Greetings, everyone.
The Q-View below is not as basic as others I have done before. If you have never ground sausage before, please do that a few times before trying to emulsify a sausage. Otherwise, the rules are the same: Do your prep work diligently, make sure you run a clean kitchen, have the right equipment and follow the directions. :)
Yesterday, Sunday, May 29, 2011 I am started and finished my first emulsified sausage project. Rytek Kutas's Great Sausage Recipes and Meat Curing, 4th Edition: Vienna Sausage, pg 203. Basically, I used much of Rytek's original 10 lb recipe, made a few tweaks for flavor, and added smoke. (Rytek suggests Vienna is not normally smoked. I like the flavor smoke brings, and so I did.)
Emulsified sausage has a totally different texture than regular sausage. Think of the interior of bologna, or hot dogs. That smoothness cannot be obtained with a grinder alone. You could re-grind and re-grind, and all you'd get is mush. For this project, I used my good old fashioned food processor. If I continue to do projects like this, I will need to invest in a processor that holds more and has a bit more torque.
Cheers!
-Princess
*~*~*
Prep work: Got all my seasonings together and whisked them into a cup. Rytek calls for:
2 tsp Insta Cure #1
4 TB powdered dextrose
1/2 cup wheat flour
4 TB salt (I use purified sea salt. NEVER use iodized salt in sausage)
1 TB ground nutmeg
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp ground cloves
I really do like using powdered dextrose in sausage. It's a fine enough powder that it practically disappears (no grainy sugary bits) and is not so sweet as to be shocking (which I find to be the case with honey.) I had never used dextrose before reading Rytek. I think my Busha would have loved it, had she been aware of it in her time.
I ran the sink full of water and cleaned out some salted casings. A pound of sausage will fill about two feet of hog casing. I had to do ten pounds, so I cleaned 25 feet. (Five extra feet is for breakage, tie offs, etc.) I got them rinsed, inside and out, then left them in a bowl of clean cool water in the fridge to soak. You can clean casings up to two days in advance, but no less than 30 minutes before you plan to stuff.
Next up, I had to get my meat in order. Rytek calls for four pounds beef, four pounds veal and two pounds pork. I swapped out two pounds of veal for two extra pounds of pork. Partially, this was a budget concern: veal is spendy. Also, I wanted the added fat from the pork, as that I was using 90/10 ground beef. My butcher does not charge me to grind my beef, so I let him do that after I picked out the cuts I wanted.
So: bone-in pork shoulder, almost five pounds in packages:
Net result, four pounds of meat for the grinder and some pretty little bones. I wasn't really very careful trimming the bones. Once I got my four pounds of meat, I was happy. These meaty little bones go in the freezer for future stock purposes:
Next up was the veal. This was a big mistake: My local guy had been pretty well picked over by thr time I got there, so all he had left was the pricey stuff. Just over two pounds of veal cost more than I'll own up to, but damn, they are pretty, aren't they?
I want all that good baby veal fat in my sausage, and I love the taste of veal, so I got the filet knife out and did a better job trimming these down. Only lost .25 to bone and trim, ended up with two pounds even.
More bones for the stock bag!
All of the meat pieces, plus the ground beef, got placed into a tray and placed into the freezer. I have said this before: ice crystals just barely forming on your meat is a good thing. Firm meat grinds better, firm fat grinds better and COLD meat is always safer. Meanwhile, I scrubbed down the kitchen and got the grinder area set up.
I keep all my grinder parts in the freezer year round. Two reasons: it is already cold when I need it AND a freezer is a dehumidifyer, so my parts stay rust free. (Also, with an inquisitive toddler around the house, keeping sharp things away from him is extra wise, in my opinion.)
It was humid out yesterday. Enough so that the grinder began to steam as soon as she hit the air. I wrapped my hands in kitchen towels and got her good and assembled:
I tried to get a picture of the steam coming off of it, but it didn't really work. I fitted the grinder with the smallest die I own. When emulsifying sausage, you want tiny, 3/16 if you have it. Here's the catch: you also have to have done a great job trimming sinew and silverfat. On a tiny grinder setting, you're asking for smear if you're not extra diligent. I like to think I'm pretty good, and I got a snarl about 4 pounds in.
Tiny little holes make good meat go SQUISH.
So anyhow, got everything ground and mixed back into the tray. I began to slowly mix the seasonings in by hand. Normally, you can use a little water or wine to help, but with emulsified, I'll be adding a LOT of water later, so for now, gradual mix, shake, mix, shake, mix ... shake. You want it all to be evenly distributed (especially since there is Insta Cure in there)
Then I tamped it all into the pan (why yes, 10 lb of meat DOES fit perfectly into a 9x13 pan), wrapped it in Saran, placed it in the fridge to get the temp back down and went off to do other things.
I dug out my food processor. It's an ancient 2 Speed Hamilton Beach, probably older than I am. I do like that the motor housing is no where near the bowl. This way, as the machine heats up from the labor, it should not drag my meat into unsafe temperatures. I had stored the cutting blade in the freezer, which is why it is not seen in the picture below.
