New Years Venison Sticks

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isucyclone

Fire Starter
Original poster
Apr 17, 2013
56
19
Johnston, IA
I have been enjoying the results of this years deer harvest. The latest product will be venison sticks. Ground and stuffed on 12/31/15 then rested in the fridge. Sorry no pics of that process. Into this smoker today...now we wait! Here is the general recipe I followed and some qview of course. I ground the venison and pork through the course plate on the Kitchen Aid then added the black pepper, garlic powder, TQ and sugar. Mixed well and back through the fine plate. Then separated the batch into thirds for three different flavors using three different pepper spices I made from my garden this summer. I then added 1 heaping tablespoon of ECA (1tsp/lb) to each batch and the pepper seasonings to flavor each. One also got ~10% of the meat weight in high temp cheddar.  

Venison Snack Sticks: 10lb batch

7lbs ground venison

3lbs ground pork shoulder

1T black pepper

1T garlic powder

1T sugar

5T Tenderquick

1tsp/lb of meat ECA added after grinding

Here are the pepper spices I used. 


And this is a Peter pepper for those wondering. They are quite hot.


Smoker loaded just before 12:00pm. This was the maiden voyage with my new LEM 5lb vertical stuffer. They turned ok but room for improvement, a few air pockets here and there. 120F for 2 hours with no smoke.


Installed this needle valve last week. Not sure why I didn't do that sooner! Much easier to control temps.


My new christmas present loaded and ready to go. Unfortunately using Traeger hickory pellets for this smoke until I can get some "real" pellets ordered. 


2pm: Bumped up to 140F and added smoke. Lit both ends because I didn't feel like it was smoking enough with the Traeger pellets. Will go up 10*/hr until I get to 170, then go until IT is 152F.


I'm looking forward to seeing how they turn out! I am a rookie sausage maker but have been accumulating equipment so I hope to keep making more.
 
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Reactions: crazymoon and disco
They got done around 4 this afternoon, much quicker than I expected. Into an ice bath then let them dry off before vac sealing.

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They are really good. I like the batch with cheese especially.


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they look great, thanks for the post. I'm trying these soon for the first time. I thought you shouldn't do icebath with sticks, Please correct me if i'm wrong

thanks
 
Dang it man them look good,,, I did 25lbs of sticks and s/s yesterday and 25 more today,, just not for me
th_crybaby2.gif
 paying a buddy back for helping me plumb my shop bathroom 

Did you grow and crush your own peppers  ?????

Great job \

A full smoker is a happy smoker 

DS
 
Very nice indeed! Love snack sticks, and the addition of cheese makes them even better! This hobby is habit forming, so watch out, you'll be making more soon!
 
they look great, thanks for the post. I'm trying these soon for the first time. I thought you shouldn't do icebath with sticks, Please correct me if i'm wrong

thanks

No issues doing an ice bath with sticks, just make sure you're at the correct IT before you do. Also, they don't need to be in the bath long, the temp drops pretty quick.
 
No issues doing an ice bath with sticks, just make sure you're at the correct IT before you do. Also, they don't need to be in the bath long, the temp drops pretty quick.
Ok thanks. Thought I read that the casing could seperate from the meat. Again, they look great
 
Well, Cyclone, you have given me 3 reasons to be jealous.
  1. You have venison.
  2. You have great looking hot peppers.
  3. You have made some great looking sticks.
Despite your cruelty, those sticks look so good you deserve a point!

Disco
 
Thanks all! I was happy with them, and surprisingly they don't have much heat.

As for the peppers, I did grow and crush my own. The jalapeños I let ripen to red on the plant then dried them on the smoker to make Chipotle peppers. The cayenne and Peter peppers are thin walled so once ripe I hung them by a thread in the house until dry. I then ran them through a coffee grinder to make the spice. Much fresher tasting than anything you can buy at the store.

The ice bath was quick as they do cool down quickly. Not sure I will do that next time as some of the collagen casings did separate a little.

I appreciate all the comments and all of the other helpful threads that I learned from before making these.

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I have not dried jalapeño yet. Usually freeze those. I have dried cayenne and paprika waiting to be ground and put in my first sausage/snack stick attempt.
 
I have some Red Moruga Trinidad Scorpion pepper seeds if you want to take next year's batch to 11.

Don
 
I have some Red Moruga Trinidad Scorpion pepper seeds if you want to take next year's batch to 11.



Don

Just Googled them, those sound hot! I've enjoyed growing different peppers since starting my own garden a few years ago. Not sure I can handle that much heat though!

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