Newb Venison Question

[tanthetoolman]

I'm sure this has been touched on frequently, but what type of fat (pork fat, bacon pieces and ends, ground pork, ground beef) and ratio is best for ground venison?

 

[Bearcarver]

I'm sure this has been touched on frequently, but what type of fat (pork fat, bacon pieces and ends, ground pork, ground beef) and ratio is best for ground venison?

I would say it depends on what you're going for:

If I'm going for Jerky, Sticks, etc, I'd go with adding Beef to my Venison.

If I'm going for a Formed Venison Bacon or Breakfast Sausage, I'd go with adding Pork.

My Deerburgers are now "50% Deer, 25% Pork, and 25% Beef", and we like it much more than all of our 50 years worth of experiments.

Bear

 

[pattyq]

I use pork mostly , I find beef to be a little greasy and if I'm adding pork it's Butts or tenderloin just chunked and ground . I use a 60/40 mix for summer sausage , it comes out juicy and has a sweeter taste then beef.
Happy Experimenting

 

[larkinjr]

I'm sure this has been touched on frequently, but what type of fat (pork fat, bacon pieces and ends, ground pork, ground beef) and ratio is best for ground venison?

I just buy pork butts grind them up and use the ratio you desire for whatever your making.

 

[rgautheir20420]

You typically want to have a 20-30% meat to fat ratio. I'll be making venison kabanosi sticks with 21mm casings tonight using straight pork fat and ground venison.

 

[rca dog]

As Bearcarver said, it depends what you're after.  I made the mistake of thinking 70% venison and 30% pork, meant using pure pork fat.  It does not.  Lol.  I have had good success using a 50-50 mix of well trimmed venison to pork shoulder (butt) or picnic roast.  I have not had good success using 70-30 venison to pure pork fat (for snack sticks).  For pure pork fat, I would say about 10-15% max.

 

[andy riley]

Haven't been on for a while and am a little late to this thread, but agree with the other posters.

What I do for pork is have my wife look for sales on whole pork loins. We just bought 6 of them for $1.79 a pound. I trim the fat off them plus a layer of lean meat to go with my venison, then make the rest into 5 or 6 inch roasts. That way we get inexpensive pork roasts and boneless chops and fatty pork to go with the venison at the same time. Works for me. I never priced pork butt, is that fairly inexpensive?

When I make snack sticks or bologna, I like beef too, but I just buy some ground beef that is 73% beef to 27% fat in a 3 pound roll, and put that with about 9 pounds of venison. It's a little leaner than some use, but it works for me and I don't have as much grinding to do then.

Hope that helps a little more.

 

[andy riley]

Oh yeah, I forgot to say what I use the fatty pork for. I mostly make the Wisconsin style Brats from a recipe I found on here, maybe from Nepas, not sure, but they are very good.

I use close to 50/50 pork to venison on those and stuff into hog casings. They are great on the grill.

I also make venison/pork scrapple( some call it paunhaus? PA dutch) I gotta make some of that soon too. I go about 50/50 with that as well. Enjoy much. Wife loves it. I have a good recipe using sweet condensed milk if anybody wants it.

 

[tomrep]

How much does that scrapple recipe make Andy Riley? I'd be interested (Berks county PA resident!).
Tom

 

[andy riley]

Tomrep, I have 4 pans that measure 9inches long, by 4"wide, x 3"deep, and this recipe fills them. I'll look it up tomorrow and post it.

 

[tomrep]

Thanks bud!

 

[andy riley]

TomRep, Here is the scrapple recipe I used the last time I made it.

3lbs meat. I used 1 1/2 lbs venison,1 1/2 lbs fatty pork.

4 14oz cans sweetened condensed milk( I may have only used 3)

4cups cornmeal(I actually use boxes of Jiffy corn muffin mix)

4cups water

3tsp sage ( you could use 4, but my wife doesn't like strong sage)

4tsp Thyme

4tsp salt

2tsp black pepper

1tsp nutmeg

tsp = teaspoons

I use ground meat. Put meat in boiling water. Doesn't take too long to cook.

If you use muscle (whole meat) you'll need to put in food processor after cooking.

Add condensed milk. I usually reduce heat to a medium setting.

I usually mix all dry ingredients before adding to meat and water.

Stir constantly until thick, probably about 10 min.

To reduce messy cleanup, I line my pans with wax paper, but sometimes I just grease them with Crisco which adds a little more fat for frying.

Fill your pans and place in cold to set. Could be fridge, could be in the garage, depending on the weather and your situation.

I let them go until the next day,because this is not as firm as some scrapple.

I slide a knife around the edge of pan and dump the loaf onto yet more wax paper.

Now for me, it works best to go ahead and slice the scrapple onto a cookie sheet and place in the freezer to partially freeze. I can only do a pan at a time, but then I vacuum seal it and it has to be frozen for that..

Then when we want scrapple, We just get a pack out of the freezer. For me and my wife I just put 4 slices per pack.

Hope you like it. We sure do, and it's another use for deer meat and saves money to my way of thinking. Plus I like making my own stuff.

BTW: You have to brown this good before trying to flip it on the griddle because it is a very soft variety of scrapple.

 

[tomrep]

Thanks Andy!

 

[reflex2852]

I used pork fat my butcher gave me he trimmed off some pork chops and roasts.  At about 60 percent venison to 40 percent pork fat, my smoked sausages turned out very good.  Was I just lucky?  I really want to learn more about making snack sticks and sausage.  I'm really enjoying this forum and posts from people like you!

 

[tddeangelo]

Another Berks PA resident....thanks for the scrapple recipe!

As for ratios, I just made some sweet bologna, and was shooting for roughly 80/20 venison to pork. Picked up 2.28lbs of ground pork and mixed it with 10.25lbs of ground venison. Came out good enough that everyone who tried it asked if I could make some for them, lol.