frankfurters

Chuckwagon · Post by **Chuckwagon** » Sun Sep 30, 2012 11:56

Good goin' Ursula!
Remember to walk before you run. Don't bite off more than you can chew or it can sour you on sausagemaking. Keep it fun and make comfortable amounts. This should be enjoyable, not a chore. Go "line upon line; precept upon precept. A little at a time... to keep it pleasurable.
How about a photo or two? Keep up the good work gal!

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

ssorllih · Post by **ssorllih** » Sun Sep 30, 2012 13:52

They don't make home kitchens with sinks as large as we need for washing up after sausage making. Dried sausage mince is the very devil to scrub out of a mixing bowl.

I read somewhere that the Chinese don't like the modern western commercial pigs because they are so lean.

Ursula you have done well and now you can enjoy the fruits of your labors.

I have made several recipes from the Marianski books and they have all be excellant when I stayed with the recipe.

Gulyás · Post by **Gulyás** » Sun Sep 30, 2012 15:44

ssorllih wrote:
They don't make home kitchens with sinks as large as we need for washing up after sausage making. Dried sausage mince is the very devil to scrub out of a mixing bowl.
Hey Ross.

Yesterday I ate lots of sawdust. No, I didn't buy sausage from the store, I was cutting out the hole for my new, and big kitchen sink. I worked outside, and it was windy. Every time I turned to get away from the wind/dust, the wind turned too. Can you believe that ?
One of the reason is for me not making sausage right now.
But I'm not here to complain, I'm here to tell you about the big kitchen sinks. My friend, they are not cheep.
Mine is the deep one.
And here they are.

http://www.homeperfect.com/brands/elkay ... MgodtiMAOA

http://www.decorglamour.com/catalogsear ... Mgodx2QAog

ssorllih · Post by **ssorllih** » Sun Sep 30, 2012 18:02

I think that I have a line on one that is coming out in a kitchen I am remodeling in a couple of weeks. It is bigger and deeper than my largest roasting pan.

ursula · Post by **ursula** » Fri Oct 12, 2012 09:11

Just a little update on my franks. I made 2 lots of franks and 1 of wieners (6 kg in all)
Well they were terrible. I oversmoked them and they were dry and grainy. I don't have a dog. (Maybe a good idea to get one?)
I am going to invest in a powerful food processor to emulsify so I can get the texture I want. (I nearly blew up the blender thinking that was a food processor)
So once I have managed to get rid of these awful ones (There is noone I dislike enough to give them to!) I will try again, and smoke a little less enthusiastically.
All a bit of a learning curve, and I've had a good laugh at myself.
Ursula

ssorllih · Post by **ssorllih** » Fri Oct 12, 2012 12:47

Is there a local animal rescue/shelter nearby? They would be happy to receive them. We have all had disappointing results at times.

Chuckwagon · Post by **Chuckwagon** » Sun Oct 14, 2012 07:51

Hi Ursula,
Please don`t become discouraged. I can`t think of a single beginner who didn`t ruin their first batch of sausage... including me! And shucks... I thought I knew everything back then.

Ursula, you wrote:

I oversmoked them and they were dry and grainy.

A sausage with this texture means only one thing. The temperature in your smokehouse (or prep-cooking) was too high. This causes the fat to separate from the flesh and in a matter of only minutes, it will separate from the meat as a liquid. When this happens, there is nothing that can be done to correct it. Once the fat liquefies, it no longer lubricates the meat particles and the tongue perceives the comminuted particles of meat as "dry and grainy".

This separation occurs at 170°F. (77°C.). The remedy is to adjust the temperature of your smoker. Use any means available or necessary to lower the temperature. I remember Rytek telling everyone to slow down and lower the temperature. I thought he was missin' the water with one paddle, but he finally got through to me. He was right all along and knew when a "proper" batch was cooked - sometimes in a period of over eight full hours. The temperature was raised by only a degree or two at a time, in intervals as much as a half an hour. Once I understood how the technique worked, I remember wondering why on earth it took me so long to get it through my head. I simply had to slow the cooking-smoking procedure and have a little more patience.

I ended up putting three temperature sensors in my smokehouse. I also built a heat diffuser. As far as the actual smoking time went, I shortened it up after awhile. I learned that a little smoke actually goes a long way. Pork is more forgiving than beef when it comes to oversmoking. Meat can get bitter with too much smoke.

So Ursula, like my ol' daddy told me, "Back up and hit it again"! You know, he was a pretty smart ol' guy. He also said, "The person who doesn't try... doesn't do anything".
Now... get back to work!

(And remember that we're all behind you kid!).

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

jbk101 · Post by **jbk101** » Sun Oct 14, 2012 15:29

Hi Ursula,
I know how you feel

The first batch of Dogs that I made came out the same (Dry and Grainy)

I am going to give it another try today using old Chuckwagon's Hobble Creek Hot Dog Recipe

I have complete faith that this time they will come out better (or at least edible

)

I believe I did two things wrong (at least

) the first being overworking the dogs trying to get the emulsification correct (or what I thought was correct) and the second not concentrating on the smoking process like I needed to. But in hind site my three Dogs appreciated my efforts as their snack and food additive supply was enhanced for about three months

. (a dog a day makes for three happy Dogs

)

I have to agree with Chuckwagon thou "you have to get back on that horse and try to break him". I know that if I would have given up after my first attempt at Sausage making I would not be eating as well as I have recently (With Good Quality Sausage, Bacon etc. which I know where it came from and what went into it)

And to clarify I am by no means an expert only a rookie trying to learn how to make a decent sausage product for my family. This forum is and has been a great help along that road

. So keep the faith and listen to the wealth of information that this forum has to offer I have found it to be the best around.
John

ssorllih · Post by **ssorllih** » Sun Oct 14, 2012 18:59

Even a bad batch of sausage can be used in some manner. All of the nutrition is still there it is the texture that is less than what we wanted.

