Featured Texas Hot Link Sausage QView (Hot Gut)

[tallbm]

So I believe I have nailed my Texas Hot Link (Hot Gut) Sausage recipe!!!! QView and then a ton of info.

I've been working on this recipe to try and nail a true hot link sausage like the kind I've gotten in Texas. Texas style sausage usually has some beef in it, plus this sausage has the Texas hot link flavor I've loved but seem so hard to find these days.
If anything would be tweaked in this recipe it would be more/less salt based on your taste. Oh also more/less Cayenne based on your heat sensitivity. This is a hot link with some heat to it.
It may be a hair too hot for some but should be fine for people who love normal buffalo sauce heat level or just a hair hotter.

Details:

• 60% Ground Pork Butt, 40% Ground Beef (73/23 was on sale at the store so used that)
• Skinless sausages using 31mm cellulose/plastic casings from The Sausage Maker
• Stuffed to be 20inch long links and then cut them in half to vac seal
• 8.75 pounds of meat to make this batch of sausage (thought I was making 10 pounds but apparently my defrosted ground pork and beef was lighter than I thought lol)
• 70% Apple, 30% Hickory smoke applied for about 3.5 hours (1 row of AMNPS + rounded turn into next row)
• Taken to 153-156F IT
• Smoked using standard walk it up sausage temp practices with smoker going up to like 170F at the end to hit my IT's
• I smoked it over night not worrying about getting to IT as fast as I could have so could have smoked it in less time but no biggie.
• Did not bloom these because they had great color and I'm finding skinless sausages may not be need it with any skinless I've made so far, so saving the time :)
• Ate 1 plate with just mustard, other plate with bbq sauce... it was an all hot link sausage day for me :D

Here are recipe ingredients in measurements in grams, oz, and by volume (tsp/TBsp) so you all can enjoy this if you like :)
Oh yeah I put in 5 pound and 1 pound batches. As you can see I also recorded all this for my notes in a spreasheet so I can just drop in numbers and have it calculate all my amounts of seasonings hahahah. Enjoy!!!


5 Pound Ingredients Amounts:

Ingredient	5lbs in grams	Unit gm	Amt Vol	tsp/TB		5lbs oz	Unit oz	Amt Vol	tsp/TB
Meat (50/50 pork/beef, or more pork than beef)	2,270	gm				80	oz
Water	10.00	floz				10	floz
Black Pepper, course	12.50	gm	2.50	TB scant		0.44	oz	2.50	TB scant
Red Pepper, crushed	5.00	gm	1.50	TB		0.18	oz	1.50	TB
Cayenne, ground	5.00	gm	1.00	TB		0.18	oz	1.00	TB
Paprika, ground	7.50	gm	2.00	TB		0.26	oz	2.00	TB
Garlic, granulated	12.50	gm	2.00	TB		0.44	oz	2.00	TB
Kosher Salt 1.63% with cure and total weight	37.50	gm	2.00	TB		1.32	oz	2.00	TB
Erythritol	15.00	gm	1.25	TB		0.53	oz	1.25	TB
Mustard, ground	2.50	gm	1.25	t		0.09	oz	1.25	t
Coriander, ground	2.50	gm	1.25	t		0.09	oz	1.25	t
Thyme, ground	2.50	gm	1.25	t		0.09	oz	1.25	t
Bay Leaf, ground	2.50	gm	1.00	t		0.09	oz	1.00	t
Fennel Seeds, whole	0.75	gm	0.63	t		0.03	oz	0.63	t
NDFM (NonFat Dry Milk)	22.50	gm	4.00	TB		0.79	oz	4.00	TB
Cure #1, 156ppm (cure#1/instacure #1/prague powder)	5.68	gm	1.25	t scant		0.20	oz	1.25	t scant
Total	2699.66	gm				95.15	oz

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1 Pound Ingredients Amounts:

