# Home made sausage question



## HuntinforTail (Mar 29, 2011)

I've been processing my deer for a few years now. This time around I made about 70 lbs of links. I didn't smoke them, just vacuum sealed and into the freezer. I've never used cure, but am now wishing I did learning more about sausage making. Here is my question, is there a safe way to prepare the non cured sausage I just made? I make sure to cook it thoroughly, but other than that nothing else. I'll list the process below. 

I deboned the deer meat, vacuum sealed it and froze it. A couple months later I ground it with some pork, and seasoned it. I didn't have time to stuff it that evening, so I put it in a cooler with a bunch of ice for about 24 hours. Then I stuffed it, vacuum packed it and froze it. 

From what I've been reading, botulism spores won't be killed by cooking or freezing, but the bacteria and toxins are killed at thorough cooking temps. 

I'll be using cure from now on when I make sausage, but is what I have now safe?


----------



## K Man (Jun 21, 2012)

I don't like using cure myself and pretty much am all natural. I researched the same information and what I found was if you're planning on smoking you should use cure. I used the cure but used about 30% less than required. I love smoked sausage so I use.


----------



## Oso Blanco (Oct 17, 2010)

You are making what we call fresh sausage. The salt you are using is a cure. You have to remember that sausage making was a way to preserve meat before refrigeration. I use mono-cure in my fresh and dry sausage. I like the pink look after the fresh sausage is cooked instead of the gray when you do not use it. It does not change the flavor. By law when you have a deer processed and you want dried sausage it has to be cooked/smoked to 185 degrees then dried. We do not do cook our dried sausage when we make it. It is old school dried without heat. So to close, if you are making links to be BBQ you are doing what you need to do. If you want your BBQ sausage pinkish red looking like some store bought ad some Mono-Cure. Remember, you can reduce your salt buy the amount of cure you add. Add an ounce of cure use an ounce less of salt.


----------



## 2Ws (Jun 28, 2016)

Oso Blanco said:


> By law when you have a deer processed and you want dried sausage it has to be cooked/smoked to 185 degrees then dried.


Since when is it a law? The Health Dept nor FDA has any rights on wild game OR processors as long as it's not for sale to the public. Yrs back our competition tried to get the Health Dept on us but failed. The only thing that I'm aware of is a restriction on feral hogs but things could have changed.


----------



## Jeff SATX (Jan 18, 2011)

As long as the sausage stayed nice and cool below 40* for the most part, then you are fine. Just throw it in a pan or on the pit and cook through. We use cure because we make the sausage to cold smoke and hang over night. Half we leave up to dry for a couple weeks, the other half we vacuum seal the links and throw into the freezer. No way would regular sausage last for an hour like that without cure. Also, we grind up our meat partially frozen to keep the temp down as long as possible before we actually mix in the cure/seasonings. Lastly, the pink cure bottle has a ratio to use plainly printed on the bottle, don't try to short it, it's there for a reason. Long story short: Sodium Nitrite levels need to be between 125-150ppm. Take 2.0 oz. of pink cure x 28 grams per ounce x 0.0625(% sodium nitrite) = 3.5g

50 pound batch of sausage X 454 grams per pound = 22700 grams

3.5/22700*1,000,000=154ppm

This is ******* math, take it for what it's worth. I'm sure an expert will be along to tell me if it's right or wrong.


----------



## Oso Blanco (Oct 17, 2010)

*Maybe not law*



2Ws said:


> Since when is it a law? The Health Dept nor FDA has any rights on wild game OR processors as long as it's not for sale to the public. Yrs back our competition tried to get the Health Dept on us but failed. The only thing that I'm aware of is a restriction on feral hogs but things could have changed.


If you have your deer processed your dry sausage and bucksticks are cooked.


