Sausage Recipes???

[Harmy]

I am looking for advice on making elk sausage. Any good recipes out there?

A few years ago I tried making my own. Not having a good recipe, I impovised. So much so, that I created 10 pounds of sage brush that even my dog would not eat. I have not tempted fate since and so am looking for some solid advice from experienced sausage makers. Looking for recipes based on using about 4-5 pounds of already ground elk. Thanks

[Dirty D]

What kind of sausage you after? Summer, Italian, Breakfast?
We've dabbled in just about everything. LEM is a great resource if you're looking for premixed seasonings. I’ve got a pretty decent Italian and breakfast mix I’d be happy to share. Just let me know.

For whatever disturbing reason I even put our sausage making on the blog... Man I need help!
http://dirtysdealings.com/2010/02/01/20 ... usage-day/

[Harmy]

Dirty, you are professional...

My interests are breakfast and Italian sausages. Not too interested yet in stuffed or smoked products. What I need is good recipes with proper spice/fat proportions. I am an experimenter at heart but so far have failed miserably with making breakfast patties from elk. Fat selection and proportions as well as spices would be appreciated. I am not too interested in kits as I want to learn and understand spice selection...

[Dirty D]

Nothing but amateur hour around here but we do like cutting our own meat and making our own specialty stuff as well.

Italian-
4lbs meat (1lb pork + 3 lbs elk)
2 tbsp pickling salt
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp black pepper
3 tbsp paprika
4 tbsp fennel
2 tsp cayenne
2 tsp crushed red pepper
1 tsp sage
2 tbsp Italian Seasoning

Breakfast Sausage
8lbs meat (2 lbs pork +6 lbs elk)
4 tbsp pickling salt
4 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp ground black pepper
1 tbsp red pepper flakes
3 tbsp sage

I'm probably not a good person to talk to about fat proportions. For years I refused to add any fat to our sausage, I couldn't bring myself to dilute our elk with anything less worthy. I've finally came around but I still only add whole pork (ground) either shoulders or butts, but I still never add any true fat (pork or beef suet).

You look like a way better cook than I could ever hope to be, so if you play around with these and come up with anything better let me know.

[eltaco]

I use a seasoning from a butcher back home. L&M Meats in Grand Forks, ND. I've tried quite a few others, but never found anything I prefer to their Old Fashion seasoning. Its cheap and easy to use.

As for grinding, I use 1.5-2# of pork trimmings to 10# of ground elk. I make sure to remove every speck of fat, tendon, etc from the elk so I have 99.9% meat going in. I sort thru the pork trimmings and its probably close to 50/50 pork meat to fat when I mix it in. This puts Mr close to 93% when its all ground together. The pork brings an excellent flavor and fat content and removing all elk fat / tendon / etc cuts down on any gamey flavor. I've used the same consistenvy for deer and pronghorn with great success. Hope that helps.

[bowhunterty]

Try Hi Country Snack Foods out of Montana. Tried a few and this is the best so far. Make quite a few differnt seasonings. Easy directions to follow.

[Vanish]

We made some Italian this year, have yet to give it a try. I'll post up the recipe if it is edible!

[Elksniper1]

There is some pretty good recipes on the internet. I like you am just trying to find a perfect recipe. The only thing I'll add to this is if you are going to grind pork fat. Make sure u chill it first. It has a tendency to clog up my grinder if it isn't chilled well good luck let us know how it ends up

[Harmy]

OK, with fresh cow elk meat ready for the grinder yesterday I ventured and made some sausage. I started with Dirty's breakfast recipe as is but added 2 tbs of fennel and only used 3 teaspoons of sage as the last time I made sausage I ruined it with too much sage. The fat was pork trimmings which I would guess were 50/50 meat to fat. This would make the batch about 15% fat. Overall the first batch was great. I was using course ground kosher salt and so I felt the batch could use more salt (the box of morton salt I had sitting around indicated that when using it as pickling salt to increase the amount by 1 tbs per 1/4 cup). I also prefer a bit more pepper flavor and it needed more sage. It could have used a bit more brown sugar and so I should have packed each table spoon instead of loosely filled. I then made a second batch as follows:

6 lb elk + 2 lb pork trim
5 tbs course ground kosher salt
4 tbs packed brown sugar
2 tbs fresh ground black pepper
2 tbs crushed red pepper flakes
2 tbs fennel
2 tbs sage

Ground the elk and pork through a 1/4 inch cutter. Then mixed everything well by hand while adding spices. Re-ground the mixture using 1/8" cutter and had to add splashes of water to better lubricate the grinder (in the end about half a liter for 40 lbs of total sausage).

This batch was also very good but I would say that for most people there would be too much black and red pepper. Everything else about it was great. Therefore, I completed making the rest of my sausage and combined the two batches above into the following recipe which I think is very good.

26 lbs elk + 10 lbs port trim (~14% fat total)
19 tbs course kosher salt
16 tbs brown sugar (half was packed and half was loose).
6 tbs fresh ground black pepper (dang it takes a long time to hand grind this much pepper)
7 tbs red pepper flakes
7 tbs sage

Dirty, thanks for your recipes and putting me on the path. Your guidance helped a lot. Now I have to go package this batch and share with friends for more unbiased feedback.

[redtop]

This is my favorite elk and deer sausage. No pork fat here. The olive oil makes it juicy enough and lower fat. This year I made it with twice as much olive oil and it was better.

[Freebird134]

We should just start a recipe thread. I've got some good stuff, but could use some more!!!