Ingredient	1lbs in gm	Unit Wt	Amt Vol	tsp/TB		1lb in oz	Unit Wt	Amt Vol	tsp/TB
Meat (50/50 pork/beef, or more pork than beef)	454	gm				16.00	oz
Water	2	floz				2	floz
Black Pepper, course	2.5	gm	0.5	TB scant		0.09	oz	0.5	TB scant
Red Pepper, crushed	1	gm	0.3	TB		0.04	oz	0.3	TB
Cayenne, ground	1	gm	0.2	TB		0.04	oz	0.2	TB
Paprika, ground	1.5	gm	0.4	TB		0.05	oz	0.4	TB
Garlic, granulated	2.5	gm	0.4	TB		0.09	oz	0.4	TB
Kosher Salt 1.63% with cure and total weight	7.5	gm	0.4	TB		0.26	oz	0.4	TB
Erythritol	3	gm	0.25	TB		0.11	oz	0.25	TB
Mustard, ground	0.5	gm	0.25	t		0.02	oz	0.25	t
Coriander, ground	0.5	gm	0.25	t		0.02	oz	0.25	t
Thyme, ground	0.5	gm	0.25	t		0.02	oz	0.25	t
Bay Leaf, ground	0.5	gm	0.2	t		0.02	oz	0.2	t
Fennel Seeds, whole	0.15	gm	0.125	t scant		0.01	oz	0.125	t scant
NDFM (NonFat Dry Milk)	4.5	gm	0.8	TB		0.16	oz	0.8	TB
Cure #1, 156ppm (cure#1/instacure #1/prague powder)	1.135	gm	0.25	t scant		0.04	oz	0.25	t scant
Total wt	539.93	gm				19.03	oz

 

[chef jimmyj]

Looks great and thanks for sharing the recipe...JJ

 

[smokerjim]

Really looks good, thanks for the info

 

[chopsaw]

Nice work and write up .

 

[JC in GB]

Very nice.. Would granulated sugar work for the Erythritol?

JC

 

[tx smoker]

Those are some fantastic looking sausages and a beautifully detailed post. Thanks so much for for posting this. Excellent job.

Robert

 

[Bearcarver]

Those Look Great, Tall !!
Nice Job!
Like.

Bear

 

[pushok2018]

Looks fantastic! Thank you for sharing the recipe!
Also, you said you cooked them overnight but do you know how many hours total they were cooked? Is it possible to replace Erythritol with any other kind of sweetener? Dextrose for example?

 

[browneyesvictim]

I will definitely be making these! My gut may not thank me later, but I'm going to anyways. They look perfect to me.
I'm already thinking these would be perfect for pickling too for my hot mammas!

 

[SmokinAl]

Those look really good, gonna bookmark this, cause we really like hot links & am always looking for a better recipe!
Thanks for posting this!
Al

 

[olaf]

This is exactly what I've been wanting to make, definitely will be saving this recipe.

 

[tallbm]

Looks great and thanks for sharing the recipe...JJ

Thanks! :)

Really looks good, thanks for the info

Thanks! :)

Nice work and write up .

Thanks, it's take a few iterations so definitely wanted to get the details and share :)

Very nice.. Would granulated sugar work for the Erythritol?

JC

Thanks! Yeah jus use 30% less sugar than the Erythritol listed and you should match the sweetness level of the amount of Erythritol I used.

Those are some fantastic looking sausages and a beautifully detailed post. Thanks so much for for posting this. Excellent job.

Robert

Thanks! No problem, it's taken some time to get it this far so I definitely wanted to share :)

Those Look Great, Tall !!
Nice Job!
Like.

Bear

Thanks! :)

Looks fantastic! Thank you for sharing the recipe!
Also, you said you cooked them overnight but do you know how many hours total they were cooked? Is it possible to replace Erythritol with any other kind of sweetener? Dextrose for example?

