Hi from California, USA!
Yesterday I tried sausage making for the first time. What fun! It was a little scary, but not too painful! I am so glad to have found this forum, I'm hoping to learn from you all!
I made breakfast sausage for my first try. I used 3 pounds of pork shoulder. When I started to grind it, gristle immediately clogged up the grinder. Have any of you had this happen? It was really stringy and tough and I kept having to take the grinder apart and cut it off the blades. It made the grinding really tedious, and I think the meat got ground too fine as a result. I persevered tho!
Next was stuffing, that went fine, but I see there is definitely a learning curve! I don't know how fat to make them. Do you stuff the casing till it is stretched tight? So I did my best. I pricked them all over then twisted them up. I evidently didn't twist them enough tho, because they had "blow outs" when I cooked them!
Oh well, it was fun! And they were tasty! So I'm ready to try again. I have another 3 pounds of the same pork shoulder, but I'm worried I will encounter the same problem. I'm hoping some of you can offer advice?
I"m using a KitchenAid Stand Mixer, with the grinder attachment, and sausage stuffer attachment. I have ground beef on it before and it worked fine. It was just the gristle in this meat that seemed to be the problem. I had cut it into one inch chunks and let it sit in the freezer for a half hour to firm up.
Here are pictures of my efforts. Please feel free to critique, I want to learn!