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Halacha has a strong tradition of "minimizing a transgression" when doing something forbidden, for example taking the shortest route possible when driving on the Sabbath.

Applying the same logic, suppose you were to purchase a cut of non-kosher slaughtered beef that would be kosher had it been properly slaughteted, and you soaked it, salted it and washed it as we are commanded to do, and ate it yourself (without offering it to anyone else). It would, of course, still be treif.

But would you be "minimizing your transgression" of eating non-kosher beef vs. eating that same treif piece of meat without having kashered it, or commiting another transgression entirely?

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    Somewhat similar concept in fiction, jewishstudies.rutgers.edu/docman/sinkoff/… discussion starts on page 60
    – rosends
    Feb 26, 2018 at 22:54
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    Do you have a source for minimizing a transgression when possible? I know we do that when it comes to saving a life on Shabbos, we still try to do less, but to minimize it when doing something on purpose for no good reason?
    – aBochur
    Feb 26, 2018 at 23:23
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    @abochur why would we not? Also we can say this is a case of needing food on Yom Kippur and move on to the interesting part of the question
    – Double AA ♦
    Feb 27, 2018 at 0:12
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    This responsum on inviting non-observant guests who may drive to shabbat dinner quotes Rabbi Akiva Eiger (Yoreh Deah 281:6) as advocating, in the case of a man who is determined to shave his temples, to have a woman (who is under no biblical prohibition from doing so) shave his temples for him in order to mimimize the transgression, @ABochur, my Aramaic is nowhere near where it would need to be to parse out the text in the original eng.beithillel.org.il/responsa/…
    – יהושע ק
    Feb 27, 2018 at 0:33
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    @ln65 that's not true. We don't tell her to have sex without Mikvah. We discourage mikvah in the hope that that discourages sex. A penuya who will have sex anyway should of course go to the Mikvah. Both those actions would be independently without rabbinic approval.
    – Double AA ♦
    Mar 6, 2018 at 2:32

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The part of soaking, salting and washing it removes the blood, so that would indeed minimize the transgression, since it removes the prohibition of eating blood. but slaughtering it does nothing to minimize the transgression because a kosher slaughtering only affects kosher animals.

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