Thread: Goat: Plentiful, Tasty but often Stringy

Originally Posted by Coote

Thank you for all the comments, suggestions and recipes. That 40 C ageing formula was particularly interesting. I look forward to trying your ideas.

I started to think about not wasting the testicles after doing a job for an Egyptian guy who suggested it. His wife/partner said that the men eat them because they believe that it makes them more 'active'. Never noticed a difference myself.

I like to hang meat before I freeze it nowadays. I don't have a chiller, and we have a pathetically small fridge.... but I do have a shed with a veranda roof on the shady side. I protect the meat from insects and dust with cotton sheets and pillowslips. I've sewn some sheets to form tubes. Dunno if it really makes a difference, but I will often hang a carcass from the aitch bone (pelvis) because I once read that hanging from the back legs can contribute to the meat being tough.

Here are a couple of pigs hanging in my 'chiller'...

That Egyptian bloke is probably still laughing and telling his mates about the day "this Kiwi bloke fell for the old 'eat Billy Goat Balls for improved libido' line". Aside from that an old fridge works a treat for aging and a top notch tip from someone clever in a prior thread was to use two 20ltr buckets one inside the other with holes drilled in the base of the inner one to let blood drain away from the meat. Re pigs, I have only had trouble when the weather is humid as well as warm. A drying wind that is not really cold gives a great set. I wonder if pork holds / retains moisture more so than other meats ?

mate you are supposed to split the pelvis open so meat can cool easier....helps prevent bone taint.
as for stringyness...carve across grain just like ringing a log with chainsaw....your teeth do the splitting bit LOL. young and tender works for many things....goats for eating is one.

For some reason pigs seem much more prone to going bad if they arent cooled quick, wetting your meat sacks will keep the contents cooler than just hanging there.

we knocked over a couple of VERY fat house muttons last year.......they nearly went off overnight hanging in garage even though it was cool because the fat layer insulated the meat too much and it just couldnt cool off properly....possibly the reason pork is so suseptable to it??? wont be a problem with most goats.....bugger all fat even on a fat one.

Thanks for all the good comments.

Although I can see the wisdom in doing so, I seldom split the pelvis, but I do take care to open up the pelvic cavity so that there is a 'chimney' that air can flow through. I cut away all the flabby bits around the bum. I also generally hang with the skin on. I figure that while enzymes are naturally present in the meat, the bacteria that cause rot generally have to come in from outside. Also, if the odd fly or two makes its way through a hole in the sheet, there is less exposed meat to lay eggs on. Sometimes prior to hanging, I might spray any exposed meat with vinegar then wipe the worst of the gunge off with paper towels. I've also rubbed salt and/or pepper on to exposed flesh in the hope it will slow rot and deter bugs.

Wetting the sheets is a good idea. At one place where I've stayed we kept our food in a sheetmetal box in the shade. The box had a cotton sheet draped over it, and on top of the box we had a big plastic bottle with a small hole drilled through its base. The bottle was filled with water and it slowly trickled out over the sheet.

I do hang pigs, but I am cautious about it. Dunno why really, but they instinctively feel like a whole different thing to venison which seems to survive a long time hanging unrefrigerated. I'd happily hang a pig in the shade for maybe four days in a Nelson winter, but I go past it regularly and have a sniff.

I don't know for sure if I've ever experienced bone taint.... but I'm pretty sure I've noticed 'gut taint' on animals that either weren't gutted when shot (like possums brought home after spotlighting), or when recovered a day or so after having been shot but not found at the time in poor light conditions etc.

I figure it can't be too bad though seeing our reasonably recent ancestors allegedly used to hang game birds and hares for days until they 'turned green'.

Hanging meat, especially venison, is something I generally strive to do nowadays no matter what the season...even for a short time. And it seems that it does improve it. Have to say though, over the sixty odd years I've been eating it, I've also enjoyed a lot of wild meat that was never hung... although there was often quite a bit of time between killing it and getting it into the freezer.

I've been a bit of a 'clean freak' for a while now, and the time I spent working at a fish processing plant made me very aware about food safety. And while I would always urge people to be clean and careful and follow the guidelines, my life experience has shown me that some people survive perfectly happily while dealing with fish and meat in a way that could get a restaurant shut down. Sometimes folks don't have refrigeration and even cooked meat is kept for a day or two in a safe. And my elderly mother horrifies me with the food she leaves in the microwave or on the bench and she is still ruling the roost at 89.

