Servings: 4
Prep time: 20 minutes
Total time: 4 hours, plus overnight fermentation
Ingredients
1 gram FLC starter culture
½ ounce|15 ml distilled water
5 pounds|2268 grams cubed pork shoulder
1 pound|454 grams fat back cubed
½ ounce|15 grams mustard seeds
1 ¼ teaspoons|18 ml white wine vinegar
1 ¼ teaspoons|18 ml water
⅓ cup|75 grams sea salt
3 ½ tablespoons|29 grams dextrose
1 teaspoon|5 grams curing salt 1 or insta cure 1
2 tablespoons freshly ground white pepper
1 ½ tablespoons|8 grams ground black pepper
2 ½ tablespoons|11 grams ground coriander
2 tablespoons|8 grams ground chile flakes
⅓ cup|8 grams chopped fresh marjoram
1 tablespoon|6 grams mustard powder
2 teaspoons|3 grams cayenne
10 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped
14 ounces|406 grams ice
5 feet of 35mm plus hog casing
Videos by VICE
Directions
- In a small bowl, mix the starter culture with the distilled water using a fork to be sure that you do not get any clumps.
- Place the cubed shoulder and fatback into the freezer. Also, place your grinder and all its parts and the mixing bowl in to the freezer.
- In a small pan, bring the water and the vinegar to a simmer over high. Add the mustard seeds, remove from the heat, and cool.
- Once the meat is below 40°F, place it and the fat back into a large bowl along with the sea salt, dextrose, curing salt 1, white pepper, black pepper, coriander, chili flakes, marjoram, mustard powder, cayenne, garlic, and the ice. Mix well.
- Assemble your grinder. I like to grind all my meat into the mixing bowl that is rested on ice inside of another larger bowl. Grind all the meat through a medium size die one and a half times being sure that you are keeping the temperature of the meat below 45°F. If your meat gets warmer than this you’ll need to stop and place it back in the freezer.
- Place the ground meat inside of your kitchen aid mixing bowl with the paddle attachment on. Add the starter culture, distilled water, and mustard seed mixture. Mix for 4 minutes.
- Moisten the nozzle of the stuffer with water and slide the casings onto the nozzle.
- Turn on the stuffer and press some of the meat into the machine until about 1-inch of meat protrudes from the tip. Turn off the machine, pull some of the casing from the nozzle over the meat, and tie a knot at the tip, taking care to press out any air pockets. You can use a pin or cake tester to poke any small holes to release air.
- Turn the machine back on and gently press the meat through the stuffer and into the casing, coiling the sausage on your work surface, until you have used up all of the meat.
- Cut off any excess casing, pressing out air pockets, and tie a knot at the end. You can either leave your sausage as a single coil or twist it into links.
- Once you have your links you are going to want to ferment your sausages. You are going to want to put a pot of boiling water in your oven with only the pilot light on. Place your sausages in there for about 12 hours. You will want to check the PH with a calibrated meter. You will need to achieve a pH of 5.3 or less. It helps with shelf life and gives it the lactic tang that we associate with summer sausage.
- Once you have achieved your PH start your smoker with a nice steady plume of smoke. I love apple wood chips. It’s nice and buttery and hard to over-smoke your sausages. You should smoke them at about 175°F for 2 hours. Check the internal temp of your sausages you are looking to bring the internal temperature of them up to 155°F you can do this by increasing the temp in your smoker or placing them in your oven at 300°F till the 155°F has been reached.
- Cool your sausages in your fridge. Slice them into rounds, crack your favorite ice cold can of beer, get some cheddar, your fave cracker, and reflect on how damn good a sausage maker you are.
Get recipes like this and more in the Munchies Recipes newsletter. Sign up here.
