lard

[labman]

I'm told my breakfast sausage is too dry. I assume it needs more fat. Can I add lard as the fat?

Thanks,

Labman

[JerBear]

Typically speaking lard is not a good choice for sausages because it's too soft, fat back is your best choice. If your sausage is too dry there may be other factors at hand. It's normally recommended to post the recipe you used and your method. You could have mixed the meat too much or more often not enough.... There are a bunch of things that could have happened...

[labman]

Thank you Jered for the reply. I'm enjoying your blog and so far I've learned a lot.

The meat was a pork shoulder that I ground up. I didn't add any other fat which may have been the problem.

My grinder too is on a Kitchen Aid and I've heard some say it's not an adequate grinder so perhaps the meat wasn't ground enough.

The recipe follows:

2 lbs. ground pork
1 TB of sage
2 t marjoram
2 t thyme
1 t brown sugar
1/2 t salt
1/2 t black pepper

Mixed by hand and put into collagen casings.

As I said the links had a good flavor, just somewhat dry. I thought because it was too lean?

labman

[BriCan]

Question if I may .... how are you cooking them??

[labman]

My wife fried them in a cast iron pan with some bacon grease.

Labman

[JerBear]

Regarding the grinder, there's nothing inherently wrong with the KitchenAid unit. My chief complaints are that the feed tube is too small at my unit (the smallest of the line and pushing 14+ years old) got wicked hot. I found that sharpening the blades helped a bit but anything over 5 lbs of grinding was pushing the motor. Stuffing sausages with the KA is a headache and if you're serious about sausage-making purchasing a dedicated stuffer would be a good next purchase. I ended up giving my KA grinder to a friend but regretted it as I sometimes only want to grind a couple lbs of meat for a test batch or terrine and the KA did that job fine.

Back to the subject of your sausages, how high was the heat. When I cook from raw on the stovetop I shoot for a temp that just barely makes the sausages sizzle. Anything more and I'm heating too fast. Typically I like the process to take upwards of 20 minutes and often finish with a slight steam.

[labman]

I do have an upright sausage stuffer that works much better than the kitchen aid. I tend to grind small batches as well since I'm still working out a base line on making different products.

The sausages were just basically warmed up in the fry pan. They weren't burned or even browned too much. I don't think they were over cooked but then I'm not sure.

Labman

[JerBear]

Best way to tell is to check internal temperature with an instant read thermometer, I try to avoid going over 160ºF. Also, how long did you mix the mixture? I find that it takes at least a 2-5 minutes depending on volume and my general rule of thumb is that I can grab a 1/2 baseball chunk of mix and it will stick upside down to the palm of my hand. Without a good mixing the fat and meat could separate during the cooking process regardless of how slowly they were heated.

And while some people frown upon the use of chemicals, until I had a better technique I found that the addtion of phosphate powder (aka Special Meat Binder from Butcher and Packer) really helped quite a bit. A little goes a long way towards insurance.

[labman]

Do you mix it by hand or using a mixer? If in the kitchen aid, what beater do you use, the hook or the paddle?

Thanks,

Labman

[JerBear]

I have used the KA in the past with the paddle attachment but it may have only been once or twice. I didn't like the disconnect...If I wanted to check on the status of the meat I'd have to turn off the mixer, wait for it to stop and either lift the head or drop the bowl. Instead I've just gone old school and do it by hand.

I am looking at a sausage mixer because my batches have gotten a little out of hand (30+ lbs) and hand mixing is getting more difficult to do well.

[BriCan]

I am looking at a sausage mixer because my batches have gotten a little out of hand (30+ lbs) and hand mixing is getting more difficult to do well.

I find that 50 lbs 'might' be pushing it

[JerBear]

show off..

[BriCan]

I would 'never' presume to do that mind you Haggis time is drawing near ...... this is the biggest/largest I mix by hand .. it is a gut wrenching heart stopping 50kg mix

[vagreys]

I'd find 30# batches unwieldy, too. My huge mixing bowl won't let me hand mix more than about 20#. My meat tubs are smaller than that. I'd be looking at a mixer. The rule of thumb is that you need to be doing batches of at least half the capacity of the meat mixer for the mixer to be effective (doing more mixing than warming). If I were doing 30+ lbs at a time, at home, I'd have my eye on a 44-50 lb. mixer with the reduction gearing.