Mignon's new home

Our Angus heifer Mignon has a new home as of this morning: The freezer.

At two years old, she was of prime butchering age. Unlike when we butchered her mother, Filet (whom we turned into pretty much nothing but hundreds of pounds of ground beef), Mignon should yield some tender and delicious high-grade cuts.

Butchering day is always tough, at least on me. The older I get, the less I like killing things, and I’m grateful Don is here to make sure things go smoothly. That said, we live on a farm for many reasons, and one of those reasons is to strive toward food self-sufficiency. Raising our own beef is part of that plan.

Unlike butchering days at our last home, however, here they’re a lot less stressful as far as logistics go. That’s because of one of the better purchases we made shortly after moving here: Horse panels. We got what we call a “screamin’ good deal” on these beauties back in 2021, and they have proven endlessly useful.

We set some of them up to be a kind of “chute” on the south side of the barn, right off the corral. It’s a sunny place the cows can hang out in winter, so they’re used to it. But it’s also proven useful as an escape-proof area to isolate an animal to be butchered (emphasis on escape-proof). We’ve had absolutely chaotic butchering days at our last place when animals escaped our admittedly ramshackle corralling attempts, so these horse panels have been a game-changer for us.

In both instances of butchering animals here at our new place – first Filet, now Mignon – it was a simple matter to scoot the animal into the chute, distract the rest of the herd by filling the feed boxes in the barn, and voilà. The local butcher can drive right up to the gate, dispatch the animal, and be off within minutes.

We’re also impressed with the dispatcher. He’s a crack shot. It’s literally one bullet and wham, the animal is down. No pain, no fear. Mignon had her nose buried in a flake of oat hay at the time, so she never even saw it coming. This was the only remnants of Mignon’s passing: A sprinkle of blood on the rocks.

During the two years we raised her, Mignon was a nice-enough animal. She had a decent temperament and let me scratch and brush her. She had a good life for as long as it lasted. If we’re going to eat meat, this is the kind of conditions under which we like to eat it. Thank you, Mignon.