Last fall I was able to pick up some fresh roadkill. Thanks to the Camillus PD officer who was kind enough to give me a call. And since then life went out and the meat was aging in the deep freezer for the right moment. Last weekend I became determined to get this meat processed and made into sausage. But this time around I wanted a bolder flavor in the sausage and after some research and combination of recipes I created something that I really enjoyed.
Now that the kids are older, everyone helped out in the process, even if it was just moral support. The process of making sausage is lengthy but at the end of the day, its something that I still enjoy doing. With each sausage making experience I learn something new.
NEW THINGS LEARNED: after cutting up the meat, set it back in the freezer for about one hour before grinding it. The chilled meat goes through the machine like butter/much easier. With a commercial grinder its hardly a chore.
After grinding down the venison, I added ground pork shoulder and grinded it together again. One can simply mix the two together by hand. I have alway used a ratio of 2 lbs venison to 1lb pork. The sausage is a little more gamier but it tastes more like venison and it still provides enough fat to the meat so its not as dry.
Another change in recipe that I did this time around was not immediately season the meat. I planned to smoke the sausages 2 days later. I added the ingredients the day before, a few hours before stuffing the casings. I usually buy my ground pork shoulder at Wegmans and because of convenience I bought the hog casing there as well. Later when stuffing, I had some terrible casing that had plenty of holes.
I had 14.5 lbs of venison meat and I added 8 lbs of pork shoulder for total of 22.5 lbs venison/pork mix.
Ingredients:
9 tbsp Kosher salt
9 tsp of ground black pepper
1 1/4 c icy water
1 1/4 c red wine
4.5 tbsp celery seed
35 cloves of garlic freshly minced
45 bay leaves ground up
Mix all of the ingredients in and mix well. I then stuffed the sausage via the meat grinder with the sausage attachment. This is definitely a two-man job as its difficult to handle the sausage while adding more meat to the grinder. Thankfully my wife was able to help. This time around I didn't prepare the proper thread to tie off the sausage and later I payed the price as the sausage tore open.
After stuffing the sausage, I kept the links in the fridge until the next day.
On the following day, I placed the sausage on baking sheets on the table. This allowed them to be open to the air for a couple hours so that the casings would dry up and get a matte look.
Meanwhile I prepped the cherry wood chips by soaking them in water for about 30 minutes. This was also the first time I was going to hang the sausage instead of laying it on the shelves. I purchased "s" shaped stainless steel hooks on Amazon.
Once the smoker was prepped and the smoke began to wisp throughout the smoker, I began hanging the sausage in the smoker. I had couple strings fail on me and there was some restringing that was done to keep the sausage in the hooks. But it was nice to have the grate at the bottom to catch the rings.
And then the babying began! The weather was exceptionally nice but that didn't help my smoking process. The smoker temperature was rising a lot faster and there was a lot of adjusting by opening the vents and even the door.
NEW TECHNIQUE: I titrated the temperature differently in the following method: 140 degrees for 1 hour, then 160 degree for 1 hour, then 180 degrees until the internal temperature reached a 152 degrees.
The total smoking time was about 4.5 hrs. I always have a meat thermometer and an air thermometer in the smoker for more accurate temperature measurement. Once the meat temperature hit 152 degrees Fahrenheit, I turned off the burners. I had an ice bath prepped. I used the ice bath technique before it and it works really well. The idea is to bath the sausage in cold water in order to get the internal temperature down to 100 degrees or less as quickly as possible. This prevents the sausage from wrinkling.
After a nice little bath, the sausage were spread out on some towels in the kitchen to allow them to cool off completely. The time frame is usually about 24 hours of cooling and curing. The turn out was 24 links/rings of sausage.
A third of sausage we gave away to family and friends. A couple of rings we ate over the course of the next few days and then we vacuum sealed and froze the rest.
Generally speaking, smoked sausage can hang out in the refrigerator for 3 weeks and months in a deep freezer.
THINGS TO IMPROVE ON NEXT TIME:
1. Smoke sausage in cooler outdoor temperature.
2. Use better string to tie off the sausage casing.
3. Add more salt, maybe right after grinding up the meat.
4. Maybe add more pork for a sausage with more moisture.
