Sausage Making (4 page)

There's not a lot of fat in liver and it is high in protein, but it doesn't have the same liquid-holding properties as lean pork or beef, and therefore is most commonly used in conjunction with these meats, along with additional fat and eggs or cream. Liver is good as a supporting ingredient, as it contributes a lot of flavor. Heart and kidneys are a nice addition. Heart contains some fat (about 5 percent by weight) but kidneys are very lean.

Bread and rice are both added to sausages as filler, to stretch a small amount of meat further. Cajun-style boudin sausage
(see page 98)
often contains rice, which gives the sausage a nice texture. Bread is a great binder and can be used in place of flour, because it also adds flavor.

What follows is a complete guide to making sausage, beginning with raw meat and ending with finished links. This process is essentially the same no matter what type of sausage you are making, and we cross-reference it throughout the book.

STEP 1:
Cut the meat into easy-to-handle pieces. Trim any sinew, blood clots, bone fragments, and glands—anything that you don't want to eat—from the meat and fat and cut the meat into 1-in/2.5-cm cubes (or a size slightly smaller than the opening of your meat grinder). Keep your workstation and tools clean to avoid cross-contamination.

STEP 2:
Open-freeze the meat. Spread it in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet or dinner plate and place in the freezer, uncovered, for 30 to 60 minutes, until the surface of the meat is crunchy to the touch and the interior is very cold but not frozen solid.

Place the grinder and dies in the refrigerator and refrigerate until very cold (don't put in the freezer to chill, or the meat will stick to the grinder).

Maintaining the best temperature is critical in sausage making; if your ingredients are well chilled, they will combine better and more easily. Cleanly ground meat will absorb more liquid and more fat, both of which are essential to flavorful sausage.

STEP 3:
Nest an empty bowl in a larger bowl filled with ice and assemble the clean, chilled grinder. We use a
³
/
₁₆
-in/4-mm die for every sausage, unless otherwise specified.

Remove the meat from the freezer, turn on the grinder, and drop the meat one piece at a time into the feed tube.

Let the auger grab each piece of meat and bring it forward toward the blade and through the grinding plate into the chilled bowl. Don't overload the feed tube and start shoving the meat down with the pusher, which will cause the meat to heat up, preventing a clean grind.

The meat should come through the grinder cleanly, in distinct extrusions.

If it is looking mushy or smeared, stop the grinder and inspect the blade and die for pieces of tangled sinew. This smearing can also be a sign that your meat has become too warm, in which case you should return it (as well as any meat you've already ground) to the freezer or refrigerator until chilled. Continue grinding until all of the meat has been processed.

STEP 4:
Once all of the meat has been ground, drop one or two ice cubes into the grinder feed tube, which will help push out any meat remaining in the feed tube or wrapped around the auger.

STEP 5:
To make the farce, begin by measuring out all your add-in ingredients.