Homemade Sausage Making

I have been making fresh sausage for a few years now and occasionally smoking some. Lately I have been trying some more smoking recipes following the Recipes in Marianski's book for some of the Polish sausages.

Well the last two times it has come out with a softer texture that I am not crazy about. The sausage I usually smoke is an Andouille and I really smoke the hell out of it since I use it as a seasoning meat in cooking. The texture of that sausage is dryer because it has spent way more time in the smokehouse but I prefer it to the way these polish ones are coming out.

I am hanging for an hour at 130°F for about an hour until the casings are tacky then I introduce smoke. The last batch was smoked for 3 hours at 130°F then poached in a 170°F water bath to an internal temperature of 154°F. Then it's removed and placed in a sink of ice water until the internal temperature is below 100°F. 2 hours hanging at room temp after that.

I could not be mixing the meat enough...developing the bind...but this doesn't make total sense since the meat is held together just fine it's just kind of "mushy".

More time in the smoker, raising the temperature as I go to "dry" the meat out more and firm it up?





Any suggestions to get a firmer meat texture and more of a snap to the casing are appreciated.

Thanks

Welcome to the forum

Looking at your polish sausage they look wonderful to me.

Are you referring to the recipe on page 206? Hard to give you help if the recipe is not noted.

Nothing wrong with the water bath and I do it from time to time but I find you do loose some of that snap. You might try hanging them/blooming longer to dry them out a bit more or leave in the refrigerator longer before you store/vac seal and freeze.

The one recipe I did look at in Marianski's book called for a 1/2 plate for grinding. That is a very course grind. I know I don'rt have a 1/2 plate as its not standard on most grinders. If you went with a smaller size plate it will give you a mushier texture.

Glad to have you join us on the forum! Your sausage from the exterior does indeed look superb! Very nice colour and even smoke coverage. The inside does, however look that there is room for improvement. At first glance it does look like the meat did not bind properly before stuffing. It also looks very moist inside and almost like a semi-cooked product. And I don't quite get whether you made a Polish or andouille? The colour also suggests beef content, is that correct?

Without having a bit more info, it's difficult to analyze why the texture is still soft, but here are possible reasons:

1. Inadequate mixing of the farce. Don't take the mix for 5, 10 minutes or whatever from recipe instructions. Mix the meat until it the myocin comes out and the texture is gluey. You should be able to pick up a handful and it should stick to the bottom of your hand.

2. All Polish recipes require a "setting" period. This could be 12 hours in the fridge or a couple of hours at cool room temp before loading into the smoker.

3. Too much moisture/water in the meat. Not all meat is the same so the amount of water has to be adjusted.

4. If you add wine or worse yet, vinegar, the binding process will be compromised.

5. Not finishing at the proper temp. Double check the IT with another thermometer.

6. If you smoked it at 130 then poached it, your IT was probably no more than 110 before poaching. Take it up to 140 IT in the smoker, then finish by poaching. Smoking dries your sausage, poaching does not.

7. Let the sausage dry for 8-12 at room temp after poaching, it should have more snap. And if you really want a drier casing, finish the sausage in the smoker and don't water bath after reaching 152-155.

I would venture to guess that your issues can be resolved under points 1 and 6.


Hope this helps. Please file reports on your next batch.

BTW great to have another member from Calgary. Love your town, but hate the Stampeders since I bleed green!

Welcome SmokedMeat - always good to have another Canuck join the crowd. You'll get lots of help here.

Red - you must still be safely south of the border to ignore our Lions so publicly
"BTW great to have another member from Calgary. Love your town, but hate the Stampeders since I bleed green! "

Thanks Guys. It is a Polish smoked sausage based off of Marianski's "Polish Sausage" book page 94 but using a hot(ish) smoke regime. All pork butt was ground through a 3/16" plate (sounds like I may want to go coarser there).

No beef was used, it may just be the camera color that is giving that impression. I used a 10:1 ice water ration....so 100ml/KG.

You guys gave me a few ideas for the next go around....I am just sautee this current batch up before eating to help the texture for me. The goal is to have a nice sausage that can be eaten cold.

" It also looks very moist inside and almost like a semi-cooked product"

Yes this is what it reminds me of too....I have two digi meat thermometers and they agree with each other but I will check against my lab one.

Redzed...I do live in Calgary but am a transplant from the land of green

Thanks again.

Shuswap wrote:Welcome SmokedMeat - always good to have another Canuck join the crowd. You'll get lots of help here.

Red - you must still be safely south of the border to ignore our Lions so publicly
"BTW great to have another member from Calgary. Love your town, but hate the Stampeders since I bleed green! "

Phil we are on the last leg of our American sojourn. Currently in Ramona in the hills above San Diego. Nice sunshine, hiking and cycling. Will be home in about a week, and start making sausage again, I'm experiencing serious withdrawal symptoms and hear meat grinders in my sleep.

And once you bleed green, you never stop. I also dislike the Lions and Wally Buono. BC is a great place to live in, but not good enough to cheer for cats.

Chris

SmokedMeatLog wrote:Redzed...I do live in Calgary but am a transplant from the land of green

Hey, that raises you by several notches as far as I am concerned. You are there even more welcome here!

lol

Is this something closer to the exterior texture you are looking for?





For these, I dried at 100 for 2 hours and then smoked for something around 6 hours. However, I did a very slow smoke/cook and it took around 10 hours to at 150 to finish off. They've got an amazing snap texture and are still juicy once heated up.

Yeah that looks nice...a bit more than I'm after I think but about halfway between yours and mine would be about right.

Here is a quote from one of Walleye1's post. He makes this pretty much ever year as far as I know and his always looks great. This might give you some better insight on smoking and the hot water bath procedure.

Walleye1 wrote:I finish mine in a hot water bath all the time as well. I start out hanging the sausage in the smoker and run it for about 1 hour at 130 degrees. I ramp the temp up to 145 degrees over the next hour and start appling the 2 hours of smoke I usually use. Over the next hour I ramp my temps to 160 and continue with the sausage in the smoker until I get the nice mahogany color I'm looking for. This usually works out to about a total time of about 4 to 4.5 hours in the smoker. I'm not shooting for an exact internal temperature, I'm trying to get the color but the IT of the sausage is usually around 132 to 135 degrees. I use a 64 qt stock pot on a propane turkey burner for my water bath. I use about 8 to 10 gallons of water in it and crank the burner up until it hits 160 degrees. Then I turn it down to an idle and it will maintain the water at 160. In this setup I can poach about 20 to 25 lbs at a time without drawing the temp down. It usually takes about 15 minutes give or take to reach 152 to 155 degrees IT in the sausage.

Here's my lovely assistant (brother in law)) manning the big stock pot...




I don't bother ice water bathing any more when using this method. I simply hang it to bloom for at least 2 hours at room temperature and it turns out fantastic.







Mike