I want to make tender beef ribs after having amazing ones in USA and asked my butcher about them
He said that unless you sous vide cook them they are beyond tough and chewy
I imagine it would solve this issue in goat too
I cooked a pork shank for 48 hours one time and the ligaments seemed to completely dissolve and dissipear

Originally Posted by Bill999

I want to make tender beef ribs after having amazing ones in USA and asked my butcher about them He said that unless you sous vide cook them they are beyond tough and chewy

I'm a qualified butcher and practically live off goat You shouldn't need to sous vide beef ribs unless they are off an old bull or an old culled cow! About 6 hours in a slow cooker or in the oven mimicking the slow cooker way i.e; low heat, slow cooking, plenty of liquid. I do goat ribs all the time and usually slow cook them and then crisp them up for half an hour under the grill basting with sauce. Last time I did them like that a friend who is mostly vegetarian tore into them and raved about them ha ha

I usually use a dry garam masala rub on the ribs and then slow cook them for 6-8 hours. Usually 6 is ample. Then finished in the oven for about 15-20 mins with a sweet chilli and soy marinade.

When frying goat steaks etc you need to take them out earlier than with beef, lamb, venison etc as the goat seems to continue "cooking" for another minute or so on the plate. So if you like your goat steak medium rare, take it off at rare....

I agree with most of the comments above except splitting the pelivis to aid cooling.

I never bother with this, either it is cool enough to not bother or I leave the pelvis intact and open up both hip joints, it is the synovial fluid in the joints that goes off first and causes bone taint.
If you are concerned about anything going off open up the hip joints.....or even all the leg joints.
Pork is exceptionally bad for bone taint if not cooled rapidly but it can happen to venison or chevon too.

yip thats the other way to do it.....I was taught to open pelvis at very early age (might even had been before taught to walk lol) the old man would go crook if it wasnt done so it sort of is ingrained.....also putting a stick or something similar between gut flaps to open them up more.....
when doing a mutton I put a cut about 2" long up close to edge just into flap side of last rib and "tuck" the forelegs into these....it sort of like grabbing your own tits.... what it does is twofold one it helps to make ribcage open once you have cut open brisket and the 2nd thing is it makes front quarter roast more square so it fits in a meat dish.

Even in the abattoirs where carcasses go straight into the chiller, during summer they often break open the hip ball joint and knee cap to let the synovial fluid out to eliminate bone taint. The fluid has a neutral PH which is perfect for the bacteria to breed in.

We used to often have wild pigs brought in for saussies that had bone taint. The hunters were always disappointed when we turned them away, Mostly they were summer caught pigs and it had taken a few hours to get them out during the heat. Bone taint can happen within a couple of hours on a hot day and of course often they'd been hung in the garage overnight before bringing them in.

I used to tan a lot of skins once and often had deer hides arrive that were slipping in the groin and armpit area. The reason was that it was summer and they'd been carried out like a backpack and the heat didn't dissipate from those areas on the carry out.

Deer farm slinkies are often like that too. The top side was fine because it had cooled. But the side touching the ground would already be slipping within an hour or so because the heat couldn't get away and it was usually warm late November.

Mind you, we had cockies bring in sheep for saussies that had been sitting uncovered in the woolshed over night. Absolutely yellow with fly eggs..... I could go on for weeks about the dodgy meat brought in by farmers and hunters!

Even had one bunch of guys turn up with a beefy on the back of a truck at 6am at first light. Still warm and covered in grass, bracken, dirt etc.... We knew one of them was dodgy so told them to f### off...... Boss rang the cops because for sure some cocky had lost a beefy...

What a great thread thanks. I'd never heard of synovial fluid before tonight. I've seen the stuff, but didn't know its name or that it could cause a problem. I guess once the joints are opened, it could be swabbed away with a paper towel and then maybe sprayed with vinegar and wiped again.

Jamming the gut flaps open with a stick is something I grew up with too. The comparison of grabbing your own tits is an intriguing one. I see what you mean though.

If you want a great goat curry (or any other curry) and live in Auckland, try this place..... I'm still trying my hardest to replicate their goat curry..... As long as you don't mind eating bone-in meat curries..... https://www.facebook.com/Viti-Currie...7086819502727/

what i use to do to save time making a curry was to bake or grill the meat first and make it and the sauce taste fantastic exclusively
then cut the meat and incorporate it into the sauce and cook a bit more.

dusting with flour and frying each individual piece gets old real fast

ahh the days of living on Tahr as a student, good times

go find a filipino friend, their goat meat recipes are amazing !!

Thanks for the continuing input !

I thought this might be an appropriate place to show how I split a carcass down the backbone. It's a lamb being butchered in the photo. I don't like the grit left behind by a saw, and I find it easy to wander off centre with a cleaver or axe. This machete method seems to create relatively few bone chips. The machete in the picture has a ten inch blade, a longer one may suit some situations better. I hold on to the machete handle with one hand while I beat the other end of the blade with a suitable bit of wood.