I agree that hog casings are best for brats. I’ve used collagen and have the same problems, in fact, when cooked, the brats swell up and the collagen doesn’t ,resulting in swollen ends with a kind of restricted center…like the brat is wearing a girdle! Not a good bite thru either.

Hi all, jut finished up 5 lbs. bacon with Walton’s imitation bacon #2. That’s with 3 1/2 lbs. venison and 1 1/12 lbs. pork sausage. I followed the Meatgistics video and then smoked it for about 5 hrs. till it reached 170 deg. When adding the water had a brain fart and put in twice as much as required. After thinking about it over night, I remembered that carrot fiber will absorb 26 times it weight of water. Since I had used it tin the mix originally , I added a 1/4 cup more in the am. remixed it, refrigerated o’nite and put it the smoker this am. Turned out famtastic!!! I put in all the steps so that folks realize that just because one might screw up a step in making a product, there may be a solution. In this case, there was a solution and it worked out perfectly. Good cooking to you !!! Forever Blue

Here in southern MI, our lightening started about midnight, heavy rain and thunder for the next 2 hours and simply rain til dawn…raining off and on all day with beautiful sunshine peeking thru now and then til 3p or so…now gloomy and misty. Really pretty good day all told since we’re stuck in and are tired of TV so now we watch the weather !!

love that mild italian seasoning !!Yumm

I’m kinda stuck on Jerry’s. Not hot and flavorful,

Jonathon I think my problem was that I put then in the oven at 300 deg. and they cooked too fast which dried them out. Ratio was 20% pork sausage to my venison. in the past I have just stuffed them, then frozen them and cooked them by grilling or boiling to 165 deg. I was thinking it would be good to have them cooked, frozen, then simply heat them through instead of worrying about the temps later. My thinking now has changed !!