Making your own

[HC Eye Hunter]

Do any of you guys make your own burger/sausage?

The question I have is what kind of meat grinder do most of you use?

and

Do you use a mixer to mix the venison and beef?

and

How do you package your burger?

[Mike89]

I make burger and sausage, mix it all by hand. It gets cold on the hands but I seem to get it done. Any where from a 50/50 mixture to maybe even 70% venison. I use both hand grinders and a small $60.00 electric that seems to work very well. The big thing is to make sure all ingrdients are mixed very well!!!! Good luck!! Mike89

[PikeTipper]

What do most people mix in with their venison and where do they get it?

[rodbuilder]

We buy suet from the butcher shop. In fact, I think he even gave it to us for free last year. Mixed it 50/50. Losts of your favorite seasonings. We make a "breakfast sausage". Just ground meat, wrap it in white freezer paper in 1 lb packages. When you are ready to eat it, just thaw it and make it into patties and fry.

We have a hand grinder but last year we had so many deer, we rented a large electric grinder. Seemed cheap enough and really saved our cranking arm.

Good luck!

[PikeTipper]

So your burger is 50% fat? Am I getting this right? This year will be the 1st time I try grinding my own burger so I have no idea on the ratios.

[HC Eye Hunter]

I would like to make lean but fryable burger, would it work to mix in 25% of the venison weight with 80% lean beef ground burger?

Does anyone use the 1# plastic bags that the meat lockers use? How do you stuff the burger?

[P.DONA]

Our venison sausage is 3 parts venison to 1 part pork. Go to the grocery store, next time PORK BUTT is on sale, get the amount you need. bone it out, it's very easy, the bone doesn't weigh much. Keep all meat almost to the point of freezing.. Chunk up small and grind together to the desired size. Then mix it all up and grind in the smaller size plate.

Lots of recipes on the internet out there!!!! Mix it up and go for it...

We have a commercial grinder with stuffing attatchements by HOBART. I"ve heard the KITCHENAID MIXER with the grinder and sausage stuffer attatchements works well for small amounts, too.. I have the KITCHENAID MIXER with the grinder and it works well, but never tried the stuffer.

[fishermann222]

I live in a VERY remote part of Alaska. There is no place to have any sausage or anything made. Before I moved up here I worked in a butcher shop were we used to make sausage etc.. I bought a stuffer and grinder up here for processing my caribou. Right now I just ordered 60 lbs of pork fat(picnic trim its called) from a place in Anchorage and had it flown into me. I want to mix it with 80% caribou.

I want to make afew different kinds of sausages including some unsmoked brats. Can anyone help me out with some starter recipies? I wish I rmembered them from the butcher shop but as a youngster I did not think it was one of the more important things to remmber

Any help is GREATLY apprecaited

[Mike89]

I would go no less than 50% deer, or why would you want any less? Unless you don't care for deer taste. If that is the case when your trim the meat be sure there is no fat at all on it. That is the bad taste, period!!! As for suet, not me. Pork butts are a great thing to get and bone out for grinding. I use very lean ground pork, in other words just enough fat for taste and frying. You can also use ground beef to, that works very well too! Hope this helps you!! Mike89

Almost forgot, I use a vacuum sealer that uses regular bags. Not a food saver brand either!! They can can use only there own bags. Also good freezer paper works to, One other thing I have seen done plastic wrap it and then paper wrap it. I like my sealer the best!! Good luck!!

[Jason Boser]

I bought a grinder on HSOList last year 99 dollars and it is pretty heavy duty we grind up our own and mix pork butt we have mixed up hambergur too it is also good I like the 30 to 40% pork and it still dont have no grease in it.

Jason

[Mike89]

That's a mix I like to, 30 to 40% What I usually try to do is 2/3 to 1/3. Seems to work for us and as I said before trim all the fat off!!!!!! Mike89

[PikeTipper]

Do you go to a grocery store or a butcher to buy pork butt? Do I just walk up and ask them for a pork butt? Will I get arrested for trying to solicit an overweight prostitute?

[HC Eye Hunter]

Mike,

The words didn't come out right on paper. What I am trying to do with the burger is mix the venison with 25- 30% percent of 80% lean beef so I am not just adding fat. What we are looking at in the end is a mix 75% venison 25% beef. The goal is to be able to fry it and have no or very little fat left in the pan.

