Making smoked sausage at home

Sausage is undoubtedly the most popular and beloved product by all. The windows of small shops and large supermarkets simply amaze with their abundance, but unfortunately they do not please with the composition. Smoked sausage prepared with love at home will be the best addition to the table.

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What kind of meat is suitable for smoked sausage?

To prepare homemade sausages, you need to take the freshest meat and lard. In the production of sausages, beef, pork, veal, lard, offal and poultry are mainly used. But you can also add: lamb, horse meat, rabbit meat, venison, wild bird meat, wild goat, nutria, pork skin, pork head, veal and bull cheek.

To prepare long-term storage sausage, you need to use only fresh meat. For greater juiciness and tenderness of the sausage, you need to select two types of meat. It must be ripe and cooled, taken from healthy and not very young animals. Dense, old and slightly hard lard will give the sausage a rich taste and will have low shrinkage during heat treatment. For boiled sausages, young, chilled meat is more suitable, and for semi-smoked and smoked sausages, older animals are more suitable.

If young meat is purchased for making sausages, then it must be removed from excess moisture by hanging it in the fresh air to dry for a day. Or cut the meat into pieces and generously sprinkle with salt, keep in a cold place for about a day.

As for lard, it must be taken from the neck or lard. If you like to feel pieces of lard in the sausage, then choose lard from the head part - the cheek. To prevent lard from being felt, you should choose internal fat, it is evenly distributed throughout the sausage. Whatever lard is chosen, it should be taken in a ratio of 20% to 30%. Before preparing the sausage, lard is kept in a cool room for 3 days.

Beef . A particularly valuable part is the back half of the carcass, except for the shanks. The front part is used for preparing lower grade sausages or for mixing with other types of meat. It is not recommended to use beef for making hard smoked sausage, it turns out tough. It is better to use this type of meat for making sausage, where the meat is processed before smoking, or to mix beef and pork.

Pork. Meat cut from the back is used to prepare sirloin sausage, and from the neck - for ham. The brisket, shoulders and sides are used to make first-class sausage, and the meat from the ribs is used to make low-grade sausage.

Chicken . Poultry meat does not require long cooking. Even after drying, the meat will retain its delicate taste.

General recommendations when choosing meat:

• Fresh meat should be elastic; when you press on it with your finger, the dent quickly evens out;
• Does not stick to fingers, has a dense consistency;
• A thin, pale pink or pale red crust on meat is normal. If its surface is dry and weathered, and the meat is wet when cut, then this indicates spoiled products;
• Inspect the cut carefully - there should be no seals in the form of nodules on it. Such meat is infected with helminths;
• Meat color. High-quality beef is red, veal is light pink, pork is pink, lamb is rich, dark red, poultry is light pink to dark pink (depending on age);
• The smell of fresh meat, without chemical aromas that could hide the spoilage of the product;
• The fat is evenly distributed and does not have a rancid unpleasant odor;
• A lot of films are old meat.

Sausage casings

Casings for making sausages are divided into natural and artificial. Natural ones are made from animal intestines, and artificial ones are made from natural and polymer materials using elastic materials. If animal intestines are eaten, then artificial ones are divided into edible and inedible.

Artificial casings are more resistant to microorganisms and meet hygiene standards. They are more durable and elastic, and can be marked. The natural shell has good moisture and smoke permeability. It holds its shape well during cooking, is environmentally friendly and edible. High-quality, expensive products are most often found in natural casings, while cheap ones are found in polymer casings.

Natural casing

To prepare sausages, they usually take beef, pork or lamb intestines - well washed and cleaned. Natural casings are good because they allow smoke and steam to pass through and are suitable for making dry-cured sausages. Beef intestines are stronger and thicker than pork intestines; they are used to make long-lasting sausages. Pork sausages are suitable for homemade sausages with various meat fillings.

Lamb intestines are more suitable for making thin sausages, such as hunting sausages and sausages. Before using the intestines, they must be checked for integrity. You need to immerse the intestine in warm water and blow air into one of its ends; if there is damage, then bubbles will appear in their place. If damage is found, then the intestine must be cut in this place. Before filling the intestine with meat, you need to put finely grated potatoes inside (for 20 minutes) - it will lighten it and get rid of odors.

