Some time ago I wondered about smoking UMAi sausage, after it was finished in the refrigerator and ready for consumption. I posed the question to the folks at UMAi and they replied: "You can absolutely do this. Smoking after the sausage is dried perhaps will not impart a deep smoke flavor but it will certainly be noticeable." Figured I'd try it with a batch of 32mm venison salami that was just finishing. I split the batch in half and stripped the bags off those that would be going into the cold smoker.
Knowing I didn't want too much smoke I cracked the door of the smoker as you can see, as well as leaving the vent wide open. Put the AMNPS away from the smoker and ran dryer vent to suck off any heat from the pellets before the smoke got to the sausage.
After some time I became concerned that I was pumping too much smoke; remembered that Dave Omak said that a thin smoke for cold smoking was the best approach. So, below you can see where I cracked the door pretty wide:
That definitely gave less concentrated smoke; however, next time I would cut out a vent on the feed at right so maybe only half the smoke even got to the smoker. Note that I did initially try using the AMNPS with only half the depth of pellets, but it conked out during the night so I filled it close to the top after that
. (I wonder if this would be an application for the sawdust?) Below you can see the difference after maybe 20 hours of smoking. The one top chub is unsmoked next to the smoked batch below. There is definitely a smoky flavor imparted after the 20 hours, but there is a little bitterness from the smoke. I think I applied too much heavy smoke to start, and even with the door cracked wide may have had too much as well. Like UMAi said, since the sausage is already dried not to expect a deep smoky flavor like you would get from a sausage that is drying and simultaneously being smoked. Nevertheless, I think this approach has merit, but will need a little fine tuning. Also, when I pulled the chubs to start the smoking they had dried 50%. Normally I pull them at 40% but just got distracted. Maybe at 40% they would smoke a bit better? The smoke batch is very edible; just not what I think it could be. For this batch adding something lighter to the sausage makes it very good, as with the tomato below:
The cold smoking temps were in the 50's and 60's; I also wonder if the results could be better if they were lower, maybe the 40's-50's. Be interesting if anyone else has tried this and what their result has been.
Knowing I didn't want too much smoke I cracked the door of the smoker as you can see, as well as leaving the vent wide open. Put the AMNPS away from the smoker and ran dryer vent to suck off any heat from the pellets before the smoke got to the sausage.
After some time I became concerned that I was pumping too much smoke; remembered that Dave Omak said that a thin smoke for cold smoking was the best approach. So, below you can see where I cracked the door pretty wide:
That definitely gave less concentrated smoke; however, next time I would cut out a vent on the feed at right so maybe only half the smoke even got to the smoker. Note that I did initially try using the AMNPS with only half the depth of pellets, but it conked out during the night so I filled it close to the top after that
. (I wonder if this would be an application for the sawdust?) Below you can see the difference after maybe 20 hours of smoking. The one top chub is unsmoked next to the smoked batch below. There is definitely a smoky flavor imparted after the 20 hours, but there is a little bitterness from the smoke. I think I applied too much heavy smoke to start, and even with the door cracked wide may have had too much as well. Like UMAi said, since the sausage is already dried not to expect a deep smoky flavor like you would get from a sausage that is drying and simultaneously being smoked. Nevertheless, I think this approach has merit, but will need a little fine tuning. Also, when I pulled the chubs to start the smoking they had dried 50%. Normally I pull them at 40% but just got distracted. Maybe at 40% they would smoke a bit better? The smoke batch is very edible; just not what I think it could be. For this batch adding something lighter to the sausage makes it very good, as with the tomato below:
The cold smoking temps were in the 50's and 60's; I also wonder if the results could be better if they were lower, maybe the 40's-50's. Be interesting if anyone else has tried this and what their result has been.
