First Sausage Q and some questions.

[dirtworldmike]

After allot of reading here and brain picking I made my first attempt at some venison  sausage.  I did 3 small test batches,2.5 lb. hot Italian.. 2.5 lbs. of sweet Italian and 2lbs, of andouille.  For the hot and sweet I used the Lem seasonings  but added some minced garlic and extra pepper to the Lem sweet. I thought the fry test on the Lem hot was pretty good so I left it alone.

The mixture I used on the hot and sweet was 70% venison- 20% pork butt and 10% back fat.  On the andouille I used 80% pork butt and 20 % venison and threw in a little back fat.

I used this recipe  http://www.nolacuisine.com/2005/11/14/andouille-sausage-recipe/    To this I added some chile powder, onion powder and a little extra crushed red pepper.  Going to smoke the andouille in a day or so.

I thought the fry tests on all three was pretty good. Although. I have never meet a sausage I didn't like. LOL   All in all so far so good !   Now that I got my hands sticky I have a few last questions.

1) I used the Lem hog casings.  Just about every section of casing had a hole or two that I found when flushing.  Is that normal with hog casings??

2)  I have the Northern/Kitchener #5 stuffer and used the 7/8 in tube. Seemed to stretch out the casings quite a bit. Should I have used the 1/2 inch tube??

Here's the only pic I managed  to take. I will add pics of the finished andouille after smoking. Thanks

PC310347.JPG

• dirtworldmike
• Dec 31, 2012

 

[dirtworldmike]

Fixed the link.. Happy New Year!!
 

 

[diggingdogfarm]

Looks good!

I used the Lem hog casings.  Just about every section of casing had a hole or two that I found when flushing.  Is that normal with hog casings??

No, it's not normal.
You'll definitely want to find some better casings.

2)  I have the Northern/Kitchener #5 stuffer and used the 7/8 in tube. Seemed to stretch out the casings quite a bit. Should I have used the 1/2 inch tube??

Use the tube that best fits the casings.
You can adjust the fullness of the casings by controlling how fast the casings pay out.

HTH

Happy New Year!


~Martin

 

[driedstick]

Looks good

 

[dirtworldmike]

UPDATE

My first  finished Andouille

P1020351.JPG

• dirtworldmike
• Jan 2, 2013

P1020354.JPG

• dirtworldmike
• Jan 2, 2013

My first try at Andouille or any sausage for that matter seemed to come out pretty good.  I have never had any on-du-ee so I really have nothing to compare to.  I keep picking at it and it may not last too much longer. So I guess it must be OK..I like the flavor and it has  a nice little after burn to it.

i smoked it in my GOSM using my 550 watt hot plate.  Apple and hickory wood. The hot plate works good, temps started at 127 and gradually increased to 167 over a 5 hour period with nice even smoke.  I was getting questionable IT readings from my new $9 insta-read so I put the sausage in the house oven at 175 and probed it with my Maverick for an hour till it reached an IT of 155. Cooled off in ice water, put under a fan for an hour and now it's in the fridge.

Conclusions....

I like it allot!  Going to do a 5 lb. batch next  as I make allot of jambalaya (can't get enough of the stuff) and have been using the cheep brand of store bought smoke sausage.  I think on the next batch I will cut back on the salt a little and work on the texture some by using the recommended  combination of coarse goring and small chop. I just used a coarse grind on this test.  Sausages are like woman, their all good, just some better than others..... 

Thanks for all the help!!

 

[boykjo]

Nice Andouillie mike... I had the same problem when I made my first andouillie. I didnt know what to compare it to cause I never had it..... LOL