----------



## teamfirstcast (Aug 23, 2006)

*Even simpler...*



Jeff SATX said:


> As long as the sausage stayed nice and cool below 40* for the most part, then you are fine. Just throw it in a pan or on the pit and cook through. We use cure because we make the sausage to cold smoke and hang over night. Half we leave up to dry for a couple weeks, the other half we vacuum seal the links and throw into the freezer. No way would regular sausage last for an hour like that without cure. Also, we grind up our meat partially frozen to keep the temp down as long as possible before we actually mix in the cure/seasonings. Lastly, the pink cure bottle has a ratio to use plainly printed on the bottle, don't try to short it, it's there for a reason. Long story short: Sodium Nitrite levels need to be between 125-150ppm. Take 2.0 oz. of pink cure x 28 grams per ounce x 0.0625(% sodium nitrite) = 3.5g
> 
> 50 pound batch of sausage X 454 grams per pound = 22700 grams
> 
> ...


I'm sure that's correct but here's a simple measuring ratio that is also accurate: Use one (1) level teaspoon for every five (5) pounds of meat.

Like was said above you must do this when smoking because the meat will be at dangerous temps for the bacteria to grow approx around 60-120 deg for several hours - the cure prevents any bacterial growth during those critical temps.

In summary, your links should be fine to eat - just cook thoroughly and quickly!

Rick :cheers:


----------



## kweber (Sep 20, 2005)

we should all be long dead from dried sausage made w/o cure...
back at least 3-4 generations....
Grampa sed the smoke would keep the bad stuff out...
deer/pork sausage smoked and dried.
left in the smokehouse for a couple weeks sometimes in winter. 
never cooked...
it came out semi-hard w/a little grease and almost black...
sliced up thin w/crackers, rat cheese and beer...
when I was a youngster, Grampa would let me have a little slice off his Tinsley's...
I learned to spit brown like a summer grasshopper...
we got to ride w/him in that old Dodge pickup and shoot ground squirrels in the fields.


----------



## Oso Blanco (Oct 17, 2010)

kweber said:


> we should all be long dead from dried sausage made w/o cure...
> back at least 3-4 generations....
> Grampa sed the smoke would keep the bad stuff out...
> deer/pork sausage smoked and dried.
> ...


My Grandpa passed when my mother was 10. I did have some great teachers growing up. Sausage, Hunting and yes Mickey Twist. I am 13 weeks into kicking my tobacco habit.


----------



## T-Muney (Aug 12, 2005)

Oso Blanco said:


> If you have your deer processed your dry sausage and bucksticks are cooked.


There are several places that will make 'old school' dried sausage from your deer that is not cooked but is cold smoked and then hung to dry.


----------



## Jeff SATX (Jan 18, 2011)

kweber said:


> we should all be long dead from dried sausage made w/o cure...
> back at least 3-4 generations....
> Grampa sed the smoke would keep the bad stuff out...
> deer/pork sausage smoked and dried.
> ...


Nitrate cured meats have been around long before your po-po was. Just because you seem to reminisce of the old hardass yonder years doesn't mean it's the right way. Take your spoiled meat and chew it with how ever many teeth you have, and everyone else will rely on cure methods that have been around since the discovery of gun powder. :idea:


