Hi there and thank you for joining me on my trip into the world of sausage making. I am by no means an expert, in fact, this was my first time trying to make sausages, and boy did I learn a lot from it. I will be jotting down my experience on this journey and hopefully answer questions from the comments.
This all started when I got a meat grinder as a gift and it came with some sausage stuffing accessories that piqued my interest. Being the person that I am, I decided to throw myself all in and research a lot…..and I mean a lot! Overall I read, saw, and discussed over two months how to go about beginning this journey.
My very first sausage I decided to make is actually a burger recipe I get complimented a lot on, the Jalapeno cheddar burgers.
Not gonna lie, I messed up the recipe trying to turn it into a sausage one.
Or at least it didn’t come out to my personal liking as Nana, my taste tester, loved it.
I used what is considered, according to most, the best cut of meat possible, the pork shoulder. I took a 9 pound shoulder and deboned it to perfection leaving me with 7.3 pounds of meat to work with and by the end of it I noticed, that is a lot of meat!
The recipe I used is as follows
- 7.3 pounds or 3300 grams pork shoulder
- 26 grams garlic
- 47 grams of salt
- 10 grams of cumin
- 23 grams paprika
- 15 grams white pepper
- 1 cup of cheddar cubed
- 2 jalapenos
I used grams because it was easier to measure out the salt. I used 1.5 percent of the meat’s total weight for salt which is about what most would agree to use. The cumin, THIS IS WHERE I MESSED UP, I would suggest bringing that down a bit. The cumin really became a dominant flavor after letting the sausages rest overnight.
After I deboned the shoulder, I cut it into 1×1 cubes to better fit my grinder. You also have to chill your meat till it hits between 30-33°FAHRENHEIT since you don’t want the fat to render while being grinded. This is probably what I got told the most, really driven home, YOU NEED TO WORK WITH COLD MEAT TO MAKE SAUSAGES.
After the first grind I added my seasonings to the meat and this is where I felt I did my second mistake. I grinded my meat a second time. This led to my sausage feeling too mixed, it didn’t have the texture I was looking for, it felt more like bologna. After the second grind I let my meat cool a little more before I stuffed my sausages.
I ended up making around 30 sausages from most of the meat I had. This is where I found out how much 7 pounds actually is as I proceeded to make 10 burger patties and still had some meat left over for other experiments.
I left my sausages to rest overnight as I read that helps firm everything up and gives them a good snap. It does.
This is the final product
Obviously, this is only the beginning. I already have a list of recipes I wanna try and share with you, the readers. If you have any questions or even tips, feel free to share them in the comments below!
Laterz
The 149 