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.

Also, for those that don’t have the money to spend on a mixer I used a drywall mud mixer connected to a drill to mix 25 lbs of grind in a 5 gallon bucket and it worked great. $10 solution.

Jonathon Yes, with my conventional oven I didn’t have the ability to get any lower than 170 degrees. I just set it and left it. I didn’t preheat at all and had 25- 1lbs summer sausages in there so it took a while to get up to temp but other than that no tricks.

I finished making 25 lbs of summer sausage, using 2.4in X 12in Mahogany Fibrous Summer Sausage Casings. For others that are using a conventional oven to make their Summer Sausage I had the oven set at 170 degrees(lowest setting possible) and the cook time was 10 hrs total to reach the 160 degree internal temperature. The final product turned out great!

Flavor wise, what does everyone prefer…Summer sausage using the Encapsulated Citric Acid and smoked right away or Summer sausage not using the ECA and refrigerated overnight? I guess I don’t really know what that “tangy” flavor is that is talked about being associated with the ECA.

AdamCA I’m getting ready to try a 16-17 lbs venison to 8 lbs pork trim mix this weekend using Waltons H summer sausage seasoning, 4oz of carrot fiber binder, 4oz encapsulated citric acid, 3 lbs high temp cheese, finely chopped jalapeno. So if I do all at once i’ll go with the ECA if I let it refrigerate overnight I can skip that.

Is there anything wrong with doing the grind the night before and refrigerating over night? What about adding the seasoning and also doing the mixing the night before? Would the Encapsulated Citric Acid cause something to happen with the meat that I wouldn’t want?

Has anyone ever added Giardiniera to their Itl Sausage before? A grocery store near me does and it is fantastic. How would this affect the process? Drain the oil? After using mixer or before? Any insight?

Joe Hell Thanks, I’ve been using Pork Butt (for instance 16 lbs of venison and 8 lbs pork butt or shoulder) as my fat source but after reading more on the subject am obviously not getting the correct ratio of fat to lean meat in my fresh sausages and snack sticks as I should be.

Where do you get Pork Fat when making venison sausage such a Brats or Italian Sausage?