Episode XVII: The Sausage Experiment

I've had this crazy idea for a year that I would make my own sausage. I love the stuff and this way I would get exactly what I wanted, right? Makes sense doesn't it? I think this all started when I realized that The Wife had a grinder attachment on the mixer and I just had to put it to good use.

So, when Boy Child gave me the sausage grinder attachment for my birthday I was set. I ordered a cook book off Amazon and quickly found out this was more complicated than I had imagened. Was I going to cure my own? Did I have to age it? Deciding "no" to that simplified some of my decisions.

Next task was to get the casings. Turns out nobody around here carries them. I had to special order from Hamm's, my butcher, and then they failed to come in their weekly shipment so I had to wait longer. And those things are expensive!! I've still got 40 or 40 feet of casing in my freezer.

Anyway, when they came in I got myself a pork shoulder and set to trimming it up. There were a lot of directions about fat to meat ratios, but this was hard work and it didn't take long to decide that the ratio was jsut going to be whatever it was. Cutting an entire shoulder into one inch cubes and separating fat from meat wasn't in the cards. I failed to take a picture of the mound of meat, but here's the shoulder bone I was left with at the end. I think it started out around 11 pounds.

While doing that I had the casings soaking and stuff like that. Again I forgot to take pictures and by this time everything was behind schedule. Ugh.

I finally started the grinding. Know what? this was HARD. First of all, I probably should've started wiht nearly frozen meat. this was turning to mush, sticking to the side and was a super pain. I also probably used too fine of a grinder.

The stuff was coming out like paste. Double ugh.

Did I tell you I was going to make two kinds of sausage at the same time? That's me, jsut add a little more complexity for the fun of it. I decided on two of my favorites, a Chorizo and an Andouille. I forget which is which in this picture. But the spices I mixed in seemed great.

Then we had to go back to the grinder this time to stuff the casings. No way I could manage the casing and feeding meat into the grinder at the same time. Time to get The Wife for help. I was on the way to failure and a burn out and I was only halfway done. Triple ugh.

However, she came through and after many hours of work, I finally had the sausages. They actually kind of looked like I know what I was doing. I twisted them into links and even though by now it was kind of late, I put them on the smoker.

As you might predict, that was taking forever. I should've stayed with the plan but it was getting too late and I was beat. By the way - the funny looking ones? I tried yet another idea of creating a caseless sausage by rolling the meat in egg and breadcrumbs. Stupid idea. Don't try it. And its ugly.

Finally, after they were about 2/3 smoked, I got impatient, pulled them off and finished them in a skillet with a little diluted wine. Kind of like beer brats,..... only not. In this case my idea was based on having some left over wine and both mixes had some wine in them already. I thought they would compliment.

So what's the final verdict? The lessons learned?

• I think next time I would just start with ground pork. That would sure save a lot of time.


• I am glad I tried a couple different kinds because the chorizo sucked! I don't know what I did wrong but they were very bland. It's supposed to be nice spicy meat and it certainly seemed like it based on the spices.


• The Anduille came out good though (even without smoking over sugar cane). Several folks tried it (including the dreaded in-laws from the Frozen Tundra) and they all liked it.


• The book said that after I mixed them, I should fry a little in a pan right then as a taste test. Should've done that. maybe I could've fixed it. But by that point I was tired and skipped the step.


• Dealing with the casings was also tough and kind of expensive. It is a whole lot cheaper to buy gourmet suasages than what I spent to make this mess. Frozen Tundra Sister-in-law suggested I just mix the mear wiht a little egg, shape them and put them straight on the smoker. They won't look as nice, but I bet they hold together (at least as well as a burger) would be much eaiser.

Am I going to do this again. Not in the near future, but maybe, just maybe......