Well decided to do some snack sticks this weekend before Elk season starts next weekend.
I decided to do 7 1/2 lbs of Lean ground beef and 5 lbs of ground poke. Stuffing them into 22MM Mahogany casings.
All my equipment re washed and sanitized and ready to go to work.
I was going to do some of the Willie's snack sticks but they must have forgotten to put in the item the helps it to prevent caking.
I even put it in a coffee grinder to try to break it up, no go just spun around the grinder.
So instead of using Willie' I saved the cure from it and put it in with the Taco flavored brats to make my snack sticks
Cure from the Willies package
I like mustard seeds
1 cup of NFDM to 5 lbs of meat, I used two cups for this recipe
Added the mustard seeds, no measurement here just eye balled it .
Mixed cure to dissolve in one cup cold water, usually do two but tried this with one and worked fine.
Hand mix till tacky
When I get a softball size of meat to stick to my hand and I can turn my hand upside down
and it does not fall off, I know I mixed it good and the cure is working.
Added the Hi Temp cheese, and the NFDM and mixed one more time
Stuffer is loaded and ready go.
The one casing on the far left (dark brown) was a old casing I used up and had real trouble with it
it was dry and brittle and I had a couple of blow outs. Got the new casings out and never had a blow out one.
Make sure you keep casings in a cool dry place and sealed in a good container or bag.
After stuffing I put them in the fridge overnight and will go in smoker next day.
Next morning, put sticks out and let them hang at room temp for about 1hr. At this time
start your smoker and bring it up to temp.
Smoker temp is at 120 dampers full open.
Put snack sticks into smoker for 1hr NO Smoke
After 1hr raise temp to 130 and add smoke from here on our.
every hr raise smoker temp 10* till you get smoker to 170*
do not go over 170* to keep from having "fat Out"
Smoke till the IT of the sticks are 152*.
Pull from smoker when temp is reached and set on racks to let them bloom at room temp
for about 1 hr or so.
Hickory in the AMPS smoker
Blooming.
After blooming I put them in brown paper bags and put them back in fridge for 24-48hrs
before vac pacing them and putting them in the freezer.
You will need to wait for the vac pac pics, these guys are still taking a nap in the fridge.
I hope you enjoyed the post. Let me know if I missed anything.
A full smoker is a happy smoker
DS
I decided to do 7 1/2 lbs of Lean ground beef and 5 lbs of ground poke. Stuffing them into 22MM Mahogany casings.
All my equipment re washed and sanitized and ready to go to work.
I was going to do some of the Willie's snack sticks but they must have forgotten to put in the item the helps it to prevent caking.
I even put it in a coffee grinder to try to break it up, no go just spun around the grinder.
So instead of using Willie' I saved the cure from it and put it in with the Taco flavored brats to make my snack sticks
Cure from the Willies package
I like mustard seeds
1 cup of NFDM to 5 lbs of meat, I used two cups for this recipe
Added the mustard seeds, no measurement here just eye balled it .
Mixed cure to dissolve in one cup cold water, usually do two but tried this with one and worked fine.
Hand mix till tacky
When I get a softball size of meat to stick to my hand and I can turn my hand upside down
and it does not fall off, I know I mixed it good and the cure is working.
Added the Hi Temp cheese, and the NFDM and mixed one more time
Stuffer is loaded and ready go.
The one casing on the far left (dark brown) was a old casing I used up and had real trouble with it
it was dry and brittle and I had a couple of blow outs. Got the new casings out and never had a blow out one.
Make sure you keep casings in a cool dry place and sealed in a good container or bag.
After stuffing I put them in the fridge overnight and will go in smoker next day.
Next morning, put sticks out and let them hang at room temp for about 1hr. At this time
start your smoker and bring it up to temp.
Smoker temp is at 120 dampers full open.
Put snack sticks into smoker for 1hr NO Smoke
After 1hr raise temp to 130 and add smoke from here on our.
every hr raise smoker temp 10* till you get smoker to 170*
do not go over 170* to keep from having "fat Out"
Smoke till the IT of the sticks are 152*.
Pull from smoker when temp is reached and set on racks to let them bloom at room temp
for about 1 hr or so.
Hickory in the AMPS smoker
Blooming.
After blooming I put them in brown paper bags and put them back in fridge for 24-48hrs
before vac pacing them and putting them in the freezer.
You will need to wait for the vac pac pics, these guys are still taking a nap in the fridge.
I hope you enjoyed the post. Let me know if I missed anything.
A full smoker is a happy smoker
DS
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