Where's the Beef?

Apparently, it's all in my freezer.

Made the hourish drive this morning to pick up our half-cow at the butcher shop. Last year we got 1/4 of a cow, twice separated by about 5-6 months. So this year when our rancher called to see if we'd be ordering any, we got 1/2 a cow. I didn't think about how much meat that actually was until fairly recently.

This is a sideways picture of our freezer before the beef. We had maybe 5# of beef leftover from our other cow order and a little pork, otherwise I've been purposely cooking all the meat up to make room for our half-cow.

The drive up to the Flathead Valley was great. Sun shining, roads clear and great company. (My fellow at-home mom K accompanied me). I wish I would've brought my camera, because there is one sight that was totally picture worthy. We're driving north and are cresting the hill right after Ravalli, right before St. Ignatius, and as we get to the top, the Mission Mountains are directly in front of us, perfectly white with snow and glowing from the sunshine. Words do not do it justice, it was so beautiful. If you've ever seen the Mission's you know what I mean. If you've never seen them, then I'm sorry. You're missing out.

I picked up the meat, 5 boxes of it. 4 large and one smaller. I could fit them all in my trunk, so I was hopeful they'd fit in my freezer. Drove them home and started the process of unpacking the boxes into the freezer.

I quickly realized I needed to ditch the plastic organizer thingies. I needed all that space for meat. I thought to myself, "How does one even organize over 400# of beef anyways?"

You don't. You just jam it all into the freezer any old way and hope for the best. As it turns out, my ground beef is mostly on top, so guess we'll be eating that for a while.

Here's the finished freezer. Filled to the absolute top w/ meat.
Oh wait, I have a freezer in the house, too, attached to the frig...

Had to kick the nuts out of the bottom and fill that with ground beef too. And some on that 2nd to bottom shelf. And that third from bottom shelf has our "old" beef and a ham hock. 

So, folks, there you have it. Half a cow is a lot of meat. But hey, at least I know "what's for dinner"!!