The bowl on my Hamilton, as you can see, is not very large. I decided to divide the meat into 1/8 portions of 1.25 pounds each. This way, most of it was staying cold. 1.25 lb was all it could handle at a time, as I found out, so it was a pretty good guess. :)
Also, my stuffer is a 5lb Grizzly, so I figured I could do half, load it, ten do the other half. Great plan!!
Rytek reccomends 2 cups ice cold water for each 10lb batch. That would be1/4 cup per loaded Hamilton Bowl for me. I got my martini shaker out, filled it with ice, and shook out/measured 1/4 cup of water. I added 1.25 lb of meat mix, and turned it on LOW. It seemed to be laboring a bit, so I scraped it down, added two TB more water, and went back. Perfect.
Then I got smart and started doing 1/4 cup water plus 2 ice cubes per batch. BINGO!
One minute on low, one minute on high. The fluffy paste looked awesome. I really wish I had more pictures.
It was light in color and in texture. I used the scraper as best as I could, but really, ended up using my mitts. It would be so easy to fold in some kind of garnish... nuts? Smoked ham? Anything, really... It was like a forcemeat pate mix. Wild...
Every batch went back into the fridge as I did the next one. I stopped after four batches, halfway. The machine needed a break, as the motor case was beginning to feel kinda warm. I had emulsified five pounds of meat. I placed the bowl and blade back in the freezer for now. I packed the five pounds of emulsified meat into the barrel of my stuffer, placed that in the fridge wrapped in Saran and went and played with my son while the Hamilton Beach cooled down.
About an hour later, I finished up emulsifying the second half. I brought the stuffer barrel down to the basement and stuffed away...
I'm not used to doing loops of sausage to be hung for a smoker. I felt really silly. My measurements were bad, my hanks of casing were uneven... In short, I am an amateur and this is where it shows, LOL!! I placed all ten pounds of them on foil-wrapped smoke bars and let them hang in the basement for about an hour to dry off and form a little pellicle.
Meanwhile, back outside, I got the smoker out and fired up. No wood just yet, just trying to hold a solid 150 temp. It took me some playing, but I finally got there.
Rytek says to rack them in a preheated house for an hour at 150, then raise to 165, waiting for an internal temp of 152. I did just that, except I added a tray of mesquite after the 1st hour.
That gorgeous red color comes from smoke and Insta Cure. My camera isn't doing this pic justice: Halfway through.
And finished. Golly were they good. :)
Thanks for looking, folks!!
Cheers!
-Princess
The Q-View below is not as basic as others I have done before. If you have never ground sausage before, please do that a few times before trying to emulsify a sausage. Otherwise, the rules are the same: Do your prep work diligently, make sure you run a clean kitchen, have the right equipment and follow the directions. :)
Yesterday, Sunday, May 29, 2011 I am started and finished my first emulsified sausage project. Rytek Kutas's Great Sausage Recipes and Meat Curing, 4th Edition: Vienna Sausage, pg 203. Basically, I used much of Rytek's original 10 lb recipe, made a few tweaks for flavor, and added smoke. (Rytek suggests Vienna is not normally smoked. I like the flavor smoke brings, and so I did.)
Emulsified sausage has a totally different texture than regular sausage. Think of the interior of bologna, or hot dogs. That smoothness cannot be obtained with a grinder alone. You could re-grind and re-grind, and all you'd get is mush. For this project, I used my good old fashioned food processor. If I continue to do projects like this, I will need to invest in a processor that holds more and has a bit more torque.
Cheers!
-Princess
*~*~*
Prep work: Got all my seasonings together and whisked them into a cup. Rytek calls for:
2 tsp Insta Cure #1
4 TB powdered dextrose
1/2 cup wheat flour
4 TB salt (I use purified sea salt. NEVER use iodized salt in sausage)
1 TB ground nutmeg
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp ground cloves
I really do like using powdered dextrose in sausage. It's a fine enough powder that it practically disappears (no grainy sugary bits) and is not so sweet as to be shocking (which I find to be the case with honey.) I had never used dextrose before reading Rytek. I think my Busha would have loved it, had she been aware of it in her time.
I ran the sink full of water and cleaned out some salted casings. A pound of sausage will fill about two feet of hog casing. I had to do ten pounds, so I cleaned 25 feet. (Five extra feet is for breakage, tie offs, etc.) I got them rinsed, inside and out, then left them in a bowl of clean cool water in the fridge to soak. You can clean casings up to two days in advance, but no less than 30 minutes before you plan to stuff.
Next up, I had to get my meat in order. Rytek calls for four pounds beef, four pounds veal and two pounds pork. I swapped out two pounds of veal for two extra pounds of pork. Partially, this was a budget concern: veal is spendy. Also, I wanted the added fat from the pork, as that I was using 90/10 ground beef. My butcher does not charge me to grind my beef, so I let him do that after I picked out the cuts I wanted.
