Great thread. It doesn't have to be about living off the land or being entirely self-sufficient. Every fall, some of us at the office get together and butcher 7-8 hogs and one big ol' sow (she's strictly for sausage). One guy raises them at his house in the sticks. We buy the piglets in the spring and turn them into meat in the fall. The sow we picked up this year was ~700lbs live weight. In the end, we averaged nearly 45 lbs of sausage, bacon, and canadian bacon per person plus whatever they had out of the pigs (some people sign up for 1/2 a pig instead of whole one).
It's a lot of work spread out over two days (executions and sow butchering on Friday and butchering/sausage making/wrapping on Saturday). Usually there are 8-10 of us. The farmer we got the sow from this year finished her off with avocados, squash and tomatoes leftover from regional farmer's market and the meat was exceptional. It's nice to use the whole hog for sausage because you get ham, rib meat, shoulder, etc in the sausage.
Right now my freezer is packed full with lamb, pork, venison, and 25lbs of kraut.
