Homemade Sausage Making

Some of us old boys never get tired of new toys and so I added to my collection. For some time I have been looking at getting a sous vide heater and circulator for poaching sausage and when Anova dropped the price to $139 with free shipping, how could you not?
http://store.anovaculinary.com//product ... oCW4Pw_wcB

Gave it a test run yesterday and here are some of my observations. The beauty of this gadget is that you can poach almost in any container and anywhere you have an electrical receptacle. I used to poach on top of our kitchen stove in a large stock pot. In addition to my wife not liking the bit of the mess it made, I always had problems with keeping the temp steady and it was always hotter on the bottom of the pot than on the top. The Anova cooker circulates the water and keeps the temp perfectly steady. You can see in the picture below that I used a meat lug for the job which was able to handle a 22" sausage. Since the Anova would take a very long time to bring the the water to poaching temp, you have to preheat the water on the stove first. After that, the circulator does a great job in keeping the temp perfectly steady.

The cooker is a basic gadget, definitely not commercial grade and one has to be careful not to damage the impeller when assembling and disassembling it. The controls are easy and as long as it works for while, I'll be happy with it. And I just might cook a sous vide meal with it!

Oh My, they even have an APP for that

Looks neat.

Good move.
I use mine almost every day.
I have the first model.
I'm hoping for some super specials around Christmas so I can upgrade.

Hi Guys:I bought an old turkey roaster like the one you see at Walmart. They have a lid and a removable lug which you can fill up at the sink and then drop it in. Because they have a built in heater you don't have to rely on the sous vide heater. Works great.

Bert

Hi Bert! How are things down south island? I was down to Langford a couple of days ago to pick up a small scissor lift at Princess Auto. Those darned wine carboys are just getting too heavy for the old back!

We also have an electric turkey roaster and it's not good for poaching since it can't hold a temp lower that 250F, and you should not take it higher than 170F. And the other issue is that while you can roast an 18lb gobbler in it won't hold more than than 5lbs of sausage for poaching. Yours must be a lot bigger and with better temp controls. Can you post a pic of it?

Hi Rezed:
Things are fine on the South Island,but I am away at the moment in Barbados for the month of November. I will post a picture of it when I get home. I built my own temperature controller and circulation pump. Basically I turn the roaster control up to full power and let my temp controller do the temperature regulating
Talk soon,

Bert

Hi Rezed:
Things are fine on the South Island,but I am away at the moment in Barbados for the month of November. I will post a picture of it when I get home. I built my own temperature controller and circulation pump. Basically I turn the roaster control up to full power and let my temp controller do the temperature regulating
Talk soon,

Bert

Geez, I just bought the thing and now it's on sale for $129!

Hi
I'm little confuse with anova cooker , usually when I making swojska kielbasa , right after smoking i pack sausage in vacuum bags and pouch I water using anova .
My question is can I pouch sausages after smoking without a packing them in vacuum bag , just drop them into the water heated by anova ?
I read somewhere than te grease, or other stains from sausage can destroy anova ? I prefer vacuum pack my swojska sausage after water bath , but little afraid to destroy anova.
Merry Christmas .

Hi Martin,

I now always use my Anova circulator to poach sausages. It's great in that I can use different size containers as necessary. And I don't vac seal the sausages. Have had it now for a year and it's still running. There really shouldn't be a large amount of grease in the water and the small amount that there is, is diluted and at a high temp. Just make sure that you preheat the water on the stove to several degrees higher than desired poaching temp, then add the sausage directly from the smoker. Rinse off the impeller on the Anova circulator immediately after use and dry.

Thanks
The anova is great for ticker steak , and also for a biala kiebasa for a Easter , but always use the vacuum seal so now my next batch going straight to the water without bags, a have 19 qarts polycarbonated water tank and works good , for bigger batch , for steaks use pot.