Do you think this mix is still to lean for frying?

[HC Eye Hunter]

Pike,

Asking a butcher if has any pork butt for sale is usually acceptable. Asking a police officer if knows of any place to buy some choice pork butt will get you arreseted.

[HawgTide]

Sam's club has the best deal (and Quality) for Pork Butts(AKA Pork Shoulders, Boston Butts) They sell them in a cryovaced two pack (around 15lbs). Just ask the butcher for it if you don't see it in the case.

[P.DONA]

Yep, the 2 pack cryovak pork butt is the way to go. But, sometimes Supermarkets will have them less expensive than Sams has.. Right now in Ct, I saw the whole pork butt on sale at grocery stores for $1.69 / lb. That's a little high. Last year I've seen .99 cents/lb .. the Pork market fluxuates, too..

What's it out in your woods, guys ???

[Mike89]

H C, now that makes sence!! That should not be to bad a mix. You could even go with an 80% lean ground beef, and still be real happy!!! That's because you have the deer trimmed better than beef would be so the extra fat will help the frying and flavor for those bacon cheese burgers!!! I'll be cooking some this weekend!! Mike

[catfish1]

We grind most of the deer and mix with pork sausage about 3lb deer to 1lb pork. To that we add a large table spoon of sage and one large table spoon of cayenne pepper. After mixing all together we let it set for a couple hours to let the seasoning work though it. Then package in one pound packs. Great for deer chiles or patties, And works good on the grill.

Catfish1

[Scenic]

New to the sausage stuffing this year I have done some experimenting here too. Instead of beef fat I found boneless beef chuck roasts on sale and mixed it 80/20 venison/beef. It seems that there was enough fat in the beef chuck to hold everything together but yet not be greasy and it turned out great.

We made both summer sausage and brats. We mixed all our seasonings with the meat, ground it up together, then ground it once again as it was going into the casings. We then let it sit over night to cure before placing it in the smoker. The smoker was set at approximately 170-180 degrees. After one hour of the meat drying I added a large pan of wet maple sawdust.

I continued to smoke/cook this sausage in the smoker until the internal meat temps reached 125 degrees. At this time I placed the smoked sausage in a 170 degree water bath until the internal temp of the meat reached 160. We then removed the meat and sprayed it with cold water until it was cool to the touch. After that I then let it sit at room temp until cool.

After it was cool we then vacuum packed them in 4" wide bags and froze what was not being used right away. I will note that it is amazing how much was “sampled” before freezing.

This method turned out great for me and I found this is actually a lot of fun. Good eating too!!

Jeff

[Mike89]

Jeff, I have only one question. Why don't you leave the product in the smoker until you reach your desired temperature? And you only have to reach 158 for pathogen reduction not 160. Also beef chuck is a good choise. Just wondering, Mike89.

[Scenic]

Mike,

I got the idea from a couple of commercial sausage makers to do the water bath. This is how they do it so I thought I would try it. I found that the sausage is moister then if left in the smoker until it has reached the proper temperature and the biggest reason is that it speeds the process up a lot too. For the summer sausage it is about 20-25 minutes and for the brats/polish it was about 10-15.

I realize you only need to reach that 158 but I just use the 160 so I know it is plenty done. And...I can see the 160 better on my thermometer...LOL

Jeff

[Mike89]

Jeff, I understand what you are doing and have done it too. I was mostly curious as to why!! No matter how it's done it's always good!! Have you ever taken a hind and cured it with a ham cure and smoked it? If not you don't know what you are missing!!! Mike

[Scenic]

Mike,

I did that to a venison hind quarter last year and it was really good. I am hoping to do that again this season too. I have been smoking fish, meats and making jerky for a several years but this is the first year I have made stuffed style sausage. A couple years ago I did a whole hog (not a large one) in the ham brine and smoked it. It took some time but turned out great.

I had a friend of mine build me a smoker out of 1/8th” steel so I was sure to have it large enough. Well it turned out large enough to say the least! Now I just need to find more time to use it!

Jeff

[Mike89]

Jeff, you will have fun with the stuffed sausage game! The different things and spices you can do are endless! Been doing different kinds off and on for awhile now. GOOD LUCK!! Mike

[Scenic]

Yes it is a lot of fun.

Thanks,

Jeff