A little trick

You can lighten the natural casing by filling it with finely chopped potatoes for 20-30 minutes.

To make smoked sausages, round, goose and casings are used.

• Krug (cattle) - used for preparing raw smoked and cooked-smoked sausages.
• Goose (small cattle) - for preparing liver and other sausages;
• Goose (pork) - for raw smoked sausages;
• Casseroles (cattle and pork) - for sausages and semi-smoked sausages;

Semi-smoked sausages are stored in a natural casing for 15 days, raw smoked sausages - up to 180 days.

Artificial shells

Artificial shells are divided into artificial shells made from natural materials and polymer shells. Artificial ones made from natural materials are divided into subtypes: collagen, cellulose, fibrous. The polymer is represented by a polyamide shell.

The collagen casing is edible, unlike other types of artificial casings. It is made from the middle layer of animal skin. It has a natural appearance and, thanks to good permeability, gives the sausage a good taste. Sausages of any diameter can be made from this material.

Cellulose - made from cellulose. It also allows smoke and moisture to pass through well and is cheaper than natural and protein casings. Most often used for boiled-smoked, boiled and semi-smoked sausages, small sausages, and frankfurters.

Fibrous casing - made from cellulose, reinforced with a polymer mesh. Permeable to smoke and suitable for many types of sausages. It has good strength and is expensive to produce.

The shelf life of sausages in a collagen, cellulose or fibrous casing is the same as that of products in a natural casing, or slightly longer.

Polyamide has high strength. It has pores and does not prevent smoke and steam from penetrating inside. When the desired temperature is reached, the pores close and it turns into a “tin can.”

Technical component

The most important thing for making good sausage is quality meat. But you will need special technological equipment and consumables.

Meat grinder

For sausage, you need minced meat with a smooth and uniform texture, which a simple household meat grinder will not produce. You need to twist the minced meat 3 or 4 times, and then grind it again with a blender. But it may not be completely homogeneous.

Simple syringe

It is necessary to fill the sausage casing with minced meat. Its mechanism of action is simple:

• the metal part of the cylinder is filled with ready-made minced meat, everything is placed inside the body;
• the sausage casing is placed on the tip;
• the syringe piston is set into motion by hand or by a motor;
• the piston pushes the minced meat through the tip into the prepared casing.

The devices can be horizontal or vertical.

Cords

Cord, twine, culinary thread - these are all the components for fixing the ends of the sausage casing. They are made from cotton or linen. In production, metal clips are used to tie sausages, but to install them you need special equipment - a clipper. For home use this is unnecessary. A cord or twine will suffice.

Sausage casings

To prepare sausages at home, you need an appropriate casing, which will need to be filled with minced meat using a sausage syringe.

Shells for such products can be natural or artificial.

Natural

Natural casings have good elasticity, permeability and natural origin. They are quite suitable for making products with different densities because they stretch well. They are produced in various diameters and lengths. With 1 meter of such material with a diameter of 34-36 mm, approximately 550–570 g of minced meat is placed. All shells undergo primary processing and become biologically harmless to humans. Natural casings are consumed during meals, resulting in waste-free production when using food - sausages. When choosing this type of casing, preparation is required before use.

Artificial

Artificial shell options have the same structure and are distinguished by ease of filling and reliability. They are made from different raw materials: polyamide, collagen, fibrous paper; they cannot be eaten. Artificial shells come in significant diameters and capacities. Inside 1 m of collagen material with a diameter of 45 mm, approximately 2.4 kg of minced meat is placed.

Choosing wood chips

For smoking sausages and other meat products, wood chips are used from oak, alder, beech, ash, pear, apricot, apple and cherry. You can take several types of wood chips. For example, you can add a little cherry or apricot to universal alder chips. The fruits give a characteristic aroma. To flavor the smokedness, you can add a sprig of currants, blackberries, juniper with berries or a grape vine.

