As a hunter, you work hard and invest a lot each season for your take. And there is a lot of satisfaction in a well-executed hunt and the meat your efforts yield. Hunting not only puts man in touch with nature in an appreciation of environment at its finest, but it’s also one of the best ways to provide healthy, truly organic, and unprocessed meat and poultry for yourself and your family.
No matter what draws you out into the wilderness to hunt, there is one thing most hunters can agree on: hunting is hard — albeit rewarding — work. This isn’t just the case during the preparation and hunt itself. Hunters must be diligent in their handling of meat from field to butchering to ensure that its integrity is maintained so that it doesn’t spoil before it can be packaged and frozen. Still, many hunters carefully go through each of the steps of the hunt, then give far too little thought to the packaging, freezing, and overall preservation of the meat once it’s been butchered.
If you’re looking for more information on cleaning, cooling, and cutting wild game, here is a great resource. In this article, we want to help make sure you’re doing everything necessary to preserve and maintain the quality of the fruits of your labor once your hunt goes from the butcher table into the freezer.
Selecting freezer paper for wild game
If you’re hunting large game then even a single kill will yield a lot of meat to store. That means packaging and freezing it in a manner that will ensure it maintains its freshness for as long as possible. When it’s time to freeze your game, keeping air out is the best way to guarantee a fresher product that lasts longer.
Unfortunately, when it comes to keeping air out, many hunters believe that all meat wrapping paper is created equally. In reality, if you want to get the most out of your season’s take, you need to use the proper materials, namely FDA-approved freezer paper, which is ideally suited for packaging all types of game. While butcher paper can also serve many food-related functions, it is not the best choice for long-term freezing and storage of meat. Rather, butcher paper is perfect for wrapping meat, displaying meat, and for short-term storage.
Why is freezer paper the best choice?
Because of freezer paper’s polyethylene coating, it keeps moisture in and air and ice crystals out. The outward-facing paper side allows you to date and label your meat to identify the specific type of meat and cut. Freezer paper is also the best choice for wrapping because it can conform to the exact cut and shape of the meat you’re storing. That tight fit translates to better storage, and longer-lasting meat for all of your hard work.
And, if you want a little variety in your freezer, you can also use vintage print camouflage freezer paper. Camo paper is a fun and creative way to differentiate various types of game, or to organize a freezer that may be full of meat from several different hunts.
Whether you use standard white freezer paper, natural freezer paper or camo freezer paper, it’s important that you know how to wrap meat for freezing.
Here are five easy steps that will help you wrap your meat like a pro and ensure it tastes fantastic when it comes out of the freezer:
- Place the cut of meat in the center of a large enough sheet of freezer paper with the shiny (poly coated) side up.
- Bring the top and bottom edges of the paper together above the meat, fold them together and crease.
- Continue to fold that creased edge until it is flush with the surface of the meat.
- Remove all air bubbles above and below the meat, then wrap the sides down and around the bottom to create a sealed package.
- Use quality freezer tape to seal every seam, finishing the air- and water-tight package.
Storing the meat in your freezer
Some important tips to keep in mind regarding storage:
- Once all of your game meat is wrapped, packages should be stored in a single layer in your freezer to promote rapid freezing throughout. (Stacked packages can act as insulation around center packages and prevent them from freezing properly. You can always rearrange packages once you’re sure everything is frozen.)
- Meat should always be stored at or below 0 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Once you know how to wrap meat with freezer paper, it can be stored in your freezer for up to one year.
Every hunter has his or her own methods and secrets to getting the game they desire. But when it comes to storing the meat from the season, there is only one method that will ensure the integrity and flavor of the meat from your hunts is maintained — high-quality freezer paper from Oren International.
If you’d like to learn more about the freezer paper options we have available for your meat packaging and storage needs, contact us today.
