sausages

This week two good friends of mine got married. The marriage was in the bride’s back yard. It was a lovely ceremony, and far less annoying and pretentious than the average ceremony. No one was overly stressed, everyone had a good time, and no one ran up massive credit card bills or bankrupted their parents. In that vein, the reception consisted of appetizers, cake, and champagne, and guests were encouraged to provide their own bagged lunch. In the vein of bagged lunch, and this scene from a night at the opera, I decided to make my friends my own sausage. This was a bad idea. I had never made sausage before. Nonetheless, and in character, I forged ahead despite incapability and time restraints. This is a list of things I did wrong. Now I will know better. But first, what I did.

I got a lean cut of meat. I left it in the fridge too long. then I trimmed the fat off. I also got a box of fresh sage. I cut the meat into cubes, and threw it into a bowl with some smoked tea. I put it in the fridge for an hour or two, and then threw the meat into the food processor with sage, garlic, parsley, nutmeg, chili powder, paprika, and a fair amount of black pepper and salt. I added back a little of the smoked tea liquid, then stuffed the ground meat into a pastry bag.

I had purchased natural pig casings from ShopRite, I was very pleased with these. I bunched an end around the pastry bag and squeezed the meat into the casing, and divided it into two sausages. One I decided to dry and one I decided to cook.

Everything I did was a horrific mistake.

Firstly, sausages need fat. the sausage was dry. I was trying to be healthy, but I’m told 20% fat is a minimum. I may play with this as I move on, but my next attempt will meet this minimum. Secondly, the food processor was just a bad move. The sinews didn’t get decomposed enough, and the meat in general was too coarsely ground. The casing was also salted, and I should have rinsed the crystals off. At least.

While I’m discussing my equipment, I need a grinder. The pastry bag worked, but since I’m dissatisfied with the food processor, and grinders come with casings attachments, so I should make that investment. I’ve been wanting a standing mixer for a while, and many come with grinding attachments. That would be an investment for after I get my own place.

The dried sausage was an epic disaster. I had read you could put meat on a fan and dehydrate it. The principal was sound but it took me a few days to achieve this. The fan needs to be all the way up from the start. Now I know, next time I’ll do that. On the other hand, next time I may just smoke it. Still noodling this one.

What I think I’m going to do for next time is do a lean beef/ fatty pork blend. I’m not 100% on the cuts yet. Boston butt is the perfect 80/ 20 proportion, but I like beef in my sausage. I may need a spreadsheet for this one. The fallback would be using fat back, cheese, or butter. I might even use bacon. Maybe.

Obviously I’ll rinse the casing next time. This will require me to premeasure it.

The spices were actually killer. I hope I can replicate that aspect. I was worried the full package of sage would be too much. I learned there is no such thing as too much sage.

As it happened, the bride let slip that she loved Taylor ham, which you people outside of new jersey are not familiar with. imagine a cross between Canadian bacon and bologna stuffed into a sock. After it became abundantly clear that I had completely and royally screwed up sausage making, I fell back on providing her with her long missed New Jersey treat. there were, thankfully, other gifts according to my means. so alls well that ends well.

I will be trying sausages again. I have like a hundred more sausages worth of casings, so I kind of have to.