project food blog: sweet meat treats
Sunday, October 10, 2010 at 2:20PM Wow! We would be amiss to not thank everyone for all of the votes in challenge number three. Thank you, thank you, thank you! You are all fabulous. Lo and I have seen more traffic and more comments than ever. Project Food Blog has been an amazing experience thus far.
Now, on to challenge four - a photo tutorial. We decided to guide you through the process of making sausage. We made two sausages with two original recipes for you. A classic hot Italian and something a little different...we're calling it a sweet meat treat. It's a maple syrup and cinnamon sausage with rubbed sage and thyme. Great for breakfast either simply fried, or served on a stick, deep fried in pancake batter with powdered sugar. The latter is our version of a breakfast "corn dog" (see photo below for tasty inspiration). But first things first, let's make some sausage goodness.
Applying this basic technique to any type of sausage you would like to make will reward you with success and deliciously bound meat concoctions. We'll try to keep this light on words (too late!) and let the pictures speak for themselves.
When we make sausages we like to use pork shoulder. It has a nice amount of fat, which is helpful for controlling the amount of fat that goes into your sausage. You'll want to break down your shoulder chunks into cubes suitable for grinding. Separate the fat from the lean meat and create two piles. Place the cubed, separated fat into a mixing bowl and keep it in the freezer until you are ready to start adding your fat.
Pass the leaner portions of the pork through your grinder, keeping it course.
Lay out your mise en place for your sausage. Measure and combine all of your ingredients: lean shoulder, spices, liquid and breadcrumbs.
This is the best part of sausage making by far! Thoroughly mix the ingredients together, to create your panada (a mixture used for binding meat). Don't be afraid to use your hands. Once you are happy with the mix, heat up a pan and start tasting! Make a small patty and give it a try. Be sure the sausage holds together nicely and tastes great. This is the time to add more seasonings if you feel you need them. When you are happy with your sausage flavor and consistency, you're ready to move on.
Now it's time to add the fat and to shout, "Hell yes, I'm adding the fat!" Remove your fat from the freezer. It should be almost frozen, but soft enough to pass through your grinder. If it's too frozen allow it to sit at room temperature for a few minutes. The idea behind keeping the fat cold is to uphold the integrity of the fat as it passes through the grinder. Warm fat would turn to mush, cold fat will store little nuggets of fatty goodness throughout your sausage mix. That's what you want.
Add, by mixing with your hands, some of the nearly frozen fat to your sausage mixture. We incorporated about a 1/4lb of fat per 2lbs of sausage. That ratio felt good to us, but you can always add a bit more if you like. Pass that mixture through your grinder one more time and refrigerate.
Now that your sausage mixture is done, you have a couple options. You can case them or leave it loose. We rarely case Italian sausage as we use it for different pastas and such. But if you were making brats or kishka, you'll undoubtedly want to case it. We get our casings from our local sausage shop. They are super cheap and you'll feel like a culinary super star asking your sausage shop for casings instead of asking for a half-dozen Polish! Rinse your casings out with cold water, and cut a suitable length piece for doing a generous size coil. Wet the tube of your sausage stuffing attachment and slide the casing piece completely onto the tube. All that's left is to push your refrigerated sausage mix through the grinder with the sausage stuffer attached and case 'em up. Twist into desired size links. You'll really appreciate the help of a friend if you're using the Kitchen Aid like we do. There are a variety of great tools for sausage stuffing, and if you find you enjoy making sausage links you might want to invest in something better suited to the task. We'll be doing the same very soon!
Apply the above technique to the recipes below and enjoy!
Hot Italian Sausage.
2lbs ground pork
Spicy broccoli pasta with Italian Sausage
1/4lb pork fat
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 & 1/3 tablespoon kosher salt
1 egg
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1/2 tablespoon dried marjoram
1 tablespoon ground fennel
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
1/2 tablespoon hot pimenton
1 1/2 teaspoon crushed red chiles
1 tablespoon basil, finely chopped
3 tablespoons fresh breadcrumbs
1/2 cup dry white wine, ie. Pinot Grigio
fresh cracked pepper, to-taste
Sweet Meat Treat.
2lbs ground pork
1/4lb pork fat
1 large shallot, finely chopped
1 egg
Breakfast corn dog with powdered sugar and poached egg
1 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg, fresh ground
2 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
2 teaspoons rubbed sage
2 teaspoons cinnamon, fresh ground
1 tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped
1/4 teaspoon white pepper, to-taste
3 tablespoons fresh breadcrumbs
1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons maple syrup
--Jd & Lo--
sausage in Project Food Blog
Reader Comments (27)
A breakfast corndog? Patent that thing, buy food truck, and collect your millions.
You know how there were two thousand bloggers to begin with? And you know how slow the internet in China is?? (you may not, but it's hard to be fast when everything has to be thoroughly censored)
Shamefully, it's taken me this long to have a read of your blog. Worth waiting for....Love the sausages! Love the Italian sausage pasta! Great photos!
Good luck with this round to you both!
Great post!!! Just gave you a vote!
I have the kitchen aid sausage attachment but have yet to use it...can't wait to try this!!!
Great entry! I have somehow missed your previous posts (too many to sift through) but I'm excited to go back and read them. I'm planning to make a big batch of turkey sausage this year when the holiday birds are on sale cheap!
How fun, I made sausages (Beer Bratwurst) for this challenge of PFB, too! It was the first time I had tackled it and I found it extremely rewarding. The sweet meat treat looks so good, salty and sweet, mmm!
@junebu8 ... we love us some turkey sausage. I think this year for Thanksgiving we are going to do a pan roasted turkey breast stuffed with a walnut cranberry sausage. Thanks for reading our post!
@Liren .... We saw that you made sausages too! Your pictures are really beautiful, nice work. Great minds think alike!
Great looking sausage! My husband is the sausage maker in our home and he would love that hot Italian one! Great tutorial as well :o)
wow, sweet meat is a new one! protein for breakfast is important though. ;) very nice tutorial - you've got my vote! good luck!
You like Pork!? I like Pork!! Next time we should collaborate our challenge efforts, I could have used your homemade sausage in my challenge #4 Ragu!
Cheers, you get my vote!
Breakfast corn dog?? VOTED!
As the mother of 5 little boys ages 13 and under and the wife of one big boy, I have to thank you. BRILLIANT! Breakfast corn dogs? I do believe I know what I'll be asked to make for the next several birthday breakfasts. Hats off to (and a vote for) you!
We should probably let everyone know, we used pancake batter for the Breakfast Corn Dog. It was perfect!
corn. dog. amazingness. brilliant!
I've always been afraid to make my own sausage... But you make it seem so simple and SO worth it. What the heck am I afraid of?? I need to get the attachment for my Kitchen Aid and then I'm so coming back here! Awesome post!! :)
Love the step by step tutorial. Fabulous photos! Making sausage seems overwhelming but with each step pictured, I would actually try making it or better yet I will just come over.
Excellent post - you got my vote for this! Good luck :) Feel free to hop over to leave a comment :)
Have a wonderful day!
jen @ www.passion4food.ca
What a great post! Loving the breakfast corn dog! Good luck in round 4!
Great tutorial guys! The sausages look perfect. I have never made my own sausages, even though I do happen to have the kitchen aid meat grinding and sausage stuffing attachments (which I inherited from my mother). You make the process look really simple. I might just have to finally dig them out, dust them off, and start making some sausage magic. Nicely done. And your photos are really lovely, as always. I voted for you again!
Best of luck! Hope to see us both in round 5!!! =)