Experiment gone questionable... supposed to be kielbasa, butt ended up ??? w/pix!!

[JustSmoke2]

I feel your pain Hawg. I had a guy want some summer sausage but I was hesitate on something going wrong. I did 30lbs of venison SS not enough fat and it was like eating saw dust. I was crushed and at that time we had no source of info like we have here. Luckily I knew a guy who worked in a meat locker and he set me straight.

[Texas-Hunter]

What was your ratio beef to pork?

[curious aardvark]

what liquid did you mix with ?

Seriously use beer and the meat binds way better.
Adding extra fat really isn't the answer most of the time.

[HawgHeaven]

What was your ratio beef to pork?

10 pounds pork/5 pounds beef... way too much beef.

what liquid did you mix with ?

Seriously use beer and the meat binds way better.
Adding extra fat really isn't the answer most of the time.

I used white wine... thought about using a beer, but drank it instead...

[curious aardvark]

I thnk any beverage would work as long as it's carbonated. Pretty sure it's the carbonic acid interacting with the muscle fibres that does the trick.

10:5 sounds spot on to me.

what else did you have in the sausage ?

[Texas-Hunter]

10 pounds pork/5 pounds beef... way too much beef.



I used white wine... thought about using a beer, but drank it instead...

I would not have thought 30% Beef would make that much difference..

[JustSmoke2]

Well adding the lean beef would have cut down the fat content by 50%. So instead of 30% fat you now cut it down to 15%. Straight Pork probably would have been okay.

[Texas-Hunter]

Well adding the lean beef would have cut down the fat content by 50%. So instead of 30% fat you now cut it down to 15%. Straight Pork probably would have been okay.

OK, I am having a hell of a time trying to wrap my mind around what you just said...

We have 10lbs Pork and 5lbs Beef.. That's 66% Pork & Fat to 33% Lean Beef.. So you are saying that by adding 5lbs Lean beef (10% Fat) it reduces the fat content of 10lbs of pork to 15%???? Since a pork butt is 30 - 35% fat??

[curious aardvark]

lmao.

I guss if you don't trim and ditch the bulk fat then yup, the pork would be round the 30 % mark.

so 3 lbs of fat from the pork.

10% from the beef (you call that lean ???)
which is 1/2 lb fat.

so in 15lb of mix you'd have 3.5 lb of pure fat.
which is 23.333etc % fat.

That's more than I'd put in any sausage and certainly enough that fat content of itself definitely isn't the problem.

How cold was it all when you ground and mixed it ?

[Texas-Hunter]

lmao.

I guss if you don't trim and ditch the bulk fat then yup, the pork would be round the 30 % mark.

so 3 lbs of fat from the pork.

10% from the beef (you call that lean ???)
which is 1/2 lb fat.

so in 15lb of mix you'd have 3.5 lb of pure fat.
which is 23.333etc % fat.

That's more than I'd put in any sausage and certainly more than enough for pretty much any kind of sausage I'd make.

So it's probably not the fat content.

10% on beef is the standard here where I live for lean..


I can see it being around 25%.. I just cannot see taking 5lbs lean beef and adding it to 5lbs pork butt and having 0% fat..

[HawgHeaven]

CA, everything was cold when ground and mixed.

[curious aardvark]

ah there's cold and then there's below freezing.

These days I grind and mix all my sausage below freezing. The last sausage batch I did, after an hour was still at 27f at the finished point when i put it in the fridge to warm up, with ice crystals on the outside of the bowl where condensed water had frozen
In fact time from taking the frozen mea from the freezer to putting the finished sausage meat back into the fridge was just over an hour and a half.
I use 3lb (ish) packs of pork shoulder and give them 30 minutes on the lowest microwave setting before cutting and grinding.

It is much easier to do this with smaller batches I realise. so maybe make several small batches ?

It really does make a helluva difference grinding and mixing at very low temperatures. The fat acts as a solid and so is ground and mixed in much more thoroughly and as distinct seperate particles. If not frozen then fat smears when ground and tends to coat the particles of muscle tissue. this both stops the muscle tissue from mixing and binding properly and also reduces the effective 'juicyness' factor of the included fat.

Sausage making is definitely as much about technique as it is about ingredients.

[DanMcG]

Sometimes dry sausage is from not mixing enough to develop the proteins that actually do the binding. It should be stickin to your hands when properly mixed.

[Fishawn]

Did you de-case these and make patty's Pop-Pop, or keep them as-is?

[HawgHeaven]

Did you de-case these and make patty's Pop-Pop, or keep them as-is?

Nope, kept them as is. I'll address them on an individual basis...