Hunky Hot's....something to tide ya over till Nepa returns

[DanMcG]

Just in case you're going through withdrawals with no Nepa posts. here's something that might hold ya over till he starts pumping them out again. ( I know I miss them)

 I've got a great recipe for hot links that I think is posted here, and I said I'd never screw with it cause it was that good.

Well chattin with RichTee a while back about real hot Hungarian paprika I did what I said I wouldn't do.... I changed the recipe and swap out some crushed red pepper for some Szeged hot paprika. I got to admit it smells pretty dang good. Made it Saturday and stuck in the frig till Sunday afternoon when it will hit the smoker with some hickory..

Here's a couple pic's
double grind through a 3/16 plate and stuffed in 32-35 hog casings

Ten pounds of links,  6.5" long.

.
Smoked these puppies up Sunday and tried one out this am........Nice taste, the Hot Hunky 'rika gave it a more sophisticated taste, (if that's possible) and along with a bump up of the cayenne I was sweatin after the second bite. I'll post the final recipe if anyone is interested.
I also tried something different. After a 4 hour warm smoke, I put them in a 175° steam bath till they got up to 154° internal. I think it really helped in giving the casing a nice snap and cut the cooking time down by an hour or two.

Here's a couple of the money shots:

the bite shot;

and a sliced shot:

Thanks for checkin out my Hunky Hots 

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[ellymae]

You have great looking Hunky Hots Dan!

 

[Fife]

 

[bmudd14474]

Looks great Dan

 

[scarbelly]

Looking mighty tasty Dan - care to post up the revised recipe

 

[cowgirl]

Looks great Dan! Makin' me hungry. :)

I miss RichT...

 

[chefrob]

dan, why the steam bath vs. a water bath and can you elaborate on the process and what you used (pot, chineese steamer etc.). these look really good and might be the ones to break in my new grinder and stuffer.

 

[SmokinAl]

Awesome Dan, I wanted to take a bite off the computer screen!

 

[boykjo]

Looks great Dan...I'm wiping the sweat off my brow from the bite I just took out of my laptop.............

 

[Bearcarver]

OMG Dan!

Those look absolutely Awesome!

You really got these dog-type things down pat!

I could eat 3 of them right now, sweat or no sweat---Wow!

Bear

 

[realtorterry]

man, love me some hotlinks, & those look incedible!!!!!

 

[chef willie]

fantastic looking hots...love crackin' a sweat on those.....definitely will add this to my recipes to try when you post it...

 

[beer-b-q]

They look Awesome Dan...

 

[solaryellow]

They look incredible Dan! I may have to try steaming them to finish.

 

[thunderdome]

I would love one of those for lunch

 

[michael ark]

Looks realy good.Thank for the post to help with my D.T'S

 

[DanMcG]

dan, why the steam bath vs. a water bath and can you elaborate on the process and what you used (pot, chineese steamer etc.). these look really good and might be the ones to break in my new grinder and stuffer.

I wanted to try the steam bath only because I never did it before and wanted to see what would happen. The end result was pretty much the same as with a water bath although the casing seemed to have a better snap to it when ya bite it. I'll need to compare that better with a future batch.

The setup was pretty basic. I took my largest stock pot with about 3/4" of water in the bottom, set a colander inside the pot to keep the sausage out of the water and used a ET73 to monitor the air temp and sausage internal temp. I tried to maintain 175° for water temp. The links were at about 125° when pulled from the smoker and placed in the bath. I didn't record the time in the bath but I bet it wasn't 15 minutes and they were up to temp and headed for the cold water bath. It would have taking a couple hours to get up to temp if I left them in smoker at 175° plus they would have lost a lot more moisture
 

Looking mighty tasty Dan - care to post up the revised recipe

Here's the recipe. If you try it you might want to cut back on the water. I wanted to see how much it would hold and what the loss would be after I finished the cooking process. That was about the max and of course I went and sampled some before I remembered to weigh the finish product so I have no clue what the total weight loss was.

Pork Shoulder 75/25         2644g

Ground beef                       1510g

Salt                                          66g

NFDM powder                       66g

Dark brown sugar                  42g

Paprika                                   26g

Onion powder                         26g

mustard powder                     23g

Szeged hot paprika               18g

Cayenne pepper                    26g

Phosphate                              16g

Garlic powder                         18g

Fennel powder                        10g

Cure #1                                   11g

Black pepper                          10g

Coriander                                  7g

Allspice                                      5g

Ice water                                650ml

 

[gotarace]

Dan that sausage looks Fantastic...we need taste-a-vision here. I could spank down 3 of them right now.

 

[solaryellow]

I wanted to try the steam bath only because I never did it before and wanted to see what would happen. The end result was pretty much the same as with a water bath although the casing seemed to have a better snap to it when ya bite it. I'll need to compare that better with a future batch.

The setup was pretty basic. I took my largest stock pot with about 3/4" of water in the bottom, set a colander inside the pot to keep the sausage out of the water and used a ET73 to monitor the air temp and sausage internal temp. I tried to maintain 175° for water temp. The links were at about 125° when pulled from the smoker and placed in the bath. I didn't record the time in the bath but I bet it wasn't 15 minutes and they were up to temp and headed for the cold water bath. It would have taking a couple hours to get up to temp if I left them in smoker at 175° plus they would have lost a lot more moisture
 

Hmmmmmmm. I am definitely going to have to try steaming. Although I am pretty pleased with the snap I get from natural casings in the smoker. I am curious to know why it seems more pronounced to you steamed.

 

[chefrob]

thx dan.......is the phos really needed? i don't have a problem with it i just don't have any on hand...............