Best way to partially thaw meat before grinding?

daftcat75

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I know how to make pink slime in a food processor.

So I hear meat should be partially frozen (or mostly frozen?) before grinding. And I just got a manual grinder to not make any more pink slime with. I hope.

I have a couple lbs of butchered rabbit meat and organs in my freezer. How should I go about partially thawing it? For how long?

Thanks in advance!
 

darg

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Refrigerator. Probably overnight or longer. I do a partial cook of the turkey I feed. After I take it out of the oven I place it in the freezer just until it's chilled. I don't allow it to freeze. It doesn't have to be partially frozen before grinding but if you are thawing, it probably would grind fine if it were still slightly frozen in the middle. I don't think grinding it while it's still hard frozen would work too well, especially with a manual grinder. But, I've never tried it.
 

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Yeah I would also leave it in the fridge. How long depends on how large the pieces of meat are and the temperature of your fridge. You probably have to test it out and monitor it the first time.
 
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daftcat75

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I'm thinking overnight is too long. Maybe four hours. At least I have two pounds if the first doesn't go well.
 
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daftcat75

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I've been reading google responses.

I bought this whole rabbit frozen from the supermarket. I defrosted it and butchered it Friday night and into the freezer the meat and organs went. But I don't believe I cubed all the meat. Some of the cuts of meat came off in large strips and into the freezer bag those went.

I am going to defrost the meat in the fridge today and hopefully tonight I will be able to properly cube the meat and put the cubed meat back in the freezer for 30 minutes to an hour before grinding. I think it will be easier to partially freeze than to partially thaw.

I hate to put it through multiple freezings. But it's already been refrozen and Krista will still eat the rabbit sashimi: bits I carve off the frozen block and warm slightly in cold water before cutting finely and plating for her.
 

darg

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I'm thinking overnight is too long. Maybe four hours. At least I have two pounds if the first doesn't go well.

It depends on how thick the cuts are and whether you really think it needs to be frozen.

I bought a cheap, manual grinder a few months ago just to try making homemade cat food before committing to buying and electric. I didn't prepare rabbit, just turkey but I never used frozen or partially frozen turkey. Just chilled as I mentioned above. Probably the same temperature or actually a little less than what it would be if it were refrigerated. I cubed it and sent it through the grinder twice, once with the coarse plate then the fine plate. It ground fine. Even handled the skin pretty well. You'll probably end up with a little less "juice" if it's cooler or partially frozen but it doesn't turn to mush if it's not frozen.

That manual grinder actually worked pretty well but I've since purchased a LEM electric grinder. Very nice grinder and makes much easier and quicker work of it but the end result between the manual and electric is basically the same. I wouldn't want to do more than a couple or three pounds with the manual but if not making a bunch of food it's manageable and works pretty well. My biggest issue wasn't with the job that the manual grinder did but that it wanted to wander of the end of the counter. I couldn't get it to clamp securely enough. If I were still using it, I'd have it mounted to a board and then double clamp the board to the counter. I think the legs on mine were a little uneven which was probably the main issue. At any rate, I think it will work fine. It's wasn't too bad at all.
 
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daftcat75

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Right now, it's one big frozen block of rabbit meat. It's not going through the grinder like this. But thawed, it will likely produce pink slime. I've already done that with turkey enough times.

I've washed the grinder and I will put the auger, blade, plates, and bowl into the freezer before it's go-time. When I get home tonight, I'll cube up the thawed meat, weigh out the first pound plus organs, and back to the freezer with both of them for 30 minutes. The other pound will go back to the freezer for next week. Sorry about all the re-freezings, Krista.
 
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daftcat75

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First try didn’t go so well. It just jammed up and squirted some juice. Also the grinder wouldn’t stop trying to walk away. I have a marble countertop and that’s just not going to secure that clamp. The meat went back into the freezer and I tore down and washed up the grinder. I’m going to finish my beer, regroup and watch some more videos, and try again after the baseball game.
 
