Help me make sausage

Cafe Society
1

For my birthday, SpouseO bought me the meat grinder and sausage stuffer attachments for my Kitchenaid mixer - awesome! Yesterday I went to our friendly neighborhood restaurant supply store and bought some collagen sausage casings (they had natural hog casings as well - should I have gotten those instead?) and this Home Sausage Making book to guide my travels (since it seemed that that was the best book they had; there were only like 3 choices).

I know very little about sausage making, other than what was shown on this year’s Worst Cooks in America. But I want to learn. What else do I need? What cookbook can I not afford to be without? Techniques, tips, tricks - I need 'em all.

2

One of the acknowledged masters of sausage making is Rytek Kutas. The book is very helpful, although you may need to cut down on size of the recipes. I only made link sausage once, but it was fun and pretty easy. I used hog casings. It would help if you have somebody helping you when you start filling the casings, to twist them at proper intervals while you continue to feed the meat into the grinder.

3

This book is also good for sausage-making and all things charcuterie.

Basic points, for a simple pork sausage: Pork shoulder/Boston butt has pretty much the right meat:fat ratio for a standard sausage. You want the meat pretty cold when you grind it. I cube my meat and put it in the freezer for a bit to harden up. Also, freeze all your sausage-making grinding attachments as well. The reason is, you want distinct pieces of fat, and room temperature meat will not grind cleanly very well, and you will end up with a sausage whose texture is off. (Add to that the fat will clog up your grinder and you will be getting mushed meat being poorly extruded rather than a clean grind easily flowing through.) If the grind starts looking sinewy and is bunching up on you, clean the blade and the grade. You do not want to me forcing the meat through a clogged up grate.

IMHO, collagen casings are terrible. I can’t find a good purpose for them other than throwing them into the garbage can. I always use natural casings (either the standard hog casings or hog middles for larger sausages.)

The Kitchen Aid stuffer attachment mushes the meat up too much for my tastes. However, it’ll do fine for when your beginning. I use one of these stuffers, which are great, as they just push the meat evenly straight through the tube, rather than having that rotating piece in there which gums up the meat a bit.

Proper salting levels are about 2-2.5% by weight for most sausages. Some go up to 3% or so, but you should aim for 2-2.5% and see how you like it. I use two scales for sausage making–one kitchen scale for the meat, and a gram scale for the salt and herbs. I do everything by percentages for consistency and to make easy scaling.

After you have it ground, that’s usually when you add the seasonings and the liquid. (Some people cube and season the meat first, then grind it.) You want to work the meat until you have a nice “bind” going. This is when the mixture becomes a bit tacky and holds together on its own. You can do this step in the mixing part of your Kitchen Aid, or you could do it by hand. It should take a couple of minutes to get the meat to this point.

Then, stuff in casings. This will take a little practice, but should be fairly self-explanatory.

There’s a reasonable video here with the basics.

4

The book that pulykamell mentions is a good one- I have a copy myself.

I’d start with something simple like their garlic sausage or italian sausage recipe and work up from there.

5

Never done it myself, but FWIW there’s a Good Eats episode on sausage making you can watch on Youtube.

6

Umm- sausage and treaties should be made in secret.

7

After much research, this was the book I chose as my bible. Turns out it was an excellent decision.

I don’t go in for those fancy electrical gizmos; my stuffer is one of these.

I’d go natural casings all the way; they’re cheap, and they will keep for a year in the refrigerator.

I’ve only made kielbasa so far, though. Bratwurst and Italian sausage are future considerations.

I would advise getting a large plastic tub in which to mix the ingredients.

And invite folks over, make it a party.

As for recipes, start with a recommended spice configuration, mix it into your batch, then fry up a sausage patty or two. Tweak the spices to your liking before committing them to the casings.

mmm

8

I would follow any advice on sausage from someone named “Mr. Mustard” :slight_smile:

Remember, sausagemaking predates widespread literacy, so you can probably get a reasonable approximation without a book. Grind meat, mix in seasonings, and stuff the casing. If it looks and tastes like a sausage, you got it; if not, figure out why not and change that.

I followed a recipe the very first time, and not since. There’s really only one procedure.

9

  1. Make sure you “thread” all of the casing onto the nozzle initially and let the sausage push it out. Otherwise the casing will rip from the pressure.

  2. Have a small frying pan ready to fry up a little and taste it to verify the salt and spices, before proceeding with the batch.

  3. Pork is getting leaner every year, so don’t be surprised if you need to buy some extra pork fat to get the mix right.

  4. Good Italian sausage can be made with just salt, black pepper and fennel seeds. You might like to bruise up the fennel seeds using a mortar/pestle, or a hammer. You don’t have to bother with garlic powder, oregano, or anything else.

10

Hyperelastic makes a good point that I should have mentioned: make sure you add more fat. The book I cited gives the proper ratio for each type of sausage. If you order in advance, your butcher will likely reserve some fat for you and possibly toss it into your order without charge.
mmm

11

I make sausage all the time; I find it’s easy to make a big batch and have several varieties in the freezer for quick meals. I actually wore out the Kitchenaid grinder attachment; it cracked, and I replaced it with a standalone grinder.

All the above advice is great. I use the Charcuterie book pulykamell linked.

The most important advice, IMO, is to keep your meat cold. If it’s too warm, it jams the grinder and ends up as meat mush, not ground. If it’s not coming out of the grinder looking like long cylindrical worms, it’s not cold enough. I cut up the meat and put it in the freezer for at least an hour before grinding.

12

You could make one of these. :smiley:

13

DCnDC, that’s awesome. Love.

pulykamell, I was surprised that the Kitchen Window store I was at didn’t seem to have Charcuterie. (I think I’ve seen it recommended here before, and so looked for it.) This place sells high-end kitchen stuff and gadgets; I was certain it’d be there. No dice.

Cold, natural casings, all good. I also need to read through my KitchenAid grinder attachment manual - is there a recommended way to clean these guys? And the test patty is an awesome idea. It’s funny - I watch chef Anne Burell’s show all the time, and she recommends exactly this with meatballs, hamburgers, meatloaf and such, and I totally forgot about it. Now I won’t - excellent idea.

14

The grinder attachment comes apart and is easy to clean. You might want to get a bottle brush to get down inside the barrel, but I’ve never had any problems. You might also think about just making bulk sausage instead of using casings. I don’t like casings in a lot of dishes and only see an advantage in link sausage for having something in a bun.

15

The Kitchenaid stuffer is too slow.Here is another stuffer that’s a bit cheaper than the cast iron model… It works well though it is easier with two people, one cranker and one twister…Hey hey,don’t go there.
Also, one more vote for the Charcuterie book

16

Beat you to it. (See post #3).