I haven't bought grocery store pork chops or sausage for a couple of years now.

This Yankee has been hunting hogs in Texas for the last six years. Between me and my wife, we have killed ten and we ate them all. We grill the chops and ham steaks and tuna the rest into sausage. All the meat we have given away has been enjoyed. We think it has much better taste than domestic pork.

I will be honest with you. I have cleaned all but on I have shot. The one I didn't clean was a big boar I shot in early bow season. I worked and worked at getting him out of the woods but he was to big for my dad (70 years old) and I to get out. After 2 hours dragging him a foot at a time in the heat I decided the meat wasn't going to be any good by the time it got him to camp and cleaned so I cut out the backstraps and left the rest for the buzzards.

I keep the backstraps whole and grind everything else. I do breakfast and link sausage some but just grind most of it with a brisket to add some fat to hamburger. I am very careful to cook it all to 165 degrees which is fine for the ground meat but really dries out the backstraps. I have had better meat but with meat at $5 per pound it will continue to clean them.

Now for the honesty part. If I had a freezer full of axis like you I wouldn't clean a single dang pig! But we have very few deer on my lease...I haven't killed one in 3 years but there are lots of pigs...so if you will promise to keep axis in my freezer I will stop cleaning them but otherwise I will keep utilizing the cheap protein!

I am currently digesting a large helping of wild pork carnitas washed down with a couple of ice cold Shiner Bocks. I'm tellin y'all who aren't eating your wild pork, you are missin out!