I’m back! After letting the summer sausage sit for a few days I have some observations.
I had some issues keeping the smoke going and it very much affect the temperature control as noted earlier. Here is the charting of the temperatures of the smoker and the sausage.
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All the fluctuations in the early smoke was due to opening to restart the wood smoking. The lull right in the middle was the auto warm function on the smoker which sets a 140F after the timer expires. The paid of the heater is too reactive. Leading to the oscillating temperature. You can see the overshoot in the latter smoke when the set point is changes. The proportional of the loop is too high and could also use some derivative to predict to the set point. Anyway this is the first smoke seeing these effects.
Thanks Tallbm for the additional analysis.
The temps in the end went too high.
Yes, fatout. In the fridge for a few days the casing is shriveled and completely pulled away from the sausage.
I also thought that is was a bit too acidic. Good flavor but a bit too acidic. Next time probably 75% of the ECA or skip it entirely and use NFDM.
Will need to improve the low temp smoke and try again.
Now on to the brats.
Used a 10lb butt. Cut the bone out but could not find the gland in whole. I think I got most of it but had some gray specs in the grind. I pulled them out but this must have been the rest of it.
Here it is ground:
View attachment 663574
Divided it into 2 equal portions. One for the Lem’s and one for diggindogfarm’s.
Mixed and did a test fry. Both seemed equally salty to me. Great flavor on both.
Modifications:
Used 26.3 gm/ lb Lem’s.
Used Red Boat fish sauce 1 tap. and celery salt ( no seed at this time). Used mace not nutmeg. Reduced the salt to 1 tbsp.
The edible collagen casing worked great in the beginning but near the end became soft and somewhat more delicate. Many blowouts. Had to make the fill quite loose compared to the start. Still worked.
Here they are:
View attachment 663575
Now that they are linked and in the fridge, I have a question.
What now? When do I separate them? Tomorrow I assume.
I will probably make something with that bowl of extra from the stuffer tonight.
Thanks for reading and providing encouragement.
Paul