Apple tree gives the sausage a golden color, delicate texture and delicious aroma. It is perfect for smoking pork, poultry, and wild birds, giving their meat a golden hue, juiciness, softness, and a slightly sweet taste.

Apricot is suitable for smoking lamb, pork, chicken, duck, beef, goat meat. Even tough meat turns into soft and juicy, acquires a subtle, rich aroma with an almond aftertaste, and a slightly sweet taste. The meat takes on a brownish-orange color.

The pear is suitable for smoking meat and poultry. Gives a unique taste and aroma. Gives smoked meat a golden yellow color.

Alder imparts a tart aroma, slightly sour taste, and dark yellow or brown color.

Beech gives a golden hue and does not affect the taste of smoked meats. It needs to be mixed with wood chips, which will add flavor to the product.

Oak is one of the most popular species for smoking meat products, especially for pork ham, lard, beef, and game. Oak chips give the product a dark yellow color, a pleasant aroma and a slightly bitter taste.

Ash gives a rich taste to meat products.

Cherry gives the product a pleasant dark golden hue and an original aroma. You need to be careful with him. You don’t need to use a lot so as not to deprive the smoked product of its individual flavor. Used as an additive to the main chips. More suitable for smoking poultry.

Smoked sausage recipes

Boiled cold smoked sausage

To prepare we need:

• 3 kg lean pork.
• 3 kg lean beef.
• 70 g salt.
• 2.5 tbsp. potato starch.
• 1 tbsp each black pepper, paprika, fennel and onion granules.
• 100 ml cognac.
• pork intestines.

We wash the meat and, if any, remove the veins and hymen. Cut the beef and pork into small pieces. Grind the beef into a fine grinder and the pork into a coarse grinder.

Mix salt, starch, black pepper, fennel, paprika, onion. Add the spice mixture to the minced meat and mix it well. Add cognac to the minced meat and mix. We tie the end of the intestine with thread. We take a meat grinder and a long sausage attachment and stuff the intestines with minced meat. Make sure the intestines are filled tightly.

The sausage should be divided into portions. Visually measure the required length of the sausage and twist it in this place and tie it with thread. You need to do this until the intestine runs out. When the intestines are filled with minced meat, they need to be pierced in different places with a needle.

Place the semi-finished products in the refrigerator for 20 hours. Then they need to be removed from the refrigerator and boiled for an hour at a temperature of 65 degrees. Dry the boiled sausage with a towel and start smoking.

We smoke the sausage using the cold smoking method at a temperature of 25 degrees for 6 hours until golden brown. The sausage should not be laid out, but hung on hooks in the smokehouse so that it is evenly smoked. After smoking, the sausage should be hung in a draft to remove strong smoke odors.

Homemade Krakow sausage

We will need:

• 1.6 kg medium fat pork tenderloin.
• 1.2 kg pork belly.
• 1.2 kg lean beef.
• 75 g of nitrite salt (will preserve the pleasant color of the finished product).
• 10 g garlic.
• 6 g glucose.
• 4 g each of ground allspice and black pepper.
• beef intestine.

Remove fat from pork. Cut pork and beef into pieces. Grind the meat in a meat grinder with a large grid. Add salt to the minced meat and knead for 15 minutes. Place the minced meat in the refrigerator for a day.

Freeze the fat, trimmed from pork and brisket in the freezer. Then cut into small cubes. Take the minced meat out of the refrigerator and add garlic and pepper to it. Mix well and pass through a meat grinder with a fine grid. Add cubes of fat and brisket to the minced meat and distribute them evenly.

We tie one end of the intestine with thread. Using a meat grinder and a long sausage attachment, stuff the intestine. We fill it tightly so that there is no air inside. We tie the other end of the sausage with thread. We connect the two ends with a thread to make a ring.

We hang the sausage rings in a cool room for 5 hours to shrink at a temperature of +10 degrees. Then hang the sausage in a warmer room (+20 degrees) for 8 hours.

