Summer Sausage - 11/3/97

Summer Sausage

In spite of the name, most household sausage is made in the autumn when hunters process their game. The sausage seasonings tend to mask strong game flavors and hunters enjoy having sausage to share with others; perhaps as a bribe to listen to the hunting story? Meat from deer and elk is extremely lean and makes a dry, crumbly sausage, however when it is combined with other meats such as beef or pork, or if beef suet is added, game based sausage is good.

To make sausage at home, you need a food grinder. Food processors chop it too finely and a mushy sausage results. If you have a sausage stuffer with a casing attachment, that is ideal, but summer sausage can be hand shaped or molded in soup cans.

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Summer Sausage Recipe

The following is adapted from Oregon State University Cooperative Extension's publication SP-50-735.

For 1 pound of Meat
1 1/2 tsp Morton's Tender Quick Curing Salt
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1/2 tsp coarse black pepper
1/2 tsp mustard seed
1/4 tsp hickory smoked salt or liquid smoke
Food Grinder
Meat Thermometer

For 5 pounds of Mea
2 Tb Morton's Tender Quick Curing Salt
2 1/2 tsp garlic salt
2 1/2 tsp coarse black pepper
2 1/2 tsp mustard seed
1 tsp hickory smoked salt or liquid smoke
Food Grinder
Meat Thermometer

Mix all the spices together and sprinkle evenly over meat as you mix it. It's best to use your hands for mixing.

Place the mixture in a covered mixing bowl or large plastic bag. Refrigerate for at least 24 hours. This is necessary for the curing salts to have an effect on the meat. Re-mix the meat at least once during this curing time.

Shape the sausage. You can use a sausage stuffer and follow manufacturer's directions. You can shape the sausages by hand. You can use a soup can (10 1/2 oz) to shape the sausage. Spray the soup can with cooking spray or lightly oil them so the sausage is easily removed after shaping. It is important for safety that the diameter of the sausage be less than 3 inches for adequate heat penetration.

There are several ways to cook the sausage, but only standard oven cooking is covered here. Consult your smoker, pressure saucepan, or convection oven's owner's manual for their special instructions. Place the sausage rolls on a rack over an oven-proof pan; a broiling pan is ideal. Bake in a preheated 200F oven for 3 to 5 hours for until the centermost portion of the sausage reaches 155F for safety. For a drier sausage or a sausage with a more cooked flavor, continue cooking until the center temperature is 165F. It is possible to cook the sausage directly in the soup cans which are loosely covered with foil for a moist sausage. When the sausage is done, it is removed from the cans and placed on paper towels to absorb fat.

Cool thoroughly on a rack then wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 2 to 3 weeks or freeze to keep for 2 to 3 months. Frozen summer sausage will keep safely longer, but the quality deteriorates.

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