Meat Curing & Sausages

[HD Adam]

Anyone curing their own meat (ooer missus) or making their own sausages?

Being based in the USA, it's not easy & it's expensive to get hold of traditional British sausages so I'm making my own.

Also, making Andouille & Boudain just for laughs.

Plus, bacon is crap here so I've got a pork belly curing & also a brisket to make Pastrami.

Anyone have any recipies or experience?

[21TonyK]

Interesting topic. I have made bacon in the past and it sort of worked.

I also have a mincer and a sausage stuffer, a pack of skins and some pink salt in a cupboard waiting for an authentic Mergeuz recipe!

[tomsugden]

I haven't done sausages but I do bacon, both back and streaky. Back seems to work better for me. I dry cure it with flavourings for about a week, then cold smoke it, leave it for 24 hours, then slice and freeze.

[Hanglow]

I've been doing bacon for a few months now, it's easy and very good. Even using bog standard Tesco pork you get a better bacon than anything but a very good butchers bacon. I've been liking using pork shoulder for collar bacon, which is hard to get normally. If I had more free time I'd try salami and other dry cured meats.

[i4got]

Until recently I used to cure my own bacon. It's so much easier than most people would expect. Apart from taste it was mainly to get nitrite free bacon. Recently though its become easier to get nitrite-free bacon at the supermarket so I've become lazy. I should really start again.

[Bill]

I make sausages occasionally and have done bacon. Currently got an air dried ham hanging, been 10 months so far and hoping to start it at a birthday party in 2 months. Might be longer...

[madcowman]

21TonyK said:

Interesting topic. I have made bacon in the past and it sort of worked.

I also have a mincer and a sausage stuffer, a pack of skins and some pink salt in a cupboard waiting for an authentic Mergeuz recipe!

I was going to try this one at some point...

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/mar/...

[21TonyK]

madcowman said:

I was going to try this one at some point...

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/mar/...

Thats interesting, plus I happen to have a few kilos of lamb to use up.

Might be a job for the weekend.

[theguvernor15]

Bacon i've made numerous times (cured & smoked).

I did give sausages ago, but i was useless with actually stuffing them, i also have far too many culinary gadgets already, so i just created my own recipes & made friends with a local butcher who makes them up for me.

[RichTT]

Just finished a batch of bacon yesterday



Maple cure, oak smoked. Used bone in belly pork from Costco and trimmed out the ribs.

So for £20 of pork and some cheap materials I got a pork rib dinner, 8 x 200-240g packs of back bacon and four small packs of bacon scraps to use in soups and pasta dishes.

I've gone a bit smoker mad though, making my own smoked salmon, smoked cheese, smoked garlic even. With varying degrees of success.

[21TonyK]

That does look rather good. Problem I had at the time was I had a good local butcher who did very good bacon for a fraction more than it cost me to do so apart from the fun element it was pointless. Not the same now, might revisit the idea.

Do you have any good brines/rubs to share?

[Bill]

Talking of stuffing... I've found my KitchenAid mincer isn't good at stuffing but a hand cranked one works surprisingly well. Iirc it's made by Porkert.

[RichTT]

21TonyK said:

That does look rather good. Problem I had at the time was I had a good local butcher who did very good bacon for a fraction more than it cost me to do so apart from the fun element it was pointless. Not the same now, might revisit the idea.

Do you have any good brines/rubs to share?

If I compare for example the cheapest rashers from Tesco it works out about on parity with the cost of a pork belly chunk. With home made being so much better and nitrate free all it takes is a bit of time investment.

Yes it's a faff, but well worth it I think. Of course I went over the top and bought a 300mm slicer but that should pay itself back in a year or so.

For cure mix i use 50g per kilo of meat. 50/50 salt and sugar with maple syrup added. Usually about 2 tbsp per 1kg. I vacuum pack and store in fridge for 5 days, turning it daily. Then let it dry uncovered in fridge for 1-2 days before smoking.

[HD Adam]

Ok, here's my efforts.

British Bangers.

2lb of pork shoulder.
Slice it up & add the seasonings.
Salt, Mace, White Pepper, little bit of garlic powder & thyme.



It goes back in the freezer for about 30mins before you grind it because it needs to be really cold so that fat doesn't melt.

Grind her up then back in the fridge for a bit.



Toast a couple of slices of bread & make breadcrumbs.
Needs to be toasted.



Into the mixer for a bit of a paddle along with some blitzed ice & milk powder.



All stuck together, not too stiff but not too sloppy.



Now the fun part.
I use natural hog casings.
You need to soak them as they are packed in salt.



Ta da !!!!!!!!



Road test



Other sausage gets smoked.

I have an offset charcoal smoker & an electric smoker.
The new black one on the left has adjustable temperature wheras the old red one does not.
Andoullie & Boudain needs to be smoked for about 3 hours without overcooking it, almost cold smoking.



Here's some I prepared earlier, as they say.
Boudain on the top & Andouillie below.



Wallah. Bone Appleteef etc.





Yummy.

Here's the Brisket being corned to make Pastrami.

Looks like it's in a swamp but that's all the spices.
It goes in the fridge, getting turned every day for 3 weeks.
Still have a week to go.



The bacon has been curing for a week & is just about ready.
I'll be smoking this with Apple wood at the weekend.

[RichTT]

Awesome. How are you judging your bacon being ready?

[HD Adam]

RichTT said:

Awesome. How are you judging your bacon being ready?

Just going by an online recipie.

This is my first go so sticking to the schedule.

It calls for 7 days in the brine/cure so I'll start with that.

[Bill]

Interesting. I've not come across the ice and chilling stages before. They certainly look the part, I might have to revisit the KitchenAid again for stuffing.

One trick I've found useful that you don't mention is frying a small patty before stuffing to check the taste.

[cml24]

Whilst I lived in Georgia, I could only get incredibly salty streaky bacon. Wasn't amazing. This is despite a lot of pork eaten in Georgia. So out of necessity I made my own. Nothing fancy at all, just a basic cure. It came out like bacon, so was pretty pleased!



Also made lots of other things you couldn't get there. Pork pies, sausage rolls, bagels, pitta bread etc...

[Mobile Chicane]

Bill said:

Talking of stuffing... I've found my KitchenAid mincer isn't good at stuffing but a hand cranked one works surprisingly well. Iirc it's made by Porkert.

Every Eastern European household has one of these.

It's perfect for mince and paté, as opposed to a food processor which whizzes everything into a pulp.

[Bill]

Some friends bought it for me in the local Polish shop and presented it to me as "your new family heirloom".