We hang the sausages in the smokehouse. We place a sensor in one ring to control the temperature. Raise the temperature to 90 degrees. We smoke on oak chips at a temperature of 90 degrees for an hour. After an hour, reduce the temperature to 40 degrees and smoke for another 3 hours. When the sausage is ready, it should be hung in a well-ventilated place for a day. After airing, it is ready for use.

Hot smoked sausage Spicy

We will need:

• 2 kg lean pork.
• 0.6 kg lean beef.
• 0.6 boneless pork belly.
• 40 g salt.
• 1 tsp each ginger, marjoram and nutmeg.
• 2 tbsp. pink hot pepper.
• pork intestine.

Cut the pork, beef and brisket into cubes and grind into a meat grinder with a large attachment. Add salt, ginger, marjoram, nutmeg, pink pepper to the minced meat. To soak the meat in spices, place it in the refrigerator for 3 hours.

We tie one end of the intestine with a thread and fill it tightly with minced meat. Divide the intestines into portioned sausages as they are filled. To do this, after filling the intestine, twist it and tie it with thread. When the intestine is filled with minced meat, the threads must be removed and pierced with a thin needle along the entire length.

Place the sausage in hot water and cook over low heat for 40 minutes. We take the boiled sausage out of the water and dry it in the fresh air for 1-1.5 hours. We prepare the smokehouse. Place the sausages on the grill, leaving some free space between them. When the first smoke comes out, we note the time. Smoke over moderate heat for 30-35 minutes. You cannot look into the smokehouse while smoking. After the time has passed, remove the smokehouse from the heat and open it. Let the sausage rest for 20 minutes and you can taste it.

Braunschweig raw smoked

We will need:

• 0.5 kg lean pork.
• 0.9 kg of premium beef.
• 0.6 kg pork fat.
• 70 g nitrite salt.
• 4 g sugar.
• 2 g ground black pepper.
• 0.2 g nutmeg or cardamom.
• pork or beef casing 2 meters with a caliber of 45-50 mm.

We cut pork and beef into pieces of 300-400 g. Rub the meat with salt and put it in the refrigerator for 5 days.

We freeze the bacon and cut it into small cubes (4-5 mm). Remove the salted meat from the refrigerator and cut into small pieces. Freeze the pieces in the freezer. We pass the frozen meat individually through a meat grinder with a fine grid. Freeze the minced meat. Add 18 g of nitrite salt to the bacon. Mix the minced pork and beef, add the rest of the nitrite salt, sugar, pepper, nutmeg or cardamom. Mix the minced meat until protein threads appear. We measure the temperature in the minced meat, it should be no higher than 12 degrees.

Add bacon to the minced meat and stir to distribute evenly. We control the temperature. Place the minced meat in the refrigerator to ripen at a temperature of 2-4 degrees.

Prepare the shell. Using a sausage stuffer, tightly stuff the minced meat into the loaves. We tie, weigh each loaf and write down the weight on the tag. If there are bubbles on the shell, then it needs to be pierced in different places with a needle. We hang the finished loaves on the lees for 5-7 days at a temperature of 3-4 degrees and a humidity of 90%.

After 5-7 days, place the sausage in a smokehouse and smoke using the cold smoking method for 13-18 hours at a temperature of 22 degrees. After smoking, the sausage needs to be hung out for 35-40 days to mature. The temperature in the building where the sausage matures should be between 10-12 degrees with a humidity of 75%. If this is not possible, then the sausage should be placed in a plastic container and placed on the top shelf of the refrigerator. Every few days, the sausage should be removed from the refrigerator and hung to dry at room temperature for several hours. Repeat this for all 35-40 days of ripening.

You can also store this sausage in the freezer in cling film if you have prepared a lot of it. But you can defrost it only once.

Boiled smoked sausage with cheese

We will need:

• 0.8 kg pork.
• 0.8 kg beef.
• 0.1 kg Parmesan cheese.
• 1 liter of water.
• 5 tbsp. salt.
• 1 tsp Sahara.
• 0.5 tsp ground coriander.
• 4 cloves of garlic.
• ground black pepper to taste.
• 2 peas of allspice.
• 5 cardamom pods (grains).
• collagen shell 32 mm.