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daftcat75

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I tore down the grinder. Washed it up. Watched a couple videos on similar models. Put it back together the right way this time and I was ready to go. In my defense, the manual wasn’t much help by showing the sausage stuffing blade in the assembly diagram. My two lbs of meat was more like 1.5 lbs of meat and a half pound of rabbit bacon. Actually I think it was huge strips of fat. I know some fat is called for. But that was beyond what I was comfortable with. So it ground down to a little more than 1 lbs when I added the organs, skipped the extra fat, and gave up on the pink slime that wasn’t going to feed through on the auger.

And did it work? Was my nearly toothless cat able to get through it and did she like it after the supplements were added?

7D472B0F-C413-4783-813F-F553B28763D7.jpeg
 

darg

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Sure helps to get the blade oriented in the right direction :)

Looks like kitty likes it. Glad it went ok.
 
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daftcat75

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Sure helps to get the blade oriented in the right direction :)

Looks like kitty likes it. Glad it went ok.
She liked it last night but this morning, she's just, "meh!" :(
 

darg

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Mine took a while to really warm up to the homemade turkey. Took a couple months actually. But it's all he wants in the afternoon and evening now. That could change of course but as of now he likes it. Try it when he's most hungry. Also, maybe he'd like Turkey better?
 
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daftcat75

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Mine took a while to really warm up to the homemade turkey. Took a couple months actually. But it's all he wants in the afternoon and evening now. That could change of course but as of now he likes it. Try it when he's most hungry. Also, maybe he'd like Turkey better?
I'm sure she'd like turkey better but I also think she's gotten tired of turkey. I wanted to give her a turkey break. I also want to keep extra proteins in her diet. I'm kind of throwing everything against the wall and seeing what sticks right now.

I think I probably made the food too fatty. I added chunks of fat to the grind that probably don't get included if I bought rabbit meat.

Another variable is that I used a duck egg yolk instead of a chicken egg yolk. I'm still not entirely sure if she can have chicken eggs. But in the same vein, I'm not entirely sure she can have duck eggs either.

A third factor that could have been at play is that, relative to how much she's been eating at one time lately, I gave her a rather large portion. A half ounce doesn't sound like much when it was a 1/3 of what she used to eat in a meal. But now I'm lucky if she eats more than a few grams anytime she visits her plates.
 

darg

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But now I'm lucky if she eats more than a few grams anytime she visits her plates.
If that's all she's eating at a sitting how on earth are you getting her to eat enough calories?
 
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daftcat75

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If that's all she's eating at a sitting how on earth are you getting her to eat enough calories?
I'm not. :( That's why I'm trying everything I can to get her on a food she enjoys and will eat more of.

She went to the vet on Saturday. They weren't able to get enough blood from her (wasn't flowing right and/or she wasn't being cooperative) for her CBC panel, but everything else including pancreatitis looks good. SDMA was slightly elevated, likely due to dehydration, because no other kidney related test is out of range. ALP was a "mild elevation" as well. Vet thinks that's just a re-test next month value.

For now, I busted out the last Rad Cat tub I had in my freezer and I'm getting her to eat about 1/2 ounce at a time. I am taking today off to get her back in for her CBC and subcutaneous fluids since she doesn't drink water except what moisture she gets from her food. Then I'm going to give it another go on another rabbit. I'm going to try to ration out the Rad Cat at 2 oz a day. So I have at least another 2 oz to make up with other food according to 3% bodyweight guideline. I'd like her eating almost twice that amount to put weight back on. But I'll take stopping the weight loss first.

She's still so very excited about the Rad Cat that I wish I could find more tubs of this. My next best bet is if I can get up to the raw feeder's coop for turkey hearts, I have the livers, and I just picked up a whole frozen leg (drumstick and thigh) that's defrosting in fridge right now. That will be stripped of meat for the grinder and the remaining meaty bones will make stock.
 
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