How To Make Homemade Snack Sticks
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How To Make Homemade Snack Sticks
Learn how to make homemade snack sticks with Walton's and Meatgistics. Watch the video, read the guide, and then post your questions or comments below
What Is A Snack Stick?
Snack Sticks are a meat snack and semi-dried sausage that are stuffed into a small diameter casing. Typically a collagen casing is used, but it is also acceptable to use natural casings or even make skinless snack sticks. Most snack sticks have a low pH from around 4.5 to 5.2, which is what gives them that familiar tangy flavor and is what helps aid in shelf stability. Another aid for shelf stability is a low water activity, which means binding water in the meat snacks to make it unavailable to support microbial growth. Water activity is not something that can be measured by a home meat processor, but we still set up our process and thermal processing to attempt to achieve a lower water activity. Snack sticks can be made from just about any type of meat, from beef, pork, chicken, other poultry, wild game, or a combination of meats. Walton’s recommends using a lean to fat ratio of at least 80/20, and many times a 30% fat ratio, with a maximum of 40% fat. Fat is where most of your flavor comes from so changing your lean to fat ratio will change the overall taste and mouthfeel of your product.
Meat Block
25lb 80/20 beef trim 1
Additives
1 package Excalibur Snack Stick Seasoning
1oz Sure Cure 2
6oz Sure Gel Meat Binder 3
4oz Encapsulated Citric Acid 4
2 to 3 lb High Temperature Cheese
19mm Collagen Casings
1 Quart Ice Cold Water 5
Process
Start the initial grind with a 3/8in (10mm) grinder plate, then grind a second time through a 1/8in (3mm) grinder plate. Always use a sharp grinder knife and plate. This will help you retain a better particle definition, color, and help prevent any smearing of the meat. If you cannot easily distinguish the lean from the fat when grinding, then it may be time for a new grinder plate and knife.
Meat Mixing
Using a meat mixer is preferred to hand mixing when making snack sticks. We need to make sure we get a lot of protein extraction, and that is a bit more difficult to achieve in hand mixing but still a possibility to do if you don’t have an actual meat mixer. We are going to want to mix for about 8 minutes, and we’ll want to reverse the direction of the mixing paddles every 1 minute. When you start the mixer, just start adding all the ingredients, except the Encapsulated Citric Acid and High Temp Cheese. These last two ingredients can be added in the last 45-60 seconds of the cycle, or just long enough to evenly disperse. Over mixing Encapsulated Citric Acid could lead to breaking the encapsulate and over mixing the cheese can lead to smearing and loss of shape.
Sausage Stuffing
Avoid creating air pockets when you load your sausage stuffer and begin stuffing until the casings are full with a smooth exterior. We will stuff into as long of ropes as we can, and then we’ll cut them to length when we actually hang on smoke sticks in the smokehouse.
Thermal Processing
For information on adding humidity to your smoke schedule go HERE
Either hang on smoke sticks or lay on racks in your smokehouse or oven. Just be sure to leave a slight gap between the snack sticks. A simple cooking schedule you can follow is here:
125F for 1 hour
140F for 1 hour
155F for 2 hours
175F until internal meat temp of 160FCooling
To help set the casing to the meat and also prevent wrinkling we need to shower the snack sticks when they are done cooking or put them in an ice water bath. It should only take around 10 minutes to get the temperature to drop down. Then, we’ll let them set out for about 1 hour before moving to the refrigerator/freezer. After we are totally done with the cooling process, then we will package in vacuum pouches for longer term storage.
Wrap up
It’s easy to get the basics on making snack sticks, but practice does make perfect. Walton’s has everything you need (except the meat) to make great snack sticks, plus we have the knowledge to help you perfect your own process. If you have any questions or need help in your process, please share your questions or comments below.
Notes
- Using a binder like Carrot Fiber, or Soy Protein Blend will not change how much water you put into your product.
- Place a small pan of water in the bottom of smokehouse during the entire cooking cycle to help increase humidity
If your smoker, smokehouse, dehydrator, or oven cannot reach temperatures as low as 125F, just start as low as possible and slowly increase the temperature over time
FootNotes
1. Or use 18 lb wild game meat and 7 lb pork fat or beef fat, though beef fat will have different texture and taste (Return to text)
2. Sure Cure packet is included with seasoning (Return to text)
3. Instead of Sure Gel also try 4 oz of Carrot Fiber (Return to text)
4. If you do not use a cure accelerator like Encapsulated Citric Acid or Smoked Meat Stabilizer, then after it has been stuffed into its casing hold in a refrigerator for approximately 12 hours or overnight (Return to text)
5. For Home Processors 2 Qts Will Make Stuffing Easier (Return to text)Watch WaltonsTV: How To Make Snack Sticks
Austin I have a question regarding shelf life. I made some snack sticks Tuesday, using Willie’s Snack Stick (Non-MSG), Sure Cure, Water and Carrot Fiber. I have them now vacuumed sealed in smaller packages after processing, blooming, and cooling, and sitting in the refrigerator. My intention is to put these into holiday gift bags for friends and family for Christmas. Will I have to freeze these between now (12/12) and Christmas or will they be ok as they are in the refrigerator? I already made 30# of H Summer Sausage and froze those. Any input would be appreciated.
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rjsenk On anything like this we like to defer to the USDA. Austin might possibly disagree with this but I find that unlikely.
Now, I strongly disagree with their recommendations on the freezer life as I have eaten more than a few snack sticks/summer sausages that have been in the freezer for a lot longer than that!
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rjsenk On anything like this we like to defer to the USDA. Austin might possibly disagree with this but I find that unlikely.
Now, I strongly disagree with their recommendations on the freezer life as I have eaten more than a few snack sticks/summer sausages that have been in the freezer for a lot longer than that!
