www.sausagemaking.org

I am Shortly about to "acquire" a quantity of venison. Has anyone got a good recipe for venison sausages that I could try.

Regards


Spenrex

Spenrex,

There are a number of recipes on the site for venison sausage as I thinkn a fair few of the guys here stalk or have freinds that do. Personally I tend to use a mixture of Franco's game mix (it's a bit too salty for me to use it aon it's own) and italian mixes, but I also did the following:

I use 10% Rusk to total meat and fat wight
I like to make up about 25%-35% of the mix with smoked bacon off cuts

I also did my last batch where I sweated off 8-10 large onions in plenty of butter untill they were caramelised. I chopped these really finely when they had cooled and added into the mixture.

Fruit also works well especially as we get closer to Xmas festivities. I think someone here soaked dried cranberrries in port or calvados???

What sort of deer will you be getting and what cuts? I use a lot of Fallow and Roe/ muntjac when I can get it. I'm out on the Reds soon but I think they will be too strong tasting for sausage so I'll save it for casseroles.

Rgds,
FB

Hi FB

yep im a soaker of fruit and I can confirm that cranberries soaked in port and then added to the mix is very nice. I have just made some pheasant pies (as pork pies) and used sloe gin to soak my sultana's in (1/2 price at Holland and Barrett I think) before adding them to the meat mix - yum yum...

Cheers WW

Wiz,

If it's the sloe gin that's half price I'm on my way!!!

Sultanas I can take or leave...



FB

Nope sorry FB you will have to stick to making your own! I do so with the cheapest gin I can find (Lidel I think) and then add the damsons, or sloes this time of year.

Good tip on sloes: instead of pricking them all over with a needle prior to putting them in the bottle, freeze them and then pop them straight into the bottle and the gin when poured onto the berries will make them open.

PS if you make damson gin, save the spent damsons when you have finished decanting and cover them in melted chocolate. When my kids were small this was their staple Christmas present to give, and I was more than happy to supply them!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cheers hic WW...................

Wiz,

I should have my sloe gin started this weekend. I bought a 25litre fermenting bin to do it in so that I can use the bin to make a hedgerow wine with another time, even though the gine isn't a fermentation proces it will be a handy airtight container to use.

How much is the Gin in Lidl? I think Iceland do about �5 a bottle last time I looked. I have 6kg's of sloes in the freezer and could probably pick up a few more over the weekend when we go out shooting. I currently have 4 litres of Gin and would like o make it up to 6 or 7 litres in total.

If you could post your recipe it would be greatly appreciated. A freind adds a couple of drops of almond essence to each bottle and this really does work a treat.

I noticed that Ascott do a nice 330ml bittle with a cork top so I thought it might be the way forward to decant into later on. I'm going to trawl the homebrew site over the next little while to see what other options there are.

Rgds,
FB

Damson and sloe gin might be a bit off topic but I adore both, though never had any success in making the finished product myself. I think the problem I had was that my recipe called for it to be turned often, which I mistakenly read as tasted often, so when I came to strain and decant it there was nothing left. It turned out easier on my liver to wait until Christmas and buy a bottle.