So lucky to try German brats in Germany!! :D
I never smoked the Brats I made with Lem's Fresh Brat seasoning. I only ever grilled em so I can't speak to any smoking experiences with them.
I have smoked the Lem's Cured Franks and they are great! I have smoked Franks and then reheated on the grill and they were also great. Finally, I simply grilled the Franks (doing some right now haha) and they were amazing as well :)
The only issue I've ever had with the Fresh Brats is being too salty or nailing the right amount of seasoning in the past. I took notes over the various times and I believe I have nailed it so here are my notes on the LEM's seasoning measurements to help you out on your next attempt :)
- Cure #1 Amount: 1.133gm per pound of sausage meat (156ppm) good to know this for any ground sausage
- LEM's Fresh Brat Seasoning Amount: 27.3gm per pound of sausage meat
- LEM's Cured Frank Seasoning Amount: 14gm per pound of sausage meat (seems more salt in this one or just less other stuff vs brats which have mace/nutmeg, etc. that franks don't have)
- LEM's Jalapeno Bacon Cure/Seasoning Amount: 3% of bacon belly weight (0.03 x bacon belly weight = amount of seasoning)
- LEM's Venison Bacon Cure/Seasoning Amount: 3% of bacon belly weight(0.03 x bacon belly weight = amount of seasoning) ALSO 3% of ground venison meat mix weight if doing ground/formed bacon :)
- I don't do ground formed bacon anymore as its just ok compared to pork belly bacon so instead of wasting the seasoning I figured out how to convert it for pork belly bacon. When I figured this one out I applied the same % to the Jalapeno version and low and behold it worked perfectly, no overly salty bacon :)
I hope these notes help and I believe that if you follow the Brat measurements above you will land in a good spot for fresh brats for grilling and you can tweak to your own tastes from here :)