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Jonathon Thank you Jonathon. Those guidelines helped out a lot. I agree with you on the freezer life of smoked meats though; I have had tasty treats that were in the freezer much longer than that.
rjsenk Jonathon
The timing listed on the freezer life is really more geared towards quality. FSIS also has another quote in that same bit of info that says “Once frozen it doesn’t matter if the date expires because foods kept frozen continuously are safe indefinitely.”
Once you freeze meat, it is going to stay safe to consume and eat, but the quality may still degrade over time. -
Austin Thank you for actually reading all of that…it was too many words, I just wanted to see the picture!
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Hi, Austin. I have been making Willie’s snack sticks for a few batches and every time I get grease pockets between the casing and the meat. I followed the recipe to the best of my ability, including the smoke/cook schedule, except that I hand mix the meat thoroughly. Would you have any idea why I am getting grease pockets?
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@kanevak This is what is known as “fatting out” the grease is the fat that has rendered out of the meat. You can use a binder like Sure Gel to help and/or mix a lot more. You need to achieve high levels of protein extraction when mixing, this will keep everything bound all together and will prevent the fat from rendering out of the meat. This is an older video but it covers the topic well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wStH-RtQUY8
Get more help with your processing questions and learn more about processing meat by subscribing to our waltonsinc.com youtube page at https://wltns.link/waltonstv I am a Gorilla, love yourself
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@kanevak This is what is known as “fatting out” the grease is the fat that has rendered out of the meat. You can use a binder like Sure Gel to help and/or mix a lot more. You need to achieve high levels of protein extraction when mixing, this will keep everything bound all together and will prevent the fat from rendering out of the meat. This is an older video but it covers the topic well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wStH-RtQUY8
Jonathon Thanks for the quick reply! Is carrot fiber as good as sure gel? We hand mix for about 15 minutes adding the encapsulated citric acid in the last couple of minutes. I like to do a turn-and-squeeze technique to really mash and mix the meat. Is this a bad technique?
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@kanevak No, a turn and squeeze isnt a bad technique, it sounds a lot like what I do, so you are good there! As for carrot fiber I do like it a lot and it gives similar results to sure gel just goes about it a different way. Carrot fiber gives you a more moist product by holding water (*up to 26 times its weight) and sure gel helps hold everything together by adding protein and some other ingredients. So, sure gel acutally makes protein extraction easier and carrot fiber holds water.
Unless you are using wild game and adding pork fat I think you will be fine with carrot fiber. In fact, even if you are using wild game and adding pork fat you will be fine but sure gel is better suited for that.
Get more help with your processing questions and learn more about processing meat by subscribing to our waltonsinc.com youtube page at https://wltns.link/waltonstv I am a Gorilla, love yourself
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@kanevak No, a turn and squeeze isnt a bad technique, it sounds a lot like what I do, so you are good there! As for carrot fiber I do like it a lot and it gives similar results to sure gel just goes about it a different way. Carrot fiber gives you a more moist product by holding water (*up to 26 times its weight) and sure gel helps hold everything together by adding protein and some other ingredients. So, sure gel acutally makes protein extraction easier and carrot fiber holds water.
Unless you are using wild game and adding pork fat I think you will be fine with carrot fiber. In fact, even if you are using wild game and adding pork fat you will be fine but sure gel is better suited for that.
Jonathon Thanks. I am using wild game and pork fat. I have used sure gel last time and still had “fatting out”. Maybe I need to just mix it longer
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@kanevak Yeah, my recommendation is to mix until you thin you are good an then go for another 3-4 minutes. While it IS possible to overmix, it’s VERY difficult
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I am going to be making Teriyaki snack sticks for the first time soon. Does anyone recommend smoking Teriyaki sticks or is it better just cooked?
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I am going to be making Teriyaki snack sticks for the first time soon. Does anyone recommend smoking Teriyaki sticks or is it better just cooked?
@kanevak that would be a matter of taste if you like smoke flavor smoke it if it is not important then don’t but I would use the cooking schedule recommended in the video either way
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@kanevak I’d smoke them, I don’t think snack sticks generally take on a huge smoked flavor anyway, it’s usually just a nice little extra, not a dominating taste unless you are making lil’ smokies or something
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For those using an oven to cook your Snack Sticks I just finished up cooking 50 lbs last night. The lowest my oven will go is 170 degrees so I put a kabob stick in the door to keep it propped open and had a total cook time of 4 hours with a great end product. 1 batch I forgot to propped the door and the sticks cooked to fast and I had fat extraction (still taste fine just don’t look as good) so I really think propping the door helped. The other 5 batches turned out great. Everything else was followed step by step here on the site. 170, 4 hours, prop door, 19 mm casings, set it and forget it.
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bigfish98 So, the short is answer is yes but you will spend more time mixing and you might never achieve the EXACT consistency you want. You will end up with a fine product but the reason it is ground through a 1/8 second is to speed up protein extraction and to get the particle size very small. So, just mix a little longer and you will be ok!
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Is cure required for making snack sticks. I think I have some venison left and would be purchasing pork butt. 3 pork to 1 lb venison right?
Rich -
Is cure required for making snack sticks. I think I have some venison left and would be purchasing pork butt. 3 pork to 1 lb venison right?
Richfourgonefishn I am not an expert but I would say Cure #1 (sodium nitrite) is required. Primarily because your snack sticks will be in the danger zone for an extended period of time as you are slowly cooking them. The cure allows you to maintain a safe environment until you hit 160 degrees (point of lethality).
Secondarily, the cure gives the meat a nice color as opposed to looking grayish.
Others may know differently but that is my understanding.
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When I order willies season will it come with cure or separate purchase.
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