Nova Scotia style pepperoni smoke

[David Leopold]

Thought I’d make a thread of my first attempt smoking some pepperoni for you guys to all watch. Who knows, could turn out good and educational, or it could be a good comedy show for you guys. Haha

So first off, here in eastern Canada we obviously have your typical pizza style pepperoni, usually cured or fermented and aged etc sliced thin kind of deal. But we also have a smoked pepperoni that is sold more as a snack or to slice up for party trays with cheese. That’s what I’m aiming for.

I’ll eventually post the recipe in here. And pics as the smoke goes on.

So far here’s some prep pics and the start to cooking. They’re in there at 120 for 1.5 at the moment.

 

[David Leopold]

Main mix is a honey garlic profile and then took 1.5lb aside to make jalapeño cheddar

In collagen cases and into the smoker. Can you tell I’ve only had this smoker a couple weeks? Haha. Still shiny!!

 

[dcecil]

I bet those are gonna be good. Definitely going to follow this

 

[David Leopold]

I have made these before using my oven and they turn out great but it’s tricky to avoid the fatout. And just doesn’t get the texture I’m lookin for, the cases don’t dry enough or stick to the meat. Was easy enough to just peel the casing off when eating though. Hoping the lower temp smoker does it better.

 

[crazymoon]

DL, Looking good, I'm in!

 

[David Leopold]

3 hours in getting some nice colour I’m not getting any smoke though as the MES won’t produce it at these low temps I might just bump the temp up hot to get some smoke for a little bit while the meat IT is still low

 

[Gwanger]

3 hours in getting some nice colour I’m not getting any smoke though as the MES won’t produce it at these low temps I might just bump the temp up hot to get some smoke for a little bit while the meat IT is still low View attachment 367956

I have an electric smoker and when smoking sausage I start smoker at higher temp to get the smoke rolling put some more chips in smoker box and turn down to my desired temp b4 putting in sausage to smoke. Hope yours turns out well for you

 

[TomKnollRFV]

Strongly suggest an Amazen Pellet Tray for electric smokers. How spicy is this Canadian Pepperoni?

 

[David Leopold]

While I await the last couple degrees of temp on mine, here are 2 pictures taken from the local deli facebook pages of what our local “pepperoni” looks like. As you can see, very different from typical pizza version. It is rolled into a hardwood fired kiln for lack of better words. Big wood fire oven I guess is more like it. Haha. I assume they’re using mahogany cases to reach that level of colour.

As for spicy, their TNT flavour is ridiculous. I can’t touch it.

My recipe is pretty mild, wife doesn’t like spice so I keep it tame. The jalapeño cheese one I make is pretty mild even, as the seeds and white get trimmed out of them and then diced very fine.

Off to check if they hit the last bit of temp rise to get to 151-152 or so!!

 

[TomKnollRFV]

I love pepperoni sticks and the like, might steal your recipe in the end if you post it!

 

[GaryHibbert]

I'm in. Looks interesting.
Gary

 

[SmokinAl]

Looks great so far!
Al

 

[David Leopold]

Well guys, thanks for all the interest.

Sadly, something didn’t go right. They looked great coming out. But something in the taste is WAY off.

I’m not sure if I maybe mis measured something, or more likely it was my awkward attempts at getting some smoke rolling. I think when I turned it up for a short high heat session the chips over smoked, as the burner was on steady from 130-200. I had some pretty thick smoke roll out when I got up hot. Certainly not TBS!! Haha

Well that’s the fun though, it’s all about learning.

I will hold off posting my recipe as I don’t want you guys to read this post about how awful it turned out AND the recipe at the same time. HAHa.

I will be attempting this again in the near future and will most certainly post those results as well for all of you!!

Dave

 

[TomKnollRFV]

Every time is a learning experience indeed! I'm going to smoke my summer sausage today and right now my fridge reeks of garlic and I'm way worried I just put to much in. Still want this recipe though to add to my collection of things to try !

 

[Gwanger]

Every time is a learning experience indeed! I'm going to smoke my summer sausage today and right now my fridge reeks of garlic and I'm way worried I just put to much in. Still want this recipe though to add to my collection of things to try !

If you didn't get a good smokiness to our sausage you didn't apply smoke long enough,or didn't form a pellicle long enough for smoke to adhere after stuffing sausage I let it dry in frig overnight to form pelicle or if I used a cure (prague powder #1) I will put it under a fan to dry and form pelicle. the pelicle alows the smoke to adhere to what you are smoking. Some users let the sausage or meat sit in frig overnight but you need air flo to form pelicle,I use a cure and let it sit in front of fan for 2 hrs.hope this helps you out.A good book to get is"Great sausage recipes and meat curing" by Rytek Kutas on Amazon

 

[David Leopold]

I write all my recipes in a journal lately so I can keep track of the things I try, change, do, don’t do.

I just took the cases off of them and they are actually MUCH better. Which very much leads me to suspect my smoke went crazy in them!!

Oh and I’m 100% certain I FORGOT the salt in the dang recipe!! Hahaha. At least they’re edible now with the bitter cases taken off.

First bad smoke I’ve done on it. Sure it won’t be the last!!

 

[David Leopold]

Gwanger,

Thanks for that info. Next time I will mix the meat, seasoning and cure....AND stuff them the night before so the casings can dry back out some like you mention.

If I do that I might get away with doing the first 1/2hr - 1hr in the MES at a higher temp so it smokes and then drop it back low to do the step ups like usual. Surely it wouldn’t go from fridge temps to fatout IT in that time??

 

[jimmyinsd]

Gwanger,

Thanks for that info. Next time I will mix the meat, seasoning and cure....AND stuff them the night before so the casings can dry back out some like you mention.

If I do that I might get away with doing the first 1/2hr - 1hr in the MES at a higher temp so it smokes and then drop it back low to do the step ups like usual. Surely it wouldn’t go from fridge temps to fatout IT in that time??

if you are going to be doing sausage in the MES... get the pellet tray or some other sort of smoke generator for the unit... its just not designed to produce smoke at the low temps required to make quality sausage. you can play all the games you want to try and trick it into doing what you want, but the plain nuts and bolts of it are pretty simple, good sausage comes from low steady temps that gradually increase and the mes doesnt produce smoke at those temps in that manner. its hard enough sometimes to keep the mes from spiking out way to high on the temp climb without trying to push it up and down intentionally. remember the temps we see on the display are typically not what our foods are experiencing in the unit.

good luck!

 

[David Leopold]

Very true!! I do plan to get the AMAZN pellet tray sometime. Bbq supplies are hard to come by up here, true bbq I mean. Lots of grill supplies. I think there may be 1 local store close by that has anything proper in it. At least Amazon has those trays now though!

And yes the MES sure does like to spike up and down as it heat cycles. The temp display will match my external meat probe when I leave it in the cook chamber itself, but it takes a long time of it settling before it will do that.

 

[jimmyinsd]

Very true!! I do plan to get the AMAZN pellet tray sometime. Bbq supplies are hard to come by up here, true bbq I mean. Lots of grill supplies. I think there may be 1 local store close by that has anything proper in it. At least Amazon has those trays now though!

And yes the MES sure does like to spike up and down as it heat cycles. The temp display will match my external meat probe when I leave it in the cook chamber itself, but it takes a long time of it settling before it will do that.

this is why when I am pushing up the temps I try and do them in small 5-10 degree increments, it seems the smaller the temp adjustment, the smaller the overshoot, but one time I tried to push the temp up from about 130 to 160 or so and it blew well up into the 200s before it caught itself and shut down.