Family Sausage Recipe

[MNGuy1959]

I decided to start a new topic of our sausage event this past weekend.  This was the most fun I ever had with my smoker, and brought back smells from my childhood!

To recap, here is the recipe:
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20 pounds ground meat (try 18-20 pork and 2 of beef) We use boston pork butts
6 Tablespoons salt
3 Tablespoons pepper
1-2 Tablespoons of freezing pickle or tender quick

Blend one large head of garlic with one quart cold water and let set overnight.  We use one quart of solution per 100# of meat so divide accordingly.

Mix all ingredients well.  Then stuff casings (polish sausage size or 32 x 35)

Once meat is stuffed, smoke at 140 degrees for 2 hours or as desired.
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The meat is all ground, and then mixed with the seasonings. 

The smoker is purely for the smoke.  I know that the sausage then rests in the garage overnight to dry, and then it is vacuum sealed. 

Again, it is an old family recipe, and I think my grandparent made this back in ND, as they had large families and needed to feed a large quantity.  It is great grilled, or simply boiled in the morning for breakfast with some eggs and toast. 

I will take lots of pictures as we go through this process.  My Mom and Dad worked for many years at a meat processing plant, and my Mom knows how to stuff, twist and tie this sausage like a pro.  She did this for over 25 years for a living.  I am looking at learning this from people that have made this sausage, year after year, my parents and my sister. 

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[MNGuy1959]

We begun this process by soaking the hog casings overnight.  We washed them in luke-warm water and then refrigerated them. 

[MNGuy1959]

We picked up the meat from the market Saturday morning.  80 lbs of Boston Butt (Sausage ground) and 10 lbs. of ground beef.  We only used 8 lbs in our sausage mix, but wanted to have enough ground beef. 

[MNGuy1959]

We added the Pepper, Salt, and Cure together for the complete 88 lbs. of meat.  Notice the Garlic water.  This is important!  Based on one quart for 100 lbs, we made 20 lbs batched, so we added a little less than a 1/2 cup to each batch. 

[MNGuy1959]

We set up a table in our garage, got out the sausage stuffer, and meat mixer.  We also had some cold water that we kept adding to the meat mixture. 

[MNGuy1959]

We added in the 10 lbs of ground pork and one lbs package of ground beef.  My mixer could only mix 17 lbs max, so we mixed 11 lbs at a time. 

[MNGuy1959]

We added in the 10 lbs of ground pork and one lbs package of ground beef.  My mixer could only mix 17 lbs max, so we mixed 11 lbs at a time.   We added in enough water to the mixed sausage until it was moist enough to not stick to the sides of the mixer. 

[MNGuy1959]

We had two smokers going.  My Model #2 and my buddy's Model #3.  The sausage hangers worked great.  We used about three ounces of Hickory per smoker.  I could smoke about 15 lbs at a time in my Model #2 and the Model # 3 could do about 20 lbs.  We got the smoke going at about 170 degrees and when we saw blue smoke, we dropped the smokers to 140 degrees and smoked each batch for two hours. 

[MNGuy1959]

We purchased some wood dowels and eye hooks to hang up the sausage to cool.  DO NOT vacuum seal the sausage until it is totally cooled.  Here is the finished sausage hanging from my garage. 

[MNGuy1959]

We vacuum sealed the sausage yesterday (Sunday).  Here in Minnesota, it was in the 40's during the evening, so the sausage cooled over night.  Let me say, my garage was very aromatic.  You do not want to park your cars in the garage while this sausage is cooling, as it is a very strong hickory smell.  I loved the smell, but I am not sure I would want it in my car.

We had a blast, and we grilled some of this yesterday.  It was so awesome.  There is just a great sense of accomplishment in doing this, and I enjoy giving this sausage to family and friends as much as I did making it with my Mom and Dad.  I will never forget this weekend! 

[NDKoze]

We do the same thing every year. It is a blast and memories for me and my kids that we will never forget.

Once recommendation. When making the sausage you want it to be as cold as possible throughout the process to prevent the fat from starting to render or get soft. So, I would strongly discourage the used of Luke-warm water. You want your meat and any liquid additions to be as cold as possible. When we add High-Temp cheese to our sausage, we add it into the mixer frozen.

It looks like you use a lot less water than we do. We use 1 Quart of Garlic water per 25lbs of meat and we use half of a head of garlic per quart. To each his own on this. I think the extra water helps allow the spices to mix better in the mixer.

That is a good idea with the dowels hanging from the rafters. We typically use Broom handles resting on ladder steps.

[MNGuy1959]

Hi Gregg:

Thanks for the catch.  Yes, the water we added to the mixture was indeed cold.  We used luke-warm water the night before to wash the casings, then we refrigerated them.  My mistake, and I edited the notes. 

Yeah, it was a blast.  I am going to make some more in a couple of weeks, as I am giving a lot of this away to family and friends. 

I think we are going to follow more of your recipe next time as well.  My buddy stated that he would have liked more garlic.  We will also play with the recipe and add cheese and some red pepper in some of our batches. 

Have you used your smokin-it for any of your sausage?  I think it works very well.  I did not use any water pan as I didn't want that extra moisture. 

[NDKoze]

I haven't actually used my Smokin-It for any of our fry sausage yet. We typically do 150-200 pounds at a time and it would take forever even in the #3.

We have a local meat market that smokes our sausage for us for just a few cents a pound all in one batch.

I am going to be smoking 50lbs of snack stix next weekend though. I will be creating a thread for that. This will be the first time smoking snack stix with the jerky dryer. My last effort without the jerky dryer did not go very well as there was just too much moisture in the smoker for snack stix.

I would highly recommend the high temp cheese. You would use 1lb for every 10lbs of sausage. We like Cheddar and Pepper Jack. Sometimes, we'll throw some diced Jalapenos in with the Pepper Jack sausage.

[MNGuy1959]

Gregg:

I really like your recipe!  I am going to try the cheese and jalapeños the next batch.  Great suggestions.  Yeah, this recipe is I suppose safe for the average taste pallet but I like sausage a bit spicier.  I know my father-in-laws recipe was a bit different and it was spicier, so I am thinking that more garlic water as well as some red pepper may be just the kick it needs. 

I am looking forward to hearing about your snack sticks using the dryer.  I can't make jerky fast enough.  I made a second batch and my family devoured it this past weekend. 

Also, I will have to check with my meat market, and perhaps have them smoke it.  It did take all day for 88 lbs, but I do enjoy the smell, so it was fun with a can of beer in my hand. 

[Pork Belly]

Looks Great! I'm glad you had a good time and got good results. It is a great fall tradition, putting meat in the freezer.