Need advice on making sausage for first time.

[justpassingthru]

Hey Al,

You've got a lot of good advice here, personally I wouldn't spend the $10 for the stuffer attachment, I watched the video several times, I liked the music, the mixing head is turning, but..., watch carefully, "there ain't no sausage coming out of the stuffer," and that's the problem using a mixer or grinder with a stuffing attachment.  You need three hands to make them work nominally, one to hold the sausage coming out of the tube, one to keep putting the meat in and one to keep pushing the meat back down the throat with the plunger.

Nepas made a good suggestion, if you're wanting to try sausage making without the expense, why not make fresh sausage, there are lots of good recipes, you don't need to cure it, you can boil it, grill it, cook it in a skillet with butter and apple juice or smoke it on you WSM.

The second problem that you will encounter is trying to maintain 140° in your WSM for 2 hours and then raising the temp 20°, I would suggest you learn how to do that before you try to dry/smoke cured stuffed sausages.

I don't mean to rain on your parade, just sharing with you what I have learned from my failures.

Gene

 

[boykjo]

Wow, 21 posts in approx. 7hrs. Ya think you could get someone to help you Al with your sausage making..................

Oh and what they all said..............

 

[SmokinAl]

Thanks guys, now I'm more confused than ever. Maybe I'll just make sausage patties the first time & rethink the whole stuffer thing.

 

[alblancher]

Hey Al, 

The recipes are pretty simple.  Take a whole pork butt, remove all "soft fat", glands and cut into 2 inch cubes.  Season and cure for about 2 days.

Grind all meat and seasonings adding a bit of cold water to make the meat move through the grinder easily and to keep it cold.  Mix with your hands well until the sausage gets sticky and comes together.

You can use the Kitchen Aide, I did for years but after doing it a couple of times you will move up to the 5 lb vertical stuffer.  So much easier and faster.

Just getting started go by a local butcher and ask him to sell you enough casings to make 10 lbs sausage.  You/ll pay a bit more but you are paying for learning.

Wash casings well and push onto stuffing tube.  A bit of water is your friend in this process, the casings need to stay wet and the meat can't dry out.

When stuffing your links experience is the only teacher.  Tie off the free end and stuff.  You want the casings full but loose enough to be able to turn into links.    Fill the first link and twist the sausage away from you 4 or 5 times, fill the next link and twist toward you 4 or 5 times.

Let the newly stuffed sausage dry a couple of hours, place in a smoker at 140 or so.  Smoke for a couple of hours to get a good smoke on them then kick your chamber temps up and bring the sausage to temp.   Enjoy.

Like bacon, once you do it a couple of times the store bought stuff will stay on the display shelves.

Al

 

[SmokinAl]

Thanks Al!

 

[alblancher]

You're welcome.  If you are going to Jerry's I can bring you some casings.

 

[SmokinAl]

Al, Thanks for the offer, but we are not going to be able to make it up there this year. We were really looking forward to going, but just can't swing it at this time.

 

[realtorterry]

AL, I'm trying myself to also get into this sausage making. I have neither grinder nor stuffer just yet? What i have been doing for now is buying ground pork. I have seasoning from Columbia Spice Imports for any type of sausage you can think of. I make the fresh sausage. I add that to the ground pork & mix REAL well. Then I just make patties ( sometimes I add chess or chili's) & fry or grill them. So far it's been OK for research.  I will get a grinder/stuffer soon though as I wanna try links. But it's helps with the sausage itch for now!

 

[alblancher]

That works just fine for me. 

I need to make up some more of Shooter Ricks Breakfast sausage.  Wifey already ate something like 10 lbs of it since January, OK maybe I helped a little bit.  I form the sausage into patties, fry and put on sliced English Muffins with a slice of American Cheese.  I vacuum pack and put in the freezer.   45 s in the micro, a little homemade blueberry jam, a cup of fresh ground coffee and we  have breakfast.  I know they taste better then the Mickey Dees stuff and I am sure they are better for you.

Yea, using preground pork is a good short cut if you don't have a good grinder.   You know in the old days they used a funnel and wood dowel to stuff sausage.

Al

 

[SmokinAl]

Thanks for all the great input guys. I think the first round will be sausage patties, since I have the grinder already that came with our KA mixer. I think for $9.00 I'm going to get the stuffer attachment and try it out. If I just go ahead & get a vertical stuffer, which I really can't afford at this time I won't appreciate how well it works compared to the grinder/stuffer combo. Judy & I will be doing it together so there will be 4 hands there to get it done. I just know Bear will have a comment on that last sentence. Thanks again guys!

 

[akawsmjim]

Agree about the KA stuffer... Tried it, it shoved more air into the casings than meat. 

The grinder does a pretty good job.