Curlys Sausage Kitchen

[Grainbelt]

It's time to make sticks and summer sausage. Got my order in last evening. Has anyone tried the Cody sticks? I got that and Peppered, Teriyaki, Tex Mex. All new to me, in the past I've used the ground formed bacon for the base flavor and different ratio's of pork to the beef or venison, garlic and mustard seeds. Very tasty but I want to mix it up. I also got the summer sausage seasoning  to build 25 pounds of chubs and smoke em'. Prime ice fishing season is coming up and I need to build our snack arsenal. 

[ThunderLund78]

Cody's is my personal favorite standard stick mix that I've tried so far and Curley's as a whole is top-notch - I don't think you'll be disappointed. Truly delicious as it is and very customizable to your liking with cheese, jalepenos, extra garlic, etc.  Next time I get some, I'm gonna try using beer instead of water as my liquid.  Unfortunately, no deer for me this year so I guess I'm buying my meat.

[Grainbelt]

Mmm beer! Good Idea!

[Jim Almquist]

Everything I have made with Curly's seasonings has been great. Adding extras always gives it your special touch of flavor. I like mustard seed and a touch of citric acid in my summer sausage. I add mustard seeds and whole peppercorns to my salami. Mustard seeds to my old fashions franks and a little heat to my polish brats. Soon i have to give the sticks a try.

[delcecchi]

For those adventuresome souls, I have several books about making sausage that have the recipes for seasonings in them.   I'll be happy to post recipes for any you are interested in....   They are ebooks.

[Thunderbird]

Jim, I like your idea of adding extra ingredients to sausage. I disagree with adding citric acid for a tangy taste.The tang can be naturally achieved by using meat starter culture LHP. You mix about a teaspoon of starter with water and mix it in at the end when all the other ingredients have been mixed in. You then stuff the sausage and let it sit in a 95F. oven or smoker for 10 to 12 hours. Smoke at 150F.- 170F. for about 8 hours. You can kick the heat up to 200F. the last hour or two to speed things up.Once you get the hang of it you will be one happy sausage meister.

[Jim Almquist]

17 hours ago, delcecchi said:

For those adventuresome souls, I have several books about making sausage that have the recipes for seasonings in them.   I'll be happy to post recipes for any you are interested in....   They are ebooks.

 

Del,

I quit making sausage the first time because I was never happy with the taste of any of my products using recipes from books. i feel they leave out the key spices that give your product flavor. In the long run it is much cheaper and tastier using spices like Curly's.

 

Thunderbird,

I just don't want to spend a entire day making sausage when the results from citric acid work perfect for me. Add 1 teaspoon right before you put into casing and make sure the sausage gets to 155 is much easier and less time consuming. Your way make taste better but the thought of starting at 6 in the morning and finishing at 8 at night takes all the fun right out of a hobby. 

[Thunderbird]

I put the sausage in a smoker or oven on low and let it cure all night. I smoke the sausage in the morning.

[KEN W]

Jim.......I looked at Curley's and don't see any Citric Acid.

[PurpleFloyd]

Try Walton's. I would also recommend trying their Tons summer sausage mix. I preferred the taste over the Curly's and I believe they are cheaper. I buy bulk and then break them down to smaller batch sizes.

https://www.waltonsinc.com/encapsulated-citric-acid

https://www.waltonsinc.com/ton-s-summer-unit

Edited November 20, 2016 by PurpleFloyd

[Jim Almquist]

38 minutes ago, KEN W said:

Jim.......I looked at Curley's and don't see any Citric Acid.

 

I believe I bought mine from P & S Seasonings

 

PurpleFloyd,

I see that Walton's has the mustard seeds right in the mix. Just might have to give them a try for a batch.

[delcecchi]

7 hours ago, Jim Almquist said:

 

Del,

I quit making sausage the first time because I was never happy with the taste of any of my products using recipes from books. i feel they leave out the key spices that give your product flavor. In the long run it is much cheaper and tastier using spices like Curly's.

 

Thunderbird,

I just don't want to spend a entire day making sausage when the results from citric acid work perfect for me. Add 1 teaspoon right before you put into casing and make sure the sausage gets to 155 is much easier and less time consuming. Your way make taste better but the thought of starting at 6 in the morning and finishing at 8 at night takes all the fun right out of a hobby. 

 

Some of the books have recipes that are supposedly more authentic, for what that is worth, and others have more exotic recipes.   Price is right, for anyone interested, even just for fun reading.  

 

Also source and freshness of spices is very important.   The stuff at the supermarket can be pretty sad.

Edited November 20, 2016 by delcecchi

[KEN W]

OK......I have used quite a few summer sausage and salami seasonings. Summer sausage is supposed to have a fermenter in it to make for a tangy taste. If you look at commercially made summer sausage that says "tangy", it has citric acid or a milk fermenter listed in the ingredients. 

 

I always add powdered milk to my sausage recipes including summer sausage and salami. And have added powdered buttermilk instead to a summer sausage mix to try and get that tangy taste. I have yet to find a "summer sausage" seasoning mix that has that fermented taste.

 

Many summer sausage seasonings have what I consider a salami taste.......Garlic, smoke, and peppercorn taste. I always add more garlic.  That is salami not summer sausage. Has anyone found a summer sausage seasoning that has citric acid or fermento in it already to give it a tangy taste?

