced beef with venision? Or would you?

[BJE80]

For those of you that have high deer numbers and can kill enough deer to feed your family do you not buy beef anymore? Or is venison just a supplement?

If you don't have high enough deer numbers would you replace beef if you could?

 

[bueller]

We haven't bought ground beef in years. Use ground venison, with pork added, for everything in place of it. We do however still cook some beef steaks once in a while as the venison ones just don't compare IMO.

 

[NWWI]

Beef is a bad word in our family. We favor venison for most everything. Besides if you don't eat what you shoot, you shouldn't be out hunting in my opinion.

 

[SD51555]

I wouldn't quit steaks and burgers. But it would be nice to have some venison one of these years. 50 lbs puts a lot $ back in a guys pocket when burger is tickling $5/lb.

 

[bwoods11]

We eat a lot of venison on the grill, and a lot of ground in hot dish and spaghetti etc...

I won't eliminate the beef though.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

When i lived in a very high deer density suburban area (Long Island, NY) we pretty much had unlimited doe tags and a long bow season (90 days) I was single at the time and I would kill 5-8 deer a year. In years that i killed 8, i donated 2-3 and kept the balance. I was renting at the time and had limited freezer space. I never bought beef from the grocery stores during those years, but that is not to say that i wouldnt eat beef if i went out to eat or to a friends house where beef was being served. My room mate and i would eat venison all the time and i would have some rather large cook outs where we would chef up a good pile of assorted venison products. Those 5-6 deer would feed me, my room mate, and a couple of cook outs through the course of the year.

Now that i am married and have a kid, i would like to use venison more, but I live in an area where at most I can get 4 deer tags (1 buck, 3 does), but most years i can only get 2 doe tags, the 3rd is a bonus if there are any unsold doe tags once the first day of archery season has passed. There are also DMAPs for state forest land nearby, but to be truthful i wouldnt really want to fill a doe tag on those lands because the deer numbers there are WAY down. I also dont have nearly as much time to hunt as i used to.

 

[Daydreamer]

Similar to Bwoods we eat a lot of steaks, ground venison in chili, hot dish, spaghetti etc and this year is the first year we've also done 1/4 pure grass fed beef. My girls love venison steak and the grass fed beef has been delicious as well. So we've moved away from store bought beef to supplement our venison intake with grass fed beef.

 

[bwoods11]

As much as I love venison and beef, buffalo and elk might beat them both!!

 

[Greta&Gus]

I eat about 80% wild game at home and that is down from 99% from the last few years because I didn't get a deer this year. Luckily I have a freezer of halibut. Between fishing, pheasants, deer, and the occasional turkey there is no need to buy meat. I always get a few bear steaks from our bear hunters too although it isn't my favorite.

Kill it, clean it, cook it, eat it. That is the only way a man should live.

 

[gwm]

My parents raise a few head of beef and butcher one or two a year. I buy half a beef from them every year when they butcher. We also shoot a few deer each year and have venison steaks and hamburger. The majority of the venison goes towards "goodies" like jerky, sausage, landjeagers, etc., so it really only supplements the beef in our house. Between the half beef I buy and the deer we shoot, it's probably been 5+ years since I've bought beef from the store.

 

[wiscwhip]

Kill it, clean it, cook it, eat it. That is the only way a man should live.

I have to see a deer before I can kill a deer, I have to kill said deer before I can clean said deer, etc., etc., etc. That is the way I would live if I could. Along with supplemental elk meat from my brother in WY when I can get some.;)

 

[tooln]

I'd love to have the numbers to substitute venison for beef. But it would also be hard to give up a good Porterhouse, T bone or New York Strip.

 

[wiscwhip]

I'd love to have the numbers to substitute venison for beef. But it would also be hard to give up a good Porterhouse, T bone or New York Strip.

 

[BJE80]

1. Ribeye
2. Prime Rib
3. Porterhouse.



IMO.

 

[wiscwhip]

I would say this:
1. Porterhouse
2. Ribeye
3. Prime Rib

My wife would say this:
1. Prime Rib
2. Prime Rib
3. Prime Rib

LOL!

 

[kabic]

Prime Rib...reminds me of a story. I was in Winnipeg for work with a co-worker. We go to a nice restaurant and he orders the Prime Rib. When it comes out he looks at it and call the waiter back.

coworker: "is there something wrong with the prime rib tonight?"
waiter: "no sir, what do you mean?"
coworker: "its not very 'prime' looking is it?

apparently it had too much fat or cartilage or something for him. He sent it back and got a steak. Yeah he was kind of an A hole, but every time I hear prime rib advertized I remember this and laugh.

 

[Rally1148]

I'm trying to head that way. We've started doing 100% venison burgers, and it's great. We don't get enough steaks to completely replace them, but if we could, then I'd go for it! We buy steaks on sale if we find them, but that's about it. 2 deer a year is the most we ever get, just because I know state land mows them down, and my one neighbor lets his buddy shoot as many as he wants. 3 deer taken off of his 100 feet. I'd only seen 5 deer all season (during daylight), and 3 of them were fawns, one was a spike, and the other was a button. I'm not complaining, as we've got solid deer numbers, it's just not worth it to me to shoot any of those deer.

 

[BJE80]

Prime Rib...reminds me of a story. I was in Winnipeg for work with a co-worker. We go to a nice restaurant and he orders the Prime Rib. When it comes out he looks at it and call the waiter back.

coworker: "is there something wrong with the prime rib tonight?"
waiter: "no sir, what do you mean?"
coworker: "its not very 'prime' looking is it?

apparently it had too much fat or cartilage or something for him. He sent it back and got a steak. Yeah he was kind of an A hole, but every time I hear prime rib advertized I remember this and laugh.

I know I am an Ahole for posting this but I'll take all that fat any day!! LOL

 

[j-bird]

When it comes to my household the primary red meat if venison. The ONLY beef we eat are steaks. We have not had actual beef burger in years. You come to my house and get red meat and it isn't steak - it's deer - get over it or get out! I have my deer made into tenderloins, burger and summer sausage. The burger goes into everything (especially with a family of 6 of us).

 

[Natty Bumppo]

I don't harvest enough deer to eat only venison. Wish I did. Even if I did, I still think beef would remain in our diet to a degree. There is something about fresh, local, grass fed beef that is just delicious.

Anybody raise their own beef for the family? I've got a 4 acre field behind the house…thought about raising a Dexter or two for some freezer beef.