Originally Posted by
antileno
so i'm relatively new in the sausage game and while i have been reading on here for hours i haven't found any answers as of yet to my specific questions. Any help would be greatly appreciated, here goes
1) when stuffing sausage what are your tricks to minimizing air bubbles? I made a batch of kielbasa yesterday and had a hell of a time keeping he sausages uniformed and keepining the air bubbles at bay. i did try to squish the meat into the stuffer the best i coud but it didnt seem to help.
Do not tie off the casing before you have run the sausage meat into the casing about 3 " from the end of the casing, then stop the stuffer and tie off the casing. Control the casing slipping off the stuffer nozzle so that the casing fills slightly firm or even a bit looser and watch for bubbles (should be only a few or none or you need to pack the stuffer tighter with meat)
2) i have a little chief smoker and while i know that it will not get hot enough to achieve the internal temperatue required it does smoke well. how the hell do you get any amount of sausage in there? i tried to rig up some wire in the vent holes to hang links but they ended up all sliding together and some got smoked more than others. can you just cut the links apart and place them on the racks rather than try to hang links? also if i do cut them into individual links prior to smoking will the meat untwist the ends and ooze out?
I used several split cedar about 1/2" that i made to fit and hung the links from them so they just hung off the bottom.
3) I watched a video on you tube about sausage making and they poked the sausage casing with a pin all over prior to smoking to allow meat to breathe? Is that required? what about popping the air bubbles with a pin? I read that bacteria will form in the air pockets, should i pbe worried about this with the sausage i,ve made? I have eaten some already and it seems fine .