Fall Butchering - Dave’s Midwestern Ohio Memories

Blog about fond memories of growing up in Midwestern Ohio during the 50’s & 60’s.

Fall Butchering

As a kid growing up, after the fall harvest in early November came butchering time. Dad and his neighbors would congregate on a Saturday morning at one of their farms and butcher a hog or two for each family. I suppose the process was considered gruesome by today’s standards, but at the time, it was a natural part of being raised on a farm. One of our neighbors was Lud Busse, one of the owners of Busse’s Meat Market in Ft. Loramie. He was there to help make the sausage using his famous recipe. Ft Loramie was so well known for Busse’s Meat Market that people would come from miles around for their meats, especially the tasty pork sausage, available in either smoked or fresh varieties. Campers at the lake each summer always made the trip into town for some sausage to take back to their homes in the cities. There was even a place in Dayton that carried Busse’s meats as I remember it being located along my route to Frigidaire where I worked. There was a large sign saying “World Famous Busse Sausage”.

Busse’s slaughter house was part of co-owner Lud Busse’s farm adjacent to our farm. I spent many a day at the slaughter house observing the butchering process and was amazed how effectively the butchers could carve up a carcass into prime steaks, ribs, hams, pork chops and bacon. A similar process was followed on those fall butchering Saturday’s at our farm. The sausage was made from portions of the hog not used for the prime cuts, which were ground up and stuffed into tubes made from pork intestines. And the animal’s blood was saved for blood pudding, a tasty concoction that Mom would serve hot with lassie bread for breakfast. The bones were saved for soup stock and the fat turned into lard for frying. Not much of the animal went to waste on our farm.

Some of the meats, especially the hams, sausage and bacon slabs, were hung in the smoke house where a small hickory fire would smolder for days to cure the meats so they wouldn’t spoil. Other cuts were packaged and sent to the Wagner’s Locker in Minster for freezing, as most farm homes at that time did not have their own freezers to store meat. Then afterwards came the best part when the pork chops and spare ribs were barbecued usually over an open fire and everyone enjoyed a feast after a hard days work butchering enough meat to last the winter.

Dad used to know the recipe for Busse’s sausage, but I think he went to his grave with that world famous recipe still a secret, although some claim current day Wagner’s and Winter’s sausage comes close, but in my book (er blog), those don't quite measure up to the original.