Pour salt into a liter of water and stir until dissolved. Cut the meat into large pieces and place in brine. We take the container for salting from non-oxidizing materials. Place the meat in the refrigerator for 3 days.

After 3 days, we take out the meat, cut it into smaller pieces, and put it through a meat grinder onto a large wire rack. Grind the cardamom grains and allspice in a mortar, add coriander and chopped garlic. We pass the Parmesan through a meat grinder.

Mix the minced meat with cheese and chopped spices. Cover the mass with cling film. Place in the refrigerator for 40 minutes. We cut the shells to the length we need. Since the sausage will dry out in the oven, you need to focus on it. The sausage ring suspended on the grill should not touch the walls or bottom tray.

Soak the collagen shell in warm salted water (1 tablespoon of salt per liter of water), it will become elastic. We tie one end of the casing with twine (we take a long piece so that we can then braid the sausage with it before smoking) for sausage products.

Using a meat grinder and a sausage attachment, fill the casing not very tightly with minced meat. If you stuff the shell tightly, you won’t be able to roll it into a ring. If there is air in the shell, then you need to pierce it with a needle. We braid the sausage with the long end of the twine using cap loops in increments of 8-10 cm from one end to the other. Roll the sausage into a ring and tie the ends of the twine. Remove the rack from the oven and attach the sausage rings to the rack. Place the rack with the sausage in an oven preheated to 90 degrees and dry it for an hour.

After the sausage has dried, it needs to be boiled. Pour water into a large saucepan and bring it to 90 degrees. Place the sausage rings in water and, reducing the heat slightly, cook for 40 minutes at a temperature of 80-85 degrees.

If the sausage floats to the surface of the water, it means there is air inside. The shell must be pierced with a needle. To prevent the shell from cracking during cooking, it is recommended to place a shallow plate at the bottom of the pan.

Prepare your smoker for smoking. Place wood chips on the bottom. Place a tray to collect grease. Hang the sausage in the smokehouse. Smoke at maximum heat for 15 minutes with the hood on. After igniting the wood chips in the smokehouse, it should be placed on low heat for 20 minutes. Then remove the smoker from the heat. Do not touch the sausage for an hour, then put it back on maximum heat for 5 minutes. Remove the smoker from the heat and let the sausage rest inside for 6-8 hours.

Homemade cold smoked sausage

Cold smoked sausage is cooked at a temperature of 40 degrees from several days to a week. Smoking at this temperature preserves natural proteins and enzymes. The complete readiness of the product is achieved through the complex work of smoking substances, enzymes, salt and dehydration. Cold smoking is suitable for preparing long-salted products - raw smoked sausages, bacon, lump meat.

The cooking time depends on the temperature and the semi-finished product. The key to success is a constant, uniform flow of smoke into the smoking chamber. If you do not follow this rule, the sausage may not be cooked. This process must be constantly monitored. Cold smoked sausages lose weight, so the casing must be tightly filled with meat.

After smoking, the sausage should be dried in a draft or well-ventilated place for 5-7 days. Golden brown color, dry and wrinkled shell indicates readiness. To get dried sausage, you need to keep it not for 5-7 days, but for 3-4 days. Then dry in a well-ventilated place for about another month. If there is not enough air, mold will appear on the sausage. It needs to be removed with salt water. Cold smoked products can be stored well at temperatures up to 10-12 degrees for up to a month.

Hot smoked sausage

• Hot smoked sausage is cooked at a temperature of 60 degrees and above;
• Cooking time depends on temperature - from 1 to 2 hours at a temperature of 60-120 degrees;
• Does not require preliminary salting or flashing (marination);
• After filling the shell with minced meat, it needs to be dried for several days;
• You can boil the sausage before smoking and get boiled-smoked sausage at the end, or you can not boil it;
• After cooking, hot smoked sausage needs to be cooled;
• Stored in the refrigerator at 5 degrees for 1-3 weeks.

Types of smoked sausages and their characteristic features

Sausages are divided into 2 types: boiled and smoked. But, since there are different processing methods, three subtypes of sausage products have arisen:

• Semi-smoked.
• Raw smoked.
• Boiled and smoked.