I have made one truly inedable meal. I had some leftover ham and ground it coarsely and thought while I have the grinder out i would also do some potatoes and carrots and make some hash. I chopped some onions and put everything into a frying pan to cook and brown. The startch from the potatoes cooked and cemented everything into one solid mass of rubbery junk.

We had to cut it with a knife and it simply wouldn't be chewed. That night we had something else for supper.

ursula · Post by **ursula** » Sun Oct 14, 2012 23:45

Thank you Chuckwagon, John and Ross for your kind words of encouragement. I don't give up on anything new and am already planning my next lot of sausagemaking. I have a long drive to buy meat at affordable prices, so I have to space things out a bit.
I am still mystified about the graininess. My smoker won't go above 80 degrees fahrenheit, so I wouldn't have exceeded the temperature required. I didn't prep-cook at all, just followed the directions to heat up the sausages to 154 degrees in hot water at 160 plus degrees afterwards. I did notice some shrinkage in the smokehouse, and wonder whether smoking them for 3 days for a few hours each day may have cumulatively dried them out a bit. I'll smoke a lot less next time and see what happens.
Meanwhile, I've found that cutting them up in an omelette is a tasty alternative to feeding them to someone's puppy. As you said Ross, you have to get creative when they turn out less than anticipated.
Meanwhile, I barbecued some of my first batch of bratwurst yesterday, and they are sensational. Even better than the specialty deli that sells them for $15 a kilo.
So I did have one win!
Warm wishes Ursula

ursula · Post by **ursula** » Sun Oct 14, 2012 23:47

You made me laugh Ross.
That meal sounds truly gross!

ssorllih · Post by **ssorllih** » Mon Oct 15, 2012 00:35

We decided that you could be charged with cruel and unusual punishment if you fed it to prisoners.

Tatoosh · Post by **Tatoosh** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 10:50

I did hotdogs for the first time a few days back. I don't have a food processor so the traditional home kitchen approach was not possible. I ran my 75 beef/25 pork fat mixture through my grinder four times. I had planned on stepping down the size of grinding plate after the first two passes. About 5 minutes into the third grind, I knew that was not going to happen. So we ground the mixture 4 times total through the large plate, the last time going into a stuffing tube.

The texture was pretty good. There were still flecks of fat in it, so it was not perfect. but it was very acceptable for home use. I only had collagen casings available. I left them on and smoked my hotdogs for 4 hours with hickory. Then I grilled a couple. The casing came out a bit tough and noticeable when eating. I was afraid I would end up with mixed success on this project.

But the next day I tried boiling them and they were excellent. They plumped up nicely, the casing was not a problem at all. I was very pleased with them. Some day I hope to either have a more powerful grinder that can handle the smaller grinding plates or a food processor ... or heck, even both. But I am happy to know I can knock out pretty good smoke hotdogs with what I have on hand.

Chuckwagon · Post by **Chuckwagon** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 01:29

Ursula, you wrote:

I am still mystified about the graininess. My smoker won't go above 80 degrees fahrenheit, so I wouldn't have exceeded the temperature required. I didn't prep-cook at all, just followed the directions to heat up the sausages to 154 degrees in hot water at 160 plus degrees afterwards.

Hey girl, when you bite into a steak, you chew it a little then swallow it. There really isn't a lot of surface area as compared to that same steak being comminuted. When we grind it into sausage, we are increasing the surface area exponentially. Our senses perceive it as dry or grainy. The simple solution is to make sure there is plenty of fat content to lubricate the increased surface area enough to convince our senses that it is palatable. For this reason, sausage must contain from 25 to 30 percent fat. Commercial pork sausage can even legally contain 50% fat. Sausage MUST contain a large amount of fat and salt. There's just no getting around it.
Most people learn this quickly and make sausage with lots of comminuted fat in it also. Then, I'll be danged, they go right ahead and cook that fat right back out of the sausage while they smoke it at too high of temperatures. Without the solidified, creamy, fat in the sausage, we perceive it as "grainy" or dry.
The solution? Weigh each. Weigh the lean meat. Then weigh the fat.
There is one more thing you can do to help and that is to try "fat replacer". It's an all-organic product that really works. I've used it for years and really like it.

Without closely inspecting your "grainy" sausage, right off hand... knowing that you didn't liquefy the fat in cooking the product, I would guess that you need to increase the fat content to balance the increased surface area in comminuted sausage.

Try making just a little sausage and check the fat content closely. Add 30 percent or more and fry up a patty. I think you'll find it really makes a difference in the texture.

Let us know how you get on.

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

ursula · Post by **ursula** » Thu Oct 25, 2012 05:25

Thanks Chuckwagon,
I think you hit the nail on the head. Pork here varies so much and the pork I purchased from the market wasn't nearly as fatty as would satisfy the normal ratio.
So tomorrow I am going to the city to buy another lot, and have found a butcher who will supply me with a couple of kilos of backfat, which should make the difference.
I also purchased a whizz bang 1400 watt food processor to refine the texture.
My project this Saturday will be for a Leberkaese for my parents (they love leberkaese), a batch of fresh Italian sausage, and a small batch of Frankfurters.
I will also restrain myself from smoking these too much.
Perhaps three hours, not three days.
Thank you for the great advice.
Regards
Ursula