Bratwurst casings
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I’m wanting to make brats soon for the first time. My question is will the fresh collagen casings allow me to link and separate before packaging easily? If so can I separate the brats from each other as soon as they’re linked or should I stuff, link, firm up in freezer, and then separate and package? Thank you in advance for your information.
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Great minds think alike! I’m making Philly Brats this weekend with the new seasoning just received, using fresh collagen casings. I’d like to put about a 20 to 45 minute smoke on them bring the internal temp up to 140 -150 degrees. I suppose I should add cure correct? I am planning on using 50/50 venison to pork butts… constructive comments please.
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metlman501 You could go either way on freezing or not, if you choose to freeze they will probably hold the twist better, but I don’t think you will really see a noticeable difference at the end of the day. Depending on how big of a batch you are making, don’t stack them all together in the freezer or they won’t freeze well.
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Tex_77 my main concern is with the ends opening up after I cut the links into individual sausages at the twist. I’ve never used the hog gut or fresh collagen casings. Being an admitted novice, the no hassle fresh collagen approach interest me, but I do not wanna have trouble maintaining links due to taking the easy route on the front end.
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As long as you don’t overstuff you won’t have a problem with meat coming out of the end of casings. If you are going to vacuum seal, then I would def. recommend that you freeze first, or you will end up with flat brats after vacuum sealing. It won’t affect the flavor, but they won’t look really pretty anymore either.
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metlman501 You will get them to stay closed a little better if you freeze them but at the end of the cooking process they will all pretty much look the same so as long as you don’t overstuff like Tex_77 says you should be ok.
deweymeats If you are going to stop at 150 and not cook all the way to 160 then to be safe I would add cure. If you have some e.coli in there and it creates spores cooking them to 160 before you eat won’t kill the spores, cure will add some safety to this. Not sure if you are the Dewey Meats that I used to talk to from my customer service days but if you are selling/custom making these I would talk to a commercial salesmen before I did this. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work, its exactly what is done with bacon but maybe there is something there that we haven’t thought of. In fact don’t worry about it, I will ask Dylan and update this post.
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Dewey here, sorry this should have been a separate post instead of intertwangled with metlman’s. This is just for my home use, finishing to only 140-150 while adding smoke,… only partial done to be finished either on the grille or boiling in a pan in the house. Learned it this way from another guy who use to do my deer sausage and am eager to try it out on the Philly Cheese Brat seasoning I just received from Waltons…
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metlman501 You will get them to stay closed a little better if you freeze them but at the end of the cooking process they will all pretty much look the same so as long as you don’t overstuff like Tex_77 says you should be ok.
deweymeats If you are going to stop at 150 and not cook all the way to 160 then to be safe I would add cure. If you have some e.coli in there and it creates spores cooking them to 160 before you eat won’t kill the spores, cure will add some safety to this. Not sure if you are the Dewey Meats that I used to talk to from my customer service days but if you are selling/custom making these I would talk to a commercial salesmen before I did this. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work, its exactly what is done with bacon but maybe there is something there that we haven’t thought of. In fact don’t worry about it, I will ask Dylan and update this post.
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deweymeats Okay, i put in e.coli but I meant botulism, sorry! Also, his response was that since you are using venison he wouldn’t mess around with a partial cook, either cook it all the way to 160 or leave it raw and just cook right before eating. Now, since this is just for you you are obviously free to do what you want, let us know how it came out!
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Dewey here, sorry this should have been a separate post instead of intertwangled with metlman’s. This is just for my home use, finishing to only 140-150 while adding smoke,… only partial done to be finished either on the grille or boiling in a pan in the house. Learned it this way from another guy who use to do my deer sausage and am eager to try it out on the Philly Cheese Brat seasoning I just received from Waltons…
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Jonathon so you’re suggesting I stuff, twist, freeze, then seperate to individual links before final packaging?
metlman501 With collagen casings I think that is how i would approach it. With natural hog casings they hold the twist much better so you could stuff, link, cut And Lightly freeze before packing or just pack and Freeze. If you choose to pack and freeze they will flatten out like mentioned before.
I feel like if you get the pre tubed hog casings then they are just as easy to work with as the collagen and i prefer the end product better. -
@Meltman501 I agree with cabelas90 about the casings. I used to buy my casings by the hank and have switched to the pretubed for convenience and ease of use. I prefer the natural casing over the collagen, but that I think is because that is how I started. I have slowly moved to some collagen casings and it is just another option that is available.
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Tex_77 my main concern is with the ends opening up after I cut the links into individual sausages at the twist. I’ve never used the hog gut or fresh collagen casings. Being an admitted novice, the no hassle fresh collagen approach interest me, but I do not wanna have trouble maintaining links due to taking the easy route on the front end.
metlman501 Pre tubed casings are A must, way easier to work with. I’ve found that cold smoking for 8 or 10 hours work’s well to add some smoke flavor without actually cooking the sausage.
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metlman501 Pre tubed casings are A must, way easier to work with. I’ve found that cold smoking for 8 or 10 hours work’s well to add some smoke flavor without actually cooking the sausage.
Snake River Smokers have you ever used the collagen, or are you giving your preference on tubed vs non-tuned in the naturals?
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Snake River Smokers have you ever used the collagen, or are you giving your preference on tubed vs non-tuned in the naturals?
metlman501 Yes, tubed vs non tubed. No, haven’t used collegen for brat’s yet.
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