Been a while since I have had good snack sticks. For years, my BIL/hunting partner, have taken meat to a abattoir/butcher/sausage maker in a small town an hour from where we live. There were a few closer, but found his stuff to be quite good. Last year, we had close to 150 pounds of beer sticks, honey pepperoni, and jerky sticks made. Well, we found there was something that was making us not reach for them so much any more, and found our dogs were eating more than we were. That's a ton of money for dog treats!! We tried to figure out what was up, and narrowed it down to texture, taste was still very good, but the texture wasn't like a sausage or a slim jim texture. When we snapped them, and looked closely at the inside, it didn't look like meat/sausage. You could see crystals, no definition between the pork and moose/deer/elk/goose. Pick a meat, they were not all in the same sausage. ;)
This was right around the time I found this place. I had seen, and was intrigued by these kabanosy sticks. and figured I had to try them, after all, any other sausage I made was a hit. I used recipes found here, Marianski's book, and Rytek Kutas book. I also learned here, that recipes were not set in stone, and there was room for experimentation.
Fast forward to today. Time to make snack sticks. Instead of all pork, which is traditional, I decided to use a mix of beef (whole eye of round roast) pork (whole pork loin) and bacon fat (trim from the bellies that became bacon) to bring up the fat content of these lean meats. Other than the meats not being strictly pork butt, I followed the recipe in Kutas book.
Started this afternoon at 1:00, stuffed them into 20mm(?) collagen casings, hung in the smoke house with maple pellets in my AMNPS. Been smoking 2 hours, now to turn on the heat.
More to follow!
This was right around the time I found this place. I had seen, and was intrigued by these kabanosy sticks. and figured I had to try them, after all, any other sausage I made was a hit. I used recipes found here, Marianski's book, and Rytek Kutas book. I also learned here, that recipes were not set in stone, and there was room for experimentation.
Fast forward to today. Time to make snack sticks. Instead of all pork, which is traditional, I decided to use a mix of beef (whole eye of round roast) pork (whole pork loin) and bacon fat (trim from the bellies that became bacon) to bring up the fat content of these lean meats. Other than the meats not being strictly pork butt, I followed the recipe in Kutas book.
Started this afternoon at 1:00, stuffed them into 20mm(?) collagen casings, hung in the smoke house with maple pellets in my AMNPS. Been smoking 2 hours, now to turn on the heat.
More to follow!