Cooked-smoked sausages

Cooked-smoked sausage, as the name suggests, is boiled in water or steamed before smoking. Then the loaves are cooled for 1-2 hours and smoked for 12-48 hours at a temperature of 35-50 degrees. Dry the finished sausage for 2-3 days at a temperature of 15 degrees and a humidity of 75%.

This sausage contains not only minced meat, but also small pieces of meat, potato starch or flour, milk and lard. Natural sausage has a short shelf life of 14 days. This sausage has a soft consistency due to boiling before smoking.

Semi-smoked sausages

Before cooking, the sausage is fried and changes some properties. It lasts longer. During heat treatment, it loses less weight. Cook the semi-finished product for an hour at a water temperature of 80 degrees.

When the center of the sausage reaches a temperature of 70 degrees, cooking stops. The boiled sausage needs to be cooled. This sausage is smoked at a temperature of 35-50 degrees for 12-24 hours. Semi-smoked sausages last longer than boiled-smoked ones. They can be stored for up to 10 days at a temperature of 12 degrees.

Raw smoked sausages

This subtype of sausage is not cooked at high temperatures. To neutralize the meat, it is ground into minced meat and salted for several weeks.

Sausage is smoked at low temperatures. The product is high in calories, but does not lose vitamins and nutrients. Hard smoked sausage, as it is also called, can be stored for a long time - up to a year. It has a solid consistency, the taste is sharp, salty, with the aroma of spices.

Summary

Any business requires skills and knowledge. When to freeze and when to pour boiling water over it; what kind of wood chips is best to pour into a smoke generator - everything comes with experience. The process of preparing smoked meats at home is quite feasible; there are no special secrets here.

Beginning sausage makers will be interested in the option of hot smoke processing. For example, you will enjoy Krakow sausage on the same day when “it all began.” But cold smoking requires not only a lot of time, but also certain skills. However, all costs are paid off in the end. We get a fragrant, tasty, and what is important – a natural product.

Calorie content

Uncooked smoked sausage, which does not contain fatty meats and a lot of lard, is considered healthier. The cold smoking method allows you to preserve vitamins and microelements in the sausage in greater quantities than in smoked and boiled-smoked sausage. The calorie content of sausages depends on their composition and method of preparation.

Home-cooked smoked sausage contains up to 17% protein and 40% fat, its calorie content is 350-420 kcal per 100 grams, smoked sausage - 20% protein, 40% fat, calorie content - 400 grams per 100 kcal, raw smoked sausage - 55 % fat, calorie content - 550 kcal per 100 grams.

Advantages of preparing cold and hot smoked sausage in a artisanal smokehouse

Sausages are perhaps the most adored product.
Their current fans, let’s say, are divided into two camps: some are satisfied with the quality of the products on store shelves, others prefer to see something slightly different on their table. Agree, the taste of artisanal sausage is absolutely incomparable with industrial samples. It is difficult to buy products based only on meat and spices so that they look decent, have an appetizing cut and a uniform structure. For natural food enthusiasts, homemade sausage in a hot and cold smokehouse turns out just like that. Maybe not right away, but over time, the sausage maker’s experience and arsenal of equipment grow, as does the quality of artisanal production.

What else pushes our artisans to prepare their own delicacies? Here are the main criteria:

• Significant savings compared to buying in stores.
• Obtaining a product with certain taste qualities.
• Food safety. If you know how to properly smoke sausage at home, then it is guaranteed to be free of harmful impurities. For example, smoked pork knuckle, made at home according to all the rules, lasts for quite a long time, which cannot always be said about a store-bought product.
• Smoke treatment gives the product high taste, aroma and color.

The listed factors confirm the advisability of preparing your favorite delicacy with your own hands. You can literally start small, stuffing the womb with minced meat through a cut-off plastic bottle. As they gain experience, sausage makers acquire an arsenal of special equipment. A little patience, adherence to technological techniques and control of temperature conditions are the main conditions for success.