Meat Processing

@Riley-Renwick I agree with everything @Jonathon has said. My brother also can not have any sort of nitrates as it triggers his epilepsy and his seizures, for years we thought it was the craziest thing but after having numerous testing they ruled foods that are “trigger” foods for him that he can not have. TONS of foods have nitrates that people don’t realize and they try to be healthy and say they don’t want nitrates, but like Jonathon said it’s in healthy foods too lol. So what I do for him is just make a no cure jerky so he can enjoy some sort of jerky, basic ingredients and just smoke for a small amount of time then in the dehydrator. Self life is terrible though so I make small batches for him so it doesn’t spoil

@GlennT Holy Regular is our best selling seasoning, not just Breakfast Sausage seasoning but all around seasoning. We sell a ton of it and for good reason, it is simply awesome, for anyone who hasn’t tried it you should!

@Jonathon I’ve experimented with ground skin in several recipes and it adds a great silkiness and melts away but it must be boiled first.

@blackjac That is correct but I wouldn’t recommend that technique. I may have just got lucky on that one!

@twilliams Thanks for info as soon as new stuffing tube an casings get here I will try the larger the stuffing tube the better, was brain storming and was wondering if I made up a dual stuffing tube head if it would help on the back pressure problem, saw one somewhere??

@craigrice I was thinking the same thing so the Friday before new year’s we made up 20#s of fresh kielbasa! 10 regular and 10 mild.

@Jonathon The last time I made a batch I cut the dehydrator out completely and just used my convection oven. I figured with the movement of air from the fan, it would pretty much mimic what a dehydrator does, and I would have a lot more confidence in the temperature.

@Parksider Lol I have done that as well. I made 4 10 lb batches and didnt separate them out when I was ice bathing them. I had to taste a little bit of each stick and after a few it was very difficult to pick the hab sticks from the gigawatt!

@miller Yeah, unless you are going for something very specific, like chorizo, 30% is the max fat you want to go with. Carrot fiber or sure gel is almost always a good idea with cured sausage, not as important with fresh but with cured sausage I always use it

thanks for your time.will be ordering soon

@AdamCA Yes, true boudin has to be that but…we also make a non-traditional lebanon bologna and I love the way that comes out!

joe you made my day buddy with that info I cant thank you enough.thanks for the time spent.im happy happy.happy new year.jim

@wildgameinmabelly First, awesome name! Second, this is hard one because the curing and drying give you some shelf stability and if you use encapsulated citric acid, or drop the pH somehow) you get more shelf stability. The issue is that to be sure you need to have a pH meter and a water activity meter, without those you are guessing and eventually something will happen and you’ll hate life for a few days! So, just like @Joe-Hell said, freeze anything you aren’t going to eat in a week.

Yeah, there isn’t really a wrong way to do it here. A lot of commercial processors do it this way. I add the cure to the water for sure, it helps make sure you have a more even distribution. It is slightly better to do this when making a fresh sausage when you are doing a cured sausage you are going to do so much mixing that everything should be evenly distributed but with fresh you only want to mix it a little bit.

@Beef1424 Absolutely it is. That cottonseed oil will maintain its integrity up to 130° so that should be fine, just make sure it is somewhere where it wont be jostled a lot.

@twilliams Lol. I’ll dig if I must. The boy’s will get it anyways…

@Mr-Jingles Anything in https://www.waltonsinc.com/seasonings/sausage-seasonings/cured-sausage-seasoning is a cured sausage but you aren’t necessarily tied to that category. You could 100% take a summer sausage or snack stick seasoning and do it. If you want to stay in that category then German is very mild, you would want to add a little something for some sweetness though. Another option would be to take a bratwurst seasoning and then make a 20-22 lb batch while using all the seasoning. You would do this because of salt content, it is what our store manager did with the Hatch Green Chili Brat and they were amazing! Another option is the landjaeger seasoning, its got a little bit of sweet and is mild though I don’t see it going well with cheddar.

@knifemaker3 Like @akdave Said, presentation is a large part of it but depending on the netting and the tightness it can also help hold the product form.

@Jonathon I will try to get a pic tomorrow if I can remember.

@Jonathon Thanks