Your process looks good for everything you have listed. I would point out that you should mix a lot! You are trying to get the fat to mix in with your meat as well as get your meat to extract the proteins so it is really really sticky. For a 12.5 lb batch you can use 1 qt of water or 3/4, the 1 quart might take a little longer to cook. Since you are having a specific problem I would recommend that you use the 3/4. Then if this is a little dryer than you would like you can increase that up to 1 qt.

Im guessing that adding the extra water while mixing was your main issue. Mixing is supposed to be tough and the closer you get to it being mixed enough it will get tougher and tougher. Try it with just the 3/4 qt and see how it goes!

North 2 qt water for 25lbs of meat block
1 qt water for 12.5lbs of meat block, so for 10 lbs i would do 3/4 qt.

Not sure what you have for a smoker but on your smoke schedule i dont see any mention of dampers or smoke if you are adding it. Your first hour of 125° you want both top and bottom dampers wide open. This is called the drying stage and this will help smoke adhere to the casing.

After that hour dampers need to be adjusted, bottom 50% closed and top 1/8" open. Continue with your schedule as you specified.

What i can suggest is, do not compare your batches to other processors. They may not and most likely will not come out the same as theirs. Assuming the processors have been doing it for years and have much better equipment and process than what we home guys can put out.

I have a master built electric smoker. I used a fireboard thermometer.

I had a waterbath as well dampers at least half if not more for the whole smoking process.

North also are you making a 12.5 batch or 10lb batch?

10lb would be 7.5 lbs elk and 2.5lbs pork fat

12.5 lbs you may be a bit light as 25% of 12.5 is 3.125 pork fat

9.375 lb elk and 3.125 lbs pork fat is you 12.5 lb meat block

I did 10lbs elk and 2.5 pork fat

10lb would be 7.5 lbs elk and 2.5lbs pork fat

12.5 lbs you may be a bit light as 25% of 12.5 is 3.125 pork fat

9.375 lb elk and 3.125 lbs pork fat is you 12.5 lb meat block

Not sure what you have for a smoker but on your smoke schedule i dont see any mention of dampers or smoke if you are adding it. Your first hour of 125° you want both top and bottom dampers wide open. This is called the drying stage and this will help smoke adhere to the casing.

After that hour dampers need to be adjusted, bottom 50% closed and top 1/8" open. Continue with your schedule as you specified.

What i can suggest is, do not compare your batches to other processors. They may not and most likely will not come out the same as theirs. Assuming the processors have been doing it for years and have much better equipment and process than what we home guys can put out.

North I don’t think your problem was the water amount, 2.5 lb for a 10 lb batch sounds in the realm of what I would do. Your fat content is right at about 80% so no worries there.

The grainy thing you were talking about and the fact that it didn’t feel firm leads me to believe that you had a temperature issue. The Encapsulated Citric Acid needs to be above 130° for at least an hour for the cottonseed oil to fully dissolve if it doesn’t you can notice a graininess to the meat. And, if it wasn’t firm, well that could be because the meat wasn’t cooked long enough at higher temps (meaning that the meat wasn’t at high enough temp long enough, not your smoker)

What thermometer were you using and how long did it take to get to 160° at 175?

One thing though you said in a response to twilliams about 12 hours ago figure about 9 pm last night (while I was fast asleep!) that you added 3 more pints of water during the mixing process, so would this be 5.5 pints of water? If so then that would be too much, a snack stick or summer sausage is a semi-dried sausage so to get the classic meat consistency and mouth feel (still hate that term) you need to cook out the majority of the water you add in. So, the more you add the longer your cook cycle is going to take as there is more water to evaporate out of your product. That is important because evaporation energy is what causes “the stall” where your meat just won’t go up in temperature because the evaporation energy is meeting (or exceeding) the thermal energy from your smoker.

Good afternoon Jonathon, I am going to be trying another batch and wanted to reach out to you and the group before doing so. I was doing 10lbs of elk and 2.5 pork fat. Is this would you would do or cut back on the fat. I would rather have less fat but I really want it to turn out better like we would get from the processor.

I thought I was following the snack sticks and summer sausage recipes that I watched on Walton’s YouTube videos. Here is the Heat Schedule that I was trying to follow: ***Smoke Times
1 hour @ 125 Degrees
1 hour @ 140 Degrees
2 hours @ 155 Degrees
Set the smokehouse at 175 degrees until internal temperature reaches 160 degrees

• I am using the fireboard for a thermometer as well a master built electric smoker

*my total smoke time was 7/8 hours to reach 160 for both snack sticks and sausage

*I was reading your response in regards to the water and I was adding a half pint every time mixing got a little tough. It could be that I added too much water and just did not cook it long enough.

Could you help me out to put together the proper schedule and mixture of elk to fat. as well I did not use a binder. I am going to be ordering some which would you suggest using? I have been doing a little reaching and just want to make sure I am using the right binder. The binder is not going to change the texture of the meat as this last batch did not have a bite to it.

Thank you again for all your help!

The grainy thing you were talking about and the fact that it didn’t feel firm leads me to believe that you had a temperature issue. The Encapsulated Citric Acid needs to be above 130° for at least an hour for the cottonseed oil to fully dissolve if it doesn’t you can notice a graininess to the meat. And, if it wasn’t firm, well that could be because the meat wasn’t cooked long enough at higher temps (meaning that the meat wasn’t at high enough temp long enough, not your smoker)

What thermometer were you using and how long did it take to get to 160° at 175?

One thing though you said in a response to twilliams about 12 hours ago figure about 9 pm last night (while I was fast asleep!) that you added 3 more pints of water during the mixing process, so would this be 5.5 pints of water? If so then that would be too much, a snack stick or summer sausage is a semi-dried sausage so to get the classic meat consistency and mouth feel (still hate that term) you need to cook out the majority of the water you add in. So, the more you add the longer your cook cycle is going to take as there is more water to evaporate out of your product. That is important because evaporation energy is what causes “the stall” where your meat just won’t go up in temperature because the evaporation energy is meeting (or exceeding) the thermal energy from your smoker.

Next time I would add a binder like Sure Gel and mix longer. But again, there shouldn’t be any safety concerns with your meat because the fat rendered out.

Schrodinger’s cat anyone

Thank you Jonathon,

***I did use a hand meat blender and I blended for 8 minutes rotating the direction after each minutes as well adding appropriate water.
***I added the ECA the last minute of mixing along with the high temp cheese
***My meat block in both was 10 pounds elk and 2.5 pounds pork fat caps
***As far as the smoke schedule I watched the youtube videos on both the summer sausage and snack sticks and followed the smoke schedule from them
***The sausage and snack still are in the fridge now I am going to cut one of the casings open tonight to take a look.

What might be your thoughts after this info?

The fact that it is greasy to the touch almost ensures that this was fatting out, a binder and more mixing will solve this. Your smoke schedule was fine, though 2 hours at 155 could be debatable for sticks but that didnt cause your issue.

Before you throw it all out try leaving it out at room temp for at least an hour and then in a cooler/fridge overnight. The grease isn’t going to magically disappear but you might be surprised and it will improve?