----------



## Wado (May 15, 2011)

*Pink Cure*

I just made my first ever batch of fresh sausage yesterday. I used six pounds of untrimmed pork and a pound and a half of beef. The beef was a big hunk of London Broil that was on sale and went in the grinder straight from the package. I'm not going to elaborate on the spices but I did add pink cure at the rate of one and a half teaspoons for seven and a half pounds of meat based on what teamfirstcast wrote in his reply. I mix the cure with a little water and sprinkle it all over the meat and mix well. I just figured I would get it more evenly than trying to sprinkle the dry powder. When I say level teaspoons I mean just that, heap the spoon up and then take a knife and level it off so there is some consistency otherwise you are just guessing. I even got my powder scale out and tried weighing the stuff to see how close I hit it by measuring with a spoon. Anyway, I ate some last night and I woke up this morning so all is good. I did smoke the sausage in my big pit away from the fire for about an hour until it hit about 160 degrees internal then moved it to the firebox while I did a couple of T Bones and it hit 190 pretty quick. Smoking on your every day pit seems to make the sausage taste a bit twangy on the smoke side. I think all the fats and seasonings in the pitch or tar in the firebox and grills send smoke that is tainted so the sausage really absorbs the smells and the worst culprit is charcoal lighter and Zesty Italian dressing. If you are going to smoke do it in a dedicated smoker that isn't full of grease and drippings from everything from shrimp to javelinas. I did like the sausage I just didn't like the funky smoke so next time I will keep it on the hot side and cook it faster or just use the gas grill and cook it like I do Brat's. I also read the cure will keep the fat from going rancid after time so I think I will keep using it and not go overboard. I found this on the web................
The answer is: n=0.30 lbs. of Cure #1 (based on 9.5
 lbs. per gallon) 
0.30 lbs = 4.8 ounces or 136 grams 
In the United States, the only folks with access to
 pure sodium nitrite are commercial professionals w
ho 
cure meat for a living. They basically use the form
ula above, but substitute pure sodium nitrite in th
eir 
own formulas in place of the hobbyistâ€™s â€œCure #1â€ w
hich is mixed with salt. By equally dispersing nitr
ate 
into salt via a roller â€œdrumâ€, Griffith Laboratorie
s developed â€œPrague Powder Cure #1â€ containing 6.25
% 
sodium nitrite and 93.75% sodium chloride. Because 
many nations around the globe (including the 
United States) yet do not use the metric system, Iâ€™
ve found that many people are confused when it 
comes time to put a specific number of â€œgramsâ€ into
 a curing mixture. Letâ€™s see if we can eliminate so
me 
of the confusion by posting a few mathematical equa
tions: 
â€¢
1 ounce of Cure #1 = 6 level teaspoons (2 tablespoo
ns). One ounce of cure weighs 28.35 grams. 
â€¢
4 ounces of Cure #1 will cure 100 lbs. of sausage. 
Four ounces of cure weigh 113.4 grams. 
â€¢
1 ounce of Cure #1 will cure 25 lbs. of sausage. 
â€¢
Â½ ounce of Cure #1 will cure 12 lbs. of sausage. Th
is means less than Â½ ounce will cure ten 
pounds of sausage. 
4.8 ounces of Cure #1 (in the formula above) is equ
al to 136 grams and will cure 100 lbs. of meat. 
I hope this takes some of the mystery out of calcul
ating nitrites in meat. For more information on thi
s 
subject, refer to â€œHome Production Of Quality Meats
 And Sausagesâ€... by Stan and Adam Marianski, and 
â€œThe Art Of Making Fermented Sausagesâ€... by Stan and
 Adam Marianski. (See Bookmagic.com)


----------



## kweber (Sep 20, 2005)

Jeff SATX said:


> Nitrate cured meats have been around long before your po-po was. Just because you seem to reminisce of the old hardass yonder years doesn't mean it's the right way. Take your spoiled meat and chew it with how ever many teeth you have, and everyone else will rely on cure methods that have been around since the discovery of gun powder. :idea:


thank you for your UN-biased opinion...
but please notice I DID NOT recommend anything, but just stating what was done by my elders long before you were around...
PS... we have all our teeth...


----------



## Wado (May 15, 2011)

*Smoke*

Smoke has formaldehyde and acetic acid in it and is a natural way to preserve meat. I wonder how the old timers figured that out? All I remember as a kid was they used saltpeter or nitrate of potash to preserve meat and my dad always said they used smoke in the process as well. They never told me why the smoke does it but I just read this fact in a sausage making book I found in my dad's collection of meat smoking books. In his last few years he bought a smoker and dabbled in making jerky and smoked meats. He even smoked cheese at one time. Pretty good stuff.


----------



## TroutChasin' (Sep 28, 2011)

I suggest picking up a copy of: "Great Sausage Recipes and Meat Curing" by Rytek Kutas. Very informative book. Grabbed mine off eBay for just a few bucks.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------

