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......

Episode XVI: Addendum

Anybody notice I made a Thanksgiving post in March of the next year? Well........ I may be a little behind. You know, life, job, etc. Expect a few more shortly.

Episode XVI: Ham for Thanksgiving

Well.... it was going to be for Thanksgiving, but it turned out a few of the folks headed over to Riff Raffs for dinner were Muslim, so maybe ham wasn't such a good idea. Therefore, a couple days later I fired up the cooker and made a double smoked ham following a recipe off the the Weber virtual bullet site.

I was intrigued because I've sometimes felt that ham comes out too dry and I didn't want to make that worse by smoking it for a couple hours. This recipe had an injection that the author raved about. Quite complicated and lots of different flavors, from butter pecan, to rum, vanilla, amaretto and orange. When ever someone commented about making a substitution, they were quickly scolded on the forum and told that perfection came with precision. Let me say first that it was HARD to find all the stuff. Ugh, eventually had to order a couple things online. And then, boy, was it messy. I wrapped it up in saran wrap as suggested, but stuff still leaked out all over the place, squirted out of other holes and was just sticky, sticky.

I eventually got it done, then trimmed off a lot of the fat and scored the sides. The idea here was since the ham was already cured and cooked, then I was afraid that the flavor wouldn't seep in so I scored the whole outside and removed the fat so flavor would get right to the meat. Don't you hate it when you buy a honey baked ham and all that good flavor gets stuck to a giant piece of fat that would make you barf if you ate it? That wasn't going to happen to me. I scored it, glazed it and smoked it.

The glaze came from the same recipe. Not the usual brown sugar / pineapple sort of thing. Nothing wrong with that, but this one was a little different which also appealed to me. Not quite as sweet as some of them.


Check out the results!

Do you hate it when you get a piece of that white ham fat running through the center of our slice? I do. I've lost the link, but I found an alternative way to slice the ham. Instead of simply slicing from the top down to the bone, this has you coming in from the side and slicing out big chunks by following the lines of fat. A little messy, but you got some nice large chunks that you could then set on a cutting board and slice nicely. Much easier to eat.

My thoughts for next time:

• This was the moistest ham I'd ever had. But was it the smoker or the injection? Not sure.
• Sometimes I got a burst of vanilla or run flavor in the meat. Definitely not right. If I used the injection again (not sure that I would) then would cut back on both of those flavors.
• The glaze was excellent. Formed a nice crust and great flavor. Would definitely do that again.
  

Episode XV Postscript: Halloween

I didn't actually cook anything, but the The Wife and the Girl Child invested a lot of time setting up for a good party, so I thought I would show it off a little....






The family









The Wife aka The Evil Cocktail Doctor








Spare Eyeballs










The dinner table









Some blood punch for the little ones












Kitty litter cake for dessert









An unfortunate guest that won't be returning....








The end of the jello eating contest

Episode XV: Smoking a big fatty

So Girl Child wants to know what I'm doing this weekend and I say " helping with your Halloween party and then relaxing the next day by smoking a big fatty". She kind of gives me an "uh huhhhhh... What?" And I say "You know - a big fatty rolled in bacon and stuffed with cheese. It'll be perfect".

I think she left around then, but of course, can't let teenage girls distract you from legitimate fun.

Again, I am leaving the fold of Big Bob and going out on my own. Similar to the previous bacon explosion, I made a weave of bacon and a 2 pound layer of spicy Italian sausage, but then deviated with a layer of cream cheese, a layer of onions and pablano pepper I had grilled with bacon and garlic, and then a layer of sharp cheddar on top. Rolled her up and popped on the cooker. About 30 minutes from completion I slathered her in some sauce.

As predicted, came out Grrrreat! A few conclusions:

• 
  It was harder to spread the cream cheese than I predicted. Next time I want it at room temperature
  

• At first I was disappointed I didn't use jalapeno because the pepper didn't come through, but when we ate the left overs a couple days later, it was great. Kind of like the pepper had soaked into the cheese more. Makes me think this is a great dish to cook ahead.




• Also, I used a thinner bacon this time and I think it worked better. Still added good flavor and held it together, but the fat cooked up very well and I didn't see the kids trying to pick any off. And I just use everything left over from the weave in the veggies.

Episode XIV: Coffee Cardamon Brisket

I am sooooooo behind in posting. Ugh. And on top of that, I'm not even using a Big Bob recipe. Instead there has been a lot of conversation on the Komodo Kamado forum about this brisket rub that uses coffee and cardamon as the base. Add to that a lot of conversation about a high temp cooking method which includes a couple hours in foil and I was definitely starting to feel like wandering from the course a little. I think a long night at the House of Blues and sleeping late in the morning was a sign from the BBQ spirits that this was the perfect time to try this combo.

Prep was easy. I deviated just a little by not mixing the oil into the rub to make a paste, rather i put the oil straight on the brisket and added the rub. Seemed to work out well for me.

Cooking in foil is interesting because it is supposed to really shorten the cook time, however it accents one of my weaknesses - using my senses to determine completion rather than temp or time.

I also thought this would be a good time to try the baked potatoes again. Last time they weren't done, but using a higher temp I thought might give me more success.

How did it go? Here's my conclusions:

• I would say that I really liked the rub. Will definitely do this one again. Even though it had been foiled it still came out with an ok bark.
• Still haven't mastered the spuds. They came out very flavorful, but this time overdone. Argh!
• The high temp cooking seems to save time, but I might have pulled it off 30 minutes too early. Guidance is to stick a fork in it to check, and it seemed good, but afterwards I wasn't sure. See the problem is that the taste sample is fantastic, but when you slice and serve, it seems to dry up way to fast. Maybe I am not resting it long enough? And maybe I am rushing to cut off the point to make burnt ends? Needs more experimentation. Hmmmmm.

Episode XIV Prologue - Poop

Ok, this isn't really about poop, but I thight I'd title it that way to annoy both The Wife and the Girl Child. Always nice to get two birds with one stone.

Not many posts lately because I've been traveling and had a lot of interruptions with work. But the travel and the changes at the office have led me to the following list. It is remarkable how much toilet paper can vary from place to place and who puts a premium on it and who doesn't.

Anyway.... here's my ranking from best to worst:

1) The stuff The Wife buys (she's looking out for me)

2) Any civilized persons home and all nice hotels

3 - 50) Various other locations

51) Terminal 4 at the DFW airport (actually surprisingly nice given the location)

52) On an American Airlines plane (satisfactory)

53) Various train and bus stations through out Europe (not satisfactory, but livalble)

54 - 99) Big gap exists....

100) Hewlett Packard. Is the new stuff they just put in awful? Worse than sandpaper. Ugh. Yet another barrier to my productivity