So: bone-in pork shoulder, almost five pounds in packages:
Net result, four pounds of meat for the grinder and some pretty little bones. I wasn't really very careful trimming the bones. Once I got my four pounds of meat, I was happy. These meaty little bones go in the freezer for future stock purposes:
Next up was the veal. This was a big mistake: My local guy had been pretty well picked over by thr time I got there, so all he had left was the pricey stuff. Just over two pounds of veal cost more than I'll own up to, but damn, they are pretty, aren't they?
I want all that good baby veal fat in my sausage, and I love the taste of veal, so I got the filet knife out and did a better job trimming these down. Only lost .25 to bone and trim, ended up with two pounds even.
More bones for the stock bag!
All of the meat pieces, plus the ground beef, got placed into a tray and placed into the freezer. I have said this before: ice crystals just barely forming on your meat is a good thing. Firm meat grinds better, firm fat grinds better and COLD meat is always safer. Meanwhile, I scrubbed down the kitchen and got the grinder area set up.
I keep all my grinder parts in the freezer year round. Two reasons: it is already cold when I need it AND a freezer is a dehumidifyer, so my parts stay rust free. (Also, with an inquisitive toddler around the house, keeping sharp things away from him is extra wise, in my opinion.)
It was humid out yesterday. Enough so that the grinder began to steam as soon as she hit the air. I wrapped my hands in kitchen towels and got her good and assembled:
I tried to get a picture of the steam coming off of it, but it didn't really work. I fitted the grinder with the smallest die I own. When emulsifying sausage, you want tiny, 3/16 if you have it. Here's the catch: you also have to have done a great job trimming sinew and silverfat. On a tiny grinder setting, you're asking for smear if you're not extra diligent. I like to think I'm pretty good, and I got a snarl about 4 pounds in.
Tiny little holes make good meat go SQUISH.
So anyhow, got everything ground and mixed back into the tray. I began to slowly mix the seasonings in by hand. Normally, you can use a little water or wine to help, but with emulsified, I'll be adding a LOT of water later, so for now, gradual mix, shake, mix, shake, mix ... shake. You want it all to be evenly distributed (especially since there is Insta Cure in there)
Then I tamped it all into the pan (why yes, 10 lb of meat DOES fit perfectly into a 9x13 pan), wrapped it in Saran, placed it in the fridge to get the temp back down and went off to do other things.
I dug out my food processor. It's an ancient 2 Speed Hamilton Beach, probably older than I am. I do like that the motor housing is no where near the bowl. This way, as the machine heats up from the labor, it should not drag my meat into unsafe temperatures. I had stored the cutting blade in the freezer, which is why it is not seen in the picture below.
The bowl on my Hamilton, as you can see, is not very large. I decided to divide the meat into 1/8 portions of 1.25 pounds each. This way, most of it was staying cold. 1.25 lb was all it could handle at a time, as I found out, so it was a pretty good guess. :)
Also, my stuffer is a 5lb Grizzly, so I figured I could do half, load it, ten do the other half. Great plan!!
Rytek reccomends 2 cups ice cold water for each 10lb batch. That would be1/4 cup per loaded Hamilton Bowl for me. I got my martini shaker out, filled it with ice, and shook out/measured 1/4 cup of water. I added 1.25 lb of meat mix, and turned it on LOW. It seemed to be laboring a bit, so I scraped it down, added two TB more water, and went back. Perfect.
Then I got smart and started doing 1/4 cup water plus 2 ice cubes per batch. BINGO!
One minute on low, one minute on high. The fluffy paste looked awesome. I really wish I had more pictures.
It was light in color and in texture. I used the scraper as best as I could, but really, ended up using my mitts. It would be so easy to fold in some kind of garnish... nuts? Smoked ham? Anything, really... It was like a forcemeat pate mix. Wild...
Every batch went back into the fridge as I did the next one. I stopped after four batches, halfway. The machine needed a break, as the motor case was beginning to feel kinda warm. I had emulsified five pounds of meat. I placed the bowl and blade back in the freezer for now. I packed the five pounds of emulsified meat into the barrel of my stuffer, placed that in the fridge wrapped in Saran and went and played with my son while the Hamilton Beach cooled down.
About an hour later, I finished up emulsifying the second half. I brought the stuffer barrel down to the basement and stuffed away...
I'm not used to doing loops of sausage to be hung for a smoker. I felt really silly. My measurements were bad, my hanks of casing were uneven... In short, I am an amateur and this is where it shows, LOL!! I placed all ten pounds of them on foil-wrapped smoke bars and let them hang in the basement for about an hour to dry off and form a little pellicle.
Meanwhile, back outside, I got the smoker out and fired up. No wood just yet, just trying to hold a solid 150 temp. It took me some playing, but I finally got there.
Rytek says to rack them in a preheated house for an hour at 150, then raise to 165, waiting for an internal temp of 152. I did just that, except I added a tray of mesquite after the 1st hour.
That gorgeous red color comes from smoke and Insta Cure. My camera isn't doing this pic justice: Halfway through.
And finished. Golly were they good. :)
Thanks for looking, folks!!
Cheers!
-Princess
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