My wife won a 11 pound pork loin, now this is great however it is just me her and the kido. So I want to cut it up and freeze it. Question is how to best do that while it is still frozen or at least mostly frozen? Thanks for any tips you all give me.
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Ya got the Pork part right.
Recipes is for an actual recipe you are posting. Discussion is for everything else. -
Two thoughts:
1) If there's a butcher nearby they might be able to cut it while it's frozen on a bandsaw etc.
2) let it partially thaw and cut it yourself with a cleaver, etc. That could be hard but I think of pork loins as no more than 4" thick or so and that seems doable to me.
Another approach would be to let it thaw and cure/smoke some of it. I also think you could refreeze it if you did it right away without any food safety issues though the texture might suffer a little.Comment
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What I would do is let it PARTIALLY thaw to where you can cut it with a large chef knife of maybe serrated knife, and keep say 1/3 of it as a pork loin to use for that type "roast" cook, and slice the rest into 3/4 to 1 inch thick pork chops, and then pack it all back up into the freezer. I've had the best luck doing this with a serrated knife, as you can kinda of saw through the semi frozen meat.
It's been a while since I bought a pork loin, but I often bought them to cut into chops, but its a good way to use a large cut of meat where cooking 11, 5.5 or even 3 pounds at once may not make sense.
Just be aware that if you cook pork loin (or pork chops) beyond about 145F, they will be as dry as a bone. Virtually no fat in those things, aside from whatever surface fat was left on it. I like to marinate the pork chops before cooking. For the pork loin treatment, I've done the porchetta thing several times, where you fillet/unroll it, apply a spice paste, and roll it back up, tying with string.Last edited by jfmorris; December 13, 2021, 02:47 PM.Comment
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You could try a hacksaw if ya have a clean blade, but one of these would be better. Japanese saws have a thinner kerf, so ya lose less meat.Comment
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I've used a clean hack saw blade to butcher deer for years and it works just fine on either raw or frozen meat. If the meat is frozen the finer the teeth the less waste there will be. But whatever tooth pitch you use the waste will be minimal. If the loin is frozen don't worry about thawing it. Just cut and wrap.
On cuts with bones you can still just cut and wrap without worry about thawing.Last edited by wu7y; December 13, 2021, 07:07 PM.
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Refreezing thawed meat doesn’t make it unsafe to eat, but it does degrade the quality. I think the best advice is to let it thaw only enough so you can cut it. I am assuming it is boneless. I usually cut a loin into chops and save a 2-3 pound piece for stuffing.Comment
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That is a big pork loin. I would hope to cut some nice thick chops out of part of it.Comment
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I've cut them with a brand new hack saw blade. Kinda tough to do. A butcher's bandsaw would be ideal.Comment
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Smoke the whole loin and invite over some friends / relatives / neighbors. My neighbors always seem to enjoy this when I do it. 😊Comment
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Just the wife and I, so when I do one, we just freeze the leftovers. No reason not to cook the whole thing depending on the method you are planning. Freezing doesn't work so good if you're gonna stuff/roll it.Comment
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