How do you preserve meat?

[raw-al]

WE are looking into the various ways of meat preservation and are wondering if any others have discovered any particularly good ideas? We are looking into buying a quarter of an animal and putting it in vacuum bags and freezing it.

I am not sure but I believe that I heard that vacuum bagging keeps the meat for a very long time in an unfrozen state. Is this true? This is due to no oxygen being available for spoilage or oxidizing.
The only real problem I see is that the meat would be in contact with plastic. Not sure if the bags from FoodSaver are the bad plastic.

[Raw Kyle]

I dry it into jerky which I then eat or mix with rendered fat for pemmican.

[kurite]

Don't primal dieters believe in eating oxidized meat???

[Roselene]

Why not keep it in glass?  Why freeze it?  Maybe get an animal together with friends, each get a primal cut, a shoulder, a loin, something like that?

[raw-al]

Kyle,
Is the jerky still considered raw? Do you have to heat it to dry it?

Kurite,
I agree about the ozidizing, but my girlfriend has not gotten to the point of eating high meat regularly.

Rosaline,
I agree with the suggestion. We have not found a group to share with but that is on our list.

[Raw Kyle]

You can heat it or not. I have a dehydrator that has temperature settings from 80 to about 150 degrees Fahrenheit. Clearly 80 is not cooking, the meat is warmer than that when the animal is alive.

[raw-al]

Kyle,
Excellent idea! Think I may try to make one. I think I saw a dehydrater somewhere on this site.

[freezerburn]

I have an Excalibur 9 shelf dehydrator.  It is awesome and we use it to make raw jerky.  We dehydrate at about 100 degrees F.  Have found it takes too long any lower but we are sure to keep it below 104.  My wife uses it for her wellness clients and they love it.  It takes a fair bit of time to prepare.  Our butcher pre-slices the beef for us, we marinate using various recipies then dehydrate.  The 9 tray dehydrator can hold about 10 lbs of meat.  Get the teflex sheets with the dehydrator should you go that way.

[mrz]

is there something wrong in storing the meat in the fridge?

[djr_81]

is there something wrong in storing the meat in the fridge?

Nope. I frequently do it for 2 weeks at a time. The meat gets kind of high after a while but it's still more than edible.

[PrimalLadyRosy]

Do you have to heat it to dry it?

From what aajonus wrote in his October 2009 that's in his newsletter in the archives -

Allow (meat) to dry for 5 hours on plates in the sun if in a cool climate or in the shade in a hot climate.

This is for making a survival kit.  This isn't for year round needs.