 

I have ordered from PS Seasonings, Waltons, Curley's. Allied Kenco, Sausage Maker,and Eldon's. Their seasonings are all the same because they don't mix them. They all come from Excalibur Seasonings. So I always order from the one that is cheaper with the size I want and with shipping added. If you want to see all the various seasonings......PS Seasoning has by far the most different mixes

Edited November 21, 2016 by KEN W

[Lip_Ripper Guy]

1 hour ago, KEN W said:

OK......I have used quite a few summer sausage and salami seasonings. Summer sausage is supposed to have a fermenter in it to make for a tangy taste. If you look at commercially made summer sausage that says "tangy", it has citric acid or a milk fermenter listed in the ingredients. 

 

I always add powdered milk to my sausage recipes including summer sausage and salami. And have added powdered buttermilk instead to a summer sausage mix to try and get that tangy taste. I have yet to find a "summer sausage" seasoning mix that has that fermented taste.

 

Many summer sausage seasonings have what I consider a salami taste.......Garlic, smoke, and peppercorn taste. I always add more garlic.  That is salami not summer sausage. Has anyone found a summer sausage seasoning that has citric acid or fermento in it already to give it a tangy taste?

 

I have ordered from PS Seasonings, Waltons, Curley's. Allied Kenco, Sausage Maker,and Eldon's. Their seasonings are all the same because they don't mix them. They all come from Excalibur Seasonings. So I always order from the one that is cheaper with the size I want and with shipping added. If you want to see all the various seasonings......PS Seasoning has by far the most different mixes

I'm also after that fermented taste.  I've had really great luck with seasonings from Louie's Finer Meats in Cumberland, WI.  I may give them a whirl this year for summer sausage seasoning.

[PurpleFloyd]

21 hours ago, Jim Almquist said:

 

I believe I bought mine from P & S Seasonings

 

PurpleFloyd,

I see that Walton's has the mustard seeds right in the mix. Just might have to give them a try for a batch.

I think you will be impressed. It's the best blend I have come across yet. 

[PurpleFloyd]

Just as a FYI with the citric acid.

 

The kind I have been using is encapsulated which means it has a coating over it similar to what they use for gel aspirin. The coating dissolves at something like 135 degrees.  

You cannot add it in the seasoning mix and you cannot run it through the grinder. Also, don't use the citric acid they sell for canning. Make sure it is encapsulated.

 

The way I do it is to have everything ground and the seasonings completely mixed, then add the ECA and mix for about another minute or so then immediately stuff and smoke. It is imperative you hit the minimum temp so make sure the I.T is a minimum of 145 degrees. You also need to smoke immediately. It cannot sit for a few days like cultures or buttermilk. If you don't follow the steps properly you can wreck the batch. It's not complicated but it has specific steps to do. I think it does help give that tangy flavor although maybe not as good as culturing. 

1 hour ago, Lip_Ripper Guy said:

I'm also after that fermented taste.  I've had really great luck with seasonings from Louie's Finer Meats in Cumberland, WI.  I may give them a whirl this year for summer sausage seasoning.

I might have to stop there next time through and check that out. They used to have a certain bar that I would stop at every time through but that has closed long ago so now it's the DQ or nothing.

[delcecchi]

I posted a chapter about fermented sausage in a new topic...

 

Looks sort of a job to do the real fermented thing.... but folks did it all the time in the old country so maybe not that bad.  

 

Let me know if you find it interesting,  

[PurpleFloyd]

I spent a few days in the black forest of Germany and got to visit a few old world sausage makers and it was amazing. They use a lot of pine and juniper for woods and they leave things hanging for months to cure. The smell of the smoke house is darn near intoxicating. 

Everything there is cold smoked rather than with heat like most hobbyists in the states use. I have been kicking around building a cold smoker myself and will some day but for now I am just sticking with the electric smoker and doing what I can. 

[KEN W]

You can cold smoke in your electric smoker using a Smoke N Tube. I do it and it works just fine. Smoke with hardly any heat.

[Grainbelt]

16 hours ago, PurpleFloyd said:

I spent a few days in the black forest of Germany and got to visit a few old world sausage makers and it was amazing. They use a lot of pine and juniper for woods and they leave things hanging for months to cure. The smell of the smoke house is darn near intoxicating. 

Everything there is cold smoked rather than with heat like most hobbyists in the states use. I have been kicking around building a cold smoker myself and will some day but for now I am just sticking with the electric smoker and doing what I can. 

Is pine and juniper their preference or is it the most abundant available wood? 

[PurpleFloyd]

1 hour ago, Grainbelt said:

Is pine and juniper their preference or is it the most abundant available wood? 

It's basically those are what was available at the time and now it's tradition.

 

[Grainbelt]

Cody snack sticks are very tasty. Time to wrap them up for Thanksmas gifts. We have family going south for the winter so we combine the two holidays.

[Jim Almquist]

Great looking batch of sticks !!

[Grainbelt]

Thanks Jim!

[Grainbelt]

Well the teriyaki sticks are very good, I made them to Curlys recipe but with powdered milk (RH1) and more water to compensate. Then I made the pepper sticks but instead of water I used Grainbelt Nordeast, close to three bottles for a ten pound batch. I also added powdered milk, minced garlic from a jar and mustard seed.  What a great flavor! These mixes are proving to be tasty. 

 

I'm smoking 3 loins of canadian bacon on Saturday. 

 

Come on ice!