Walk temp up in Sous Vide?

[SmokinEdge]

Melting Points of Different Fats:

Pork) 82-104*F

Beef) 104-122*F

Lamb) 110-130*F

Chicken) 75*F

So as you can see hot smoking or generally cooking sausage is a balancing act of heat over time. The higher the heat the lower the cooking time. Lower temps the longer you can be there but not to long as fat is melting.

Cooking or smoking sausage warm/hot in a smoker is done with dry heat. This is much different than cooking with sous vide where the thermal transfer is much more powerful with water than is dry air heat. It’s my belief that the time in temperature is the key factor. 150*F in dry air heat is much different acting than 150*F in water heat.

The Polish pretty much cold smoke then poach in 170*F water. The cold smoking dries the sausage slightly, and this may be key because a dryer meat will come to temp faster than just fresh. Think dry aged steaks. So the more water you bind in sausage the juicier it will be cooked, at least theoretically, but the longer it will take to come to temperature because of the extra water. This is fine in fresh sausage that’s grilled, but a bit counterproductive for hot smoked sausage. Cherry picking parts of one sausage method and blending them with others can cause problems. This is to say that finding that balance for smoked sausage is very important. There is more to say, but I’ll see where this goes.

 

[indaswamp]

Pork) 82-104*F

Beef) 104-122*F

Lamb) 110-130*F

Chicken) 75*F

My experience has been beef fat melts before pork fat. I get more fat out with beef fat than pork fat. The different fats on an animal have very different melting temps depending on where the fat cones from off the animal.

 

[SmokinEdge]

My experience has been beef fat melts before pork fat. I get more fat out with beef fat than pork fat. The different fats on an animal have very different melting temps depending on where the fat cones from off the animal.

Meats also have varying abilities to uptake and hold or retain water, beef being the highest. For example beef bull meat has the ability to hold or retain 100% it’s weight in water, meaning on average red meat holds about 75% water but bull meat can hold as much as 100%. This ability to retain or hold more water is my suspicion on fat out experience. Is it water out or fat out? This is where protein extraction becomes very important. Protein extraction not only holds the meat mass together but it also binds fat and water into the mix. Lots to discuss Here.

 

[SmokinEdge]

The more fine the grind the more important that you grind lean meat and fat separate. Then mix the fat in last after protein extraction has been produced from the lean meat. If not the fat can smear and stop the bind. This is especially true in emulsified sausages.

 

[jbo_c]

some interesting notes there. Didn’t realize lamb melting point had such a high end. Never noticed that waxiness associated with high melt point fats.

Also, since food safety, demands temps well above the melting points, it seems like temp wouldn’t have as much to do with fatout as other things might. My supposition(only that. I make no claim to know.) has been that the primary key to preventing fat-out is to make sure to get enough bind to hold the fat in the matrix while it’s melted so that it stays put when the meat cools back down. Again, that’s not based on science or knowledge, just me logic-ing my way through it.

Interesting thing about my recent issue with fat-out was that, from the same batch, one sausage had fatout and one didn’t. As noted above, only difference was the step up plan and casing. So there’s no denying temp steps must have something to do with it, but I’m far from really “getting” it.

I do hate going through the journey and feeling like in the end I’m just crossing my fingers and hoping it works out this time. Definitely see the comfort in adding binders as insurance, so may start doing that even though I’ve tried to avoid it.

Jbo

 

[jbo_c]

“Is it water out or fat out?”

In this specific case, the liquid definitely looked and felt like water(of course with a little fat scum) but was also definitely what we refer to as fat-out.

Jbo

 

[indaswamp]

The fail safe method for mixing for protein extraction is to mix until you can take a golf ball size pinch of meat paste and it will not fall from your hand turned upside down. If you over mix, it will not help you with the bind and you run the risk of fat smear which will lead to fat out. Make sure you are mixing with the paste cold...below 35*F.

 

[jbo_c]

Definitely made that. I’m sure that wasn’t the problem with mine.

Jbo

 

[yakman34]

I pull my summer sausage out of the smoker after about 4 hours and vacuum seal in bags, bring the water temp to 145 and dump in the sausage for an hour then pull them out and heat water back up to 170 and dump back in for another hour, no fire on the pot when sausages are in the water and they come out pretty good no fat out and great texture. also i let them hang over night before resealing in bags and then to the freezer. i do use a binder and citric acid in them.