akdave WildWest the convection oven fans helped my home built smoker as well. I took another step further and added two fireplace fans with motors that are outside of the smoke chamber. Between all of the moving air and the added automotive sponges in water pans anything I smoke comes out almost to the exact minute… my smoker actually keeps temp better then our oven…

Jonathon my wife is going to kill me but I’ve finally got some use out the 2 roasters that we got for wedding presents 9 years ago. Way more consistent than using the grill or gas Turkey roaster.

PapaSop don’t forget cheese! I don’t really care for the stuff but time drastically changes smoked cheese

mcherbies what internal temp are the sticks when you pull them? I religiously pull them at 140 IT and go straight to the hot water bath shown in my pictures a few posts above. I had a ton of issues in the past with casings wrinkling before I changed to this process. However, this can also be caused from under stuffing. There is definitely a fine line when stuffing snack sticks. For me I’d rather deal with a blow out when stuffing than have my sticks look wrinkled.

mcherbies I find that when I use carrot fiber I like to use 1.5 qt to 25lbs of meat for snack sticks. It is boarder line too much water but the finished product is top notch and everyone raves at how much moisture is still in my sticks.

Jonathon Thanks for the mention. Walton’s and the Meatgistics community have been awesome and a great help! IMO this forum is a key element in separating Walton’s from the competition.

I also want to throw a shout out to the rest of the regular contributors. As a relatively new member, the information, time and experience you all provide is outstanding. Thank you! Happy 2020!

Dawson Coates Cooking snack sticks kicked my butt for years… the only way I will finish cooking snack sticks is in a water bath now. Cuts down the total cook time in half and retains all of the moisture.

I’ve been using roasters and warming the water temp to 165. Load the snack sticks in the water, the water temp will dip to about 150, once the water temp is back up to 160 start checking the internal temp of the sticks until they hit 160. This process take about 30 minutes. Just make sure you get your water up to temp and very stable ahead of time. You can make the sticks fat out much faster if you are not carefully monitoring the water temp.

If you have to work on opening day of Deere season you might as well load up some sausage and program the smoker to take care of the rest!!

akdave I didn’t order my fans from Auber but I did build them on my own in a similar design. It made a big difference, especially when my smoker is fully loaded.

twilliams I’ve had that happen when I didn’t use the entire package and then vacuum sealed the bag closed. I’ve let it soak in the water that I mix in and also used a ninja blender to break it back apart. Both worked good. You could always add a little more seasoning and use it as a test batch.

I personally like strong seasoning so I tend to add more to almost everything unless I’m getting a baseline.

In 10 years of smoking sausage and snack sticks I’ve never came close to the results at home that I have now. All thanks to you guys and the community here. Lifetime Walton’s customer earned for sure!

Thank you!

Now if only I could figure out how to load my pictures in the right orientation from my phone ‍️

ctraymond Do you have any pictures? The casings should be VERY tight when stuffing and tying. If the casing was completely tight and you have pockets of water that have pushed to the outside of the casing, almost like a gelatin then you have too much water mixed in.

I try to keep a high moisture content and have had that happen a few times when making snack sticks.

craigrice Ha! Not NASA. Just a former Army avionics guy that needs to keep too many projects going at the same time.

weatherbow21 I also go to around 165 on water temp and make sure it is stable. The 2-1/2" sausage casings took around 50 minutes and the 19mm snack sticks were just under 30 minutes. I’ll try and post some better logs from my Fireboard app on the next runs that I make.

Speaking of that, Jonathon I might have went a little overboard on my last Walton’s order.