Dateline: July 22-23, 2020 Perfecting Kielbasa

I had a very large pork shoulder in the freezer that I took out on the morning of July 22.  By that evening, I had completed making kielbasa minus the smoking.  As I started to cut the shoulder up, I found out that it was NOT boned!  I had to cut around the bone in a half frozen hunk of meat and take care not to cut my fingers off with the boning knife.  No accidents!  

After freeing up the bone, I cut up the pork belly.  It came with skin on, which it never has done before, so after thinking about it, I decided to take the skin off.  Why you ask?  Because pork skin unless shatteringly crisp is awful to chew on.  And in an otherwise tender sausage, a gnarly bit of chewy is not very appetizing.  So off came the skin on the belly as well as the skin on the shoulder.  I saved the skin in case some day I have a big vat of hot oil that is begging for chicharones to be made.  

I used the same recipe as before, Homemade Polish Kielbasa, by Hank Shaw.  I did a few things differently than I did on the first go round.  I let the sausages sit in the fridge over night on a rack to allow the casings to fully adhere to the filling.  I also added about 2 teaspoons of yellow mustard seeds to the spice mix.  I did not have the abundance of pork fat that I had in the first go, so I added some beef fat from brisket trimmings that I had in the freezer along with about a pound of pork belly.  In all I had about 10-11 lbs of sausage that needed to be stuffed.

I did have a couple of blow outs while stuffing.  It was one casing that blew out 2 times.  It was responsible for the short guy in the center of the top picture below.  

This was the output from Wednesday night.  As you can see, there is quite a bit of sausage here.  About half will be given away, if I can do it when Bill is not looking!

This morning, I got up and set up the smoker.  And put these bad girls in there.

It is critical that the sausages do not touch each other because that will result in a spot that the smoke will not get to.  This means a "white" spot in an otherwise reddish sausage.  

Here are the finished ones:  

You can clearly see the color change, and I think that is a result of overnight resting and proper smoke coverage.  The last batch were much paler.  The proof will be in the tasting.  When Bill and I sampled some of the sausage pre-stuffing, we were both happy with the flavors.  The overnight sit only will enhance those flavors and the smoke will provide them another layer of flavor.

Every batch is a learning experience.  I learned that being totally prepared ahead of your start is essential as is prepping your equipment.  The tedious part is the cutting up of the meat and grinding it.  

I have a bunch of chicken in the fridge that I was thinking of turning into sausage this weekend.  What I learned from the turkey sausage is that fat is a necessary element.  I have both white and dark meat with skin on and if I think there is not enough fat, that I will grind up a duck breast along with the chicken to help out the lean-ness problem.

Tasting Notes:  

This sausage was delicious!  I know, I know, I say that about everything I cook, but in this case it is not hyperbole!  I like the texture of the coarse grind, the snap of the casing, and the flavor.  We ate a good deal of a very big ring last night, and Bill finished off the remains for breakfast!