Thanks!
I started them in the smoker at 9pm and raised temp every hour or so until i hit smoker temp of 155F around 1:30am then went to bed. I knew they wouldn't hit 152-153F at that temp so then at like 9:30am (went to bed late and slept in) they were at about 142F so I raised temp again to 165F, then at 11am I raised to 170F to speed it up a little more. Pulled em just before noon.

So in all they took 15hrs in the smoker but honestly could have easily taken half that time had I cared to stay up and bump the temps more rather than go to bed.

Yep you could replace the Erythritol with any suitable sweetener. Use 30% less sugar if doing sugar. Dextrose is used all the time in sausage but I don't know how much to use to be equivalent to my Erythritol. That would definitely be something for you to experiment with but should work :)

I will definitely be making these! My gut may not thank me later, but I'm going to anyways. They look perfect to me.
I'm already thinking these would be perfect for pickling too for my hot mammas!

Thanks! Yeah these things are goooood just don't punish your gut too much haha.
Oh I bet they would be good pickling options. I'm guessing you would just need to calculate the amount of salt between the sausage and the pickling brine to make sure you get the proper level of salt and not be too salty :)
Not sure how the brine would affect the other seasonings if it would pull them out of the sausage or not.

Those look really good, gonna bookmark this, cause we really like hot links & am always looking for a better recipe!
Thanks for posting this!
Al

Thanks! I think you will like these Al. I personally could go a little bit hotter but I wanted to make a good general recipe and then I could tone the heat up if I like. These do have kick to them so don't think they aren't spicy at all. They are probably borderline for a number of people but are just a hair over my "average" line in tastes haha.

This is exactly what I've been wanting to make, definitely will be saving this recipe.

Awesome! Yeah give it a shot.


Also everyone feel free to make this into a loaf and slice for sandwich meat!!!
I'm not sure if the slices will tear up easily or not if sliced thin but even if so it doesn't matter you just put the 2 halves of a slice on bread and no one knows the difference! hahaha

Enjoy! :D

 

[indaswamp]

relative sweetness scale- Sucrose= 100

Sucrose 100
Fructose 140
High Fructose Corn Syrup 120-160 (depends on concentration of syrup)
Glucose(dextrose) 70-80
Galactose 35
Maltose 30-50
Lactose 20


*from Marianski

 

[pushok2018]

relative sweetness scale- Sucrose= 100

Sucrose 100
Fructose 140
High Fructose Corn Syrup 120-160 (depends on concentration of syrup)
Glucose(dextrose) 70-80
Galactose 35
Maltose 30-50
Lactose 20

Thanks, inda! Vary handy information.... I must be missed it while reading that book....

 

[BGKYSmoker]

Dayum

Them look really good.

Galactose?
Aint that where them big lizards live?

 

[tallbm]

relative sweetness scale- Sucrose= 100

Sucrose 100
Fructose 140
High Fructose Corn Syrup 120-160 (depends on concentration of syrup)
Glucose(dextrose) 70-80
Galactose 35
Maltose 30-50
Lactose 20


*from Marianski

Erythritol is reported at 70% the sweetness of Sugar and I can very much attest to that with how much I sub it for sugar.

Allulose is also reported at 70% the sweetness of Sugar BUT I'm not finding that. I think it's around 60% or less when compared to sugar sweetness.
It's definitely not as sweet as Erythritol when I make my own sugar free gelatin gummy worm/bear type candies. I use the same recipe with Erythritol and Allulose and Allulose is noticeably less sweet. Not bad but just less sweet

 

[chopsaw]

I make my own sugar free gelatin gummy worm/bear type candies.

Can we expect a hot gut flavor ?

 

[tallbm]

Can we expect a hot gut flavor ?

Hahahaha nope not with the gummies. Would be interesting to try and make some hot gut gummies :D

 

[boykjo]

Very nice t. They look spot on..... Great Job!

Boykjo

 

[boykjo]

What a waste of vacuum bags...... I'll bet those links wont make it past 2 weeks. lol

Boykjo