We use the cotto salami mix also and found the best meat mix is 50% venison, 25% pork shoulder, 25% ground beef (85/15) when making venison sausage. We do not use ECA or suregel. We hang overnight at 40-50 degrees to cure and allow some of the excess moisture to escape. You’ll want your final finish temp to be at least 145 degrees and to end with an ice bath. Smoker times are all variable, the size of your sausage stick makes the biggest difference. We typically go to the smoker in three stages. First is about 120 to remove the chill and do additional drying. Then raise temp to about 150 and apply smoke. Finally raise temp to 175 to finish. Adding a high-temp cheese is a nice touch. Cheddar or pepper jack are our favorites.

You must be quite a ways south of me. We have yet to get into the garden. I’ll be canning more this fall than in the past. Canned goods can survive power outages. Get your supply of lids early.

However, I was very happy with the results of last year’s green beans that were frozen and vacuum sealed. Frozen is much less work.

Before smoking, instead of simply soaking it, I rig up a hose to provide a slow but steady stream of fresh water that carries more salt away. Then after smoking an ice bath will take away more salt.

IMHO, the added saltiness is why I cure and smoke my own bacon.

Have mostly gone 50/50 venison and pork butt. That is enough fat for us.

If you’d like a fattier brat, try the 50/30/20. Maybe 50/40/10.

It’s really up to how you’d like your brats.

The Philly cheese mix is one of our favs, but we have not smoked any of these. We’ve smoked others using just the seasoning provided, no additional cure, and they turned out great. We don’t finish them like you would a snack stick or summer sausage so they still need to be cooked.

Freezing before packaging is for cosmetics only. They’ll plump up round again with cooking. It is a good idea though if you have sealing issues because of drawn out moisture.

When fresh, we call them brats. When smoked we call them Polish sausage. That may not be completely accurate but works for us.

Here’s a great recipe from Jeff Phillips:

https://www.smoking-meat.com/?s=Spiral cut ham