Burgers and Fries - Homestead Style

A few days ago, my family butchered a steer. Summer isn't normally the time to do butchering but we were out of beef, so we (my parents, brothers, sisters, and their spouses) went ahead and did it.

We are rather new to beef butchering; this was only the fourth we have done. It took much longer to cut up the meat than we expected but it went well. The meat had been hanging for a week in the cooler. Maybe someday it will go as quickly and smoothly as hog butchering.



We saved the ground beef for the next day. It was nice to split up the project.



After grinding the meat twice...



most of the ground meat was bagged (this photo only shows a fraction)...



but some was made into burgers and vacuum packed.



That night, my brother and his wife invited us over to their house for a cook-out.



Fresh burgers with all the fixins - including vine ripened tomatoes - delicious!




Also that week my parents had dug their potatoes and got a terrific crop.



They cut up a bunch of potatoes...




and my brother made them into homemade fries.



Brown paper on the tables,



piles of greasy fries and burgers,



washed down with a homegrown watermelon and sweet tea -



a satisfying reward to an exhausting project!