Content
- 1 Benefits of making homemade cold smoked sausage
- 2 How to make homemade cold smoked sausage
- 3 Selection and preparation of ingredients
- 4 Cold smoked beef and pork sausage
- 5 Homemade cold smoked sausage with ginger
- 6 DIY cold-smoked smoky sausage
- 7 Cold smoked Krakow sausages
- 8 Useful tips
- 9 Storage rules
- 10 Conclusion
Many people like cold smoked sausage more than boiled or boiled-smoked sausage. In stores it is presented in a very wide assortment, but it is quite possible to prepare the delicacy yourself. This will require special equipment, high-quality products and a lot of time, but the result is worth the effort.
Benefits of making homemade cold smoked sausage
Homemade cold-smoked sausage compares favorably with store-bought sausage in the following ways:
- independent selection of raw materials allows you to control the freshness and quality of meat and lard;
- there is an opportunity to “experimentally” choose the optimal combination of ingredients, spices and their proportions;
- the finished product is completely natural, while the purchased product inevitably contains preservatives, dyes, and flavors.
To prepare homemade sausage using a cold method, you don’t even have to have a special smokehouse and smoke generator. Although, of course, for a beginner this is the best option. Experienced specialists can cook sausage even in a homemade smoking cabinet. But in this case, the process must be constantly monitored.
How to make homemade cold smoked sausage
Preparation of any product by cold smoking requires strict adherence to technology. If you allow deviations from the algorithm, you will not be able to achieve full readiness and destroy pathogenic microflora. And in the latter case, cold smoked sausage will be hazardous to health.
Cooking technology
The cold smoking method involves treating the product in the smoking cabinet with low-temperature smoke. It is formed due to the smoldering of sawdust located at the bottom under the influence of minimal draft and practically without air access.
When cold smoking it is more convenient to use a smoke generator
Processing temperature is within 18-22°C. Trying to speed up the process by lifting it is a bad idea. In this case, cold smoked sausage will not work, it will simply be cooked.
Selection and preparation of ingredients
The taste of the finished cold smoked sausage directly depends on the high quality of raw materials. Offal is absolutely not suitable for it; you only need fresh (not frozen) meat. For homemade sausage, it is not taken from the youngest animals - otherwise, due to insufficient density and richness of taste, the sausage will turn out watery.
The part of the carcass also matters. The best beef for homemade cold smoked sausage is from the back half (except for the shanks), pork - from the shoulders, sides, and brisket.Fresh meat is pink-red, without a “rainbow” or greenish tint.
Suitable lard for cold smoked sausage is from the neck or back of the carcass. First, it is left for 2-3 days in a cool room at a temperature of 8-10°C.
The best casing is natural casing, not collagen casing. It is more convenient to buy it in a store. There it undergoes special processing and undergoes calibration. Cold smoked sausage can be stored for a long time, so the best option for it is beef intestines, they are stronger and thicker
Pre-processing of meat for cold smoked sausage involves dividing it by grade and removing cartilage, veins, tendons, film membranes, and layers of fat that “grow” inside. Also remove those parts that turn into jelly or glue during heat treatment.
How and how much to smoke cold smoked sausage
You need to smoke cold smoked sausage in a smokehouse for 2-3 days, the first 8 hours continuously. Sometimes the process lasts for 6-7 days, in exceptional cases it can be longer – 8-14 days. This depends on the size of the sausages themselves, their number in the smokehouse, and the dimensions of the smoking cabinet.
Since it is impossible to determine exactly how long to smoke cold-smoked sausage over time, readiness is assessed visually. On the outside, the shell takes on a yellowish-brown tint, while the meat on the inside becomes very dark red. The surface is dry; when you try to compress it, it only dents slightly, leaving no marks.
During the cold smoking process, meat is dehydrated as much as possible.There is almost no moisture in it, only fat. It acquires a characteristic taste and is saturated with the aroma of smoke and smoking substances.
Smoke enters the smoking cabinet from a smoke generator or through a long (4-5 m) pipe from a fire or barbecue. Only in this case will it have time to cool down to the required temperature.
Cold smoked beef and pork sausage
Required:
- pork tenderloin (not too fatty) – 1.6 kg;
- pork belly – 1.2 kg;
- lean beef pulp – 1.2 kg;
- nitrite salt – 75 g;
- ground allspice and black pepper - 1 tsp each.
It is prepared like this:
- Trim fat from pork and set aside temporarily. Cut it and the beef into portions and pass through a meat grinder with a large wire rack.
- Pour nitrite salt into the minced meat, knead for 15-20 minutes, put in the refrigerator for a day.
- Freeze the lard and brisket in the freezer, cut into cubes 5-6 mm in size.
- Add pepper to the minced meat, knead well again, pass through a meat grinder with a fine grid, add lard and brisket. Stir until they are distributed evenly.
- Stuff the shells as tightly as possible with minced meat and hang them to settle. Maintain the temperature at about 10°C for the first 5-6 hours, raise it to 16-18°C for the next 7-8 hours.
- Throw a couple of handfuls of wood chips at the bottom of the smoking cabinet and hang the sausages. Connect a smoke generator or light a fire in the grill and smoke until done.
You can’t eat homemade cold-smoked sausage right away; the meat is still raw inside. To complete the process, it is left for 3-4 weeks in a cool, dry (10-15°C) room with good ventilation, but without drafts.If mold appears on the shell, it is washed in a strong (100 g/l) saline solution and drying continues.
Homemade cold smoked sausage with ginger
Required ingredients:
- lean pork – 2 kg;
- lean beef – 0.6 kg;
- pork belly – 0.6 kg;
- lard – 0.5 kg;
- nitrite salt – 40 g;
- ground pink pepper or paprika – 20 g;
- ginger and dry marjoram - 5 g each.
How to cook sausage:
- Scroll the chopped meat in a meat grinder through a large mesh grill.
- Add nitrite salt