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How Amish Preserve Meat Without Refrigeration

Frugal Solutions

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Visit https://www.frugal-solutions.com for recipes, guides, printables, and more.

How did Amish families keep meat safe to eat for months without a refrigerator or freezer? In this video we walk through the traditional preservation methods still used on Amish farms today: dry curing and salt curing, smoking over hardwood, rendering and sealing meat in lard, and root cellar storage that holds a stable temperature year-round. You'll learn the salt-to-meat ratios, how long each method takes, and which cuts work best for each technique - the same practical, low-cost methods that let a family preserve a whole hog or side of beef without spending a dime on electricity.

In this video:
Dry curing and salt curing meat the Amish way
Smoking meat for long-term preservation
Rendering and sealing meat in lard for pantry storage
Root cellar and springhouse storage without refrigeration
How long cured and smoked meat actually lasts

Visit https://www.frugal-solutions.com for more traditional preservation guides, Amish-inspired recipes, and printables to help your family become more self-sufficient.

#AmishRecipes #FoodPreservation #Homesteading #FrugalLiving

20 Comments

@Ledenik88 1 year ago

Respect to the Amish people for keeping the tradition going.
Many people in Europe keep up with this tradition.

@thestorm613 2 years ago

I'm 79 yrs. old & I remember the ice box, with a block of ice delivered daily to keep food cold. My granddad in Alabama had a farm. After butchering a cow, he kept it in a wooden barrel after salting the meat down.

@samuski36 1 year ago

I grew up on a farm in northern California, and we did all this, all of it. And we aren't Amish! This is how all Americans lived before modern times.

@scotyluv 1 year ago

You give the Amish alot of props on this, but Americans have been doing this for many many years. It's not an Amish thing. When I was growing up as a normal black kid in rural NC, we preserved our meat the same way because we did not have enough money to buy large enough freezers to hold all of our meat, after we slaughterd our Pigs and hunted deer. My grandparents and their peers of there day all did this, before and after refrigeration was widespread.

@WJV9 1 year ago (edited)

I grew up in NW Missouri farm country before the REA brought electricity to the farm in the mid 1950's. Every farm had a smoke house and a cellar for canned goods and potatoes, onions, etc. We had a ice box to keep our butter and milk in and usually bought a 50lb block every week to put in the ice box. Canning meat is difficult without a pressure cooker because of the long canning time required for 'cold pack' canners. We always canned a lot of green beans, peas and corn along with fruit such as peaches or cherries. Salt curing and smoking meat was the best way to preserve it although I did not care for the extra salty flavor unless the meat was cooked with vegetables. You did not need to be Amish in the 1940s and 1950s to know how to preserve food without electricity.

@daleboe8912 1 year ago

My mom would use a crock to cook down lard and store pork and keep it in the Root Cellar with a layers of lard and pork. Then store carrots in a wooden keg with dry sand. Grandpa would ship kegs of salmon in a salt brine. All of our meats and vegetables were put up every year for all the family.

@JesusPrice 1 year ago

I thought that we'd get a tutorial instead of a basic history lesson.

@sshumkaer 1 year ago

Ever old timer used to know how to do this as a skill, COLD smoking is a lost art today.

@roncameron7461 1 year ago

Great video...one tip though. Pressure canned bottled meat can safely be stored far longer than 5 years... we've pulled venison off the shelf that was 12 years plus old and was perfect 👌🏻

@onlinecheatersexposed8491 2 years ago

we all did this decade's/century's ago, but people have been modernized to technology instead.. and some still do it.. it not just the amish.. frist fridge was sold in 1918.. before fridge we had cellars as cool space for preserved/fermented foods.. and before food cellars, this was the technology we all used - salt, sugar, smoke, fat or boiled in glass jugs/jars.. and before glass it was just layered in even more salt etc in wooden box or "whiskey barrels"

@DeepSouthHomestead 1 year ago

Thanks for using a couple of shots of our smoked bacon. We aren't Amish but the Bacon before it was cut is from our HOMESTEAD Channel

@homesteadgamer1257 1 year ago

Lard is also used to make candles when there's not enough beeswax, or sometimes they're combined for candle wax.

@Cici_Dial 2 years ago

Props to the creator for not having music.!!!!!!
I hate music overriding spoken dialog. So. again, props to the creator for having NO music!!!!!
(Now, if they would just leave out the incessant Shutter click, FLASH,

@Freedomunplugged 1 year ago

“I grew up off-grid in Brazil, and this is exactly how we used to do things! It makes me so happy to be returning to this lifestyle again.

@jackhodge6015 2 years ago

Very eloquent presentation, however i was expecting to learn how to do it

@sergioalin6609 1 year ago

With all the respect to the Amish people… the Italians and most Europeans have been doing it for thousands of years!!! Still doing it!!!! Nothing new… I leaned from my parents and still doing it!

@compassion-t9y 1 year ago (edited)

I'm from north Algeria the mountain region, during summer we salt lamb meat and dry it in the sun for days and then keep it for the winter months, the meat once cooked is so good.

@alive.off-grid 1 year ago

I haven't owned refrigerator in the last 10 years. I live 100% off grid. I can alot been learning to smoke meat. Learn from the best. Thanks for the video

@mikkimikki5376 1 year ago

Thank you. We will all use these skills before too long. ❤

@markhaseley3304 2 years ago (edited)

That's okay, the thumbnail shows possibly what I will look like when I start smoking, salting, vinegar brining my meats here over the next couple years. I already have a white beard! Thanks for a fairly broad presentation of a much needed topic. If we really want to decrease our electricity usage, then pickling/fermenting/smoking etc needs to become an everyday necessity for all families! Thank you. (My wife now makes better types of pickles than we buy from any store with produce from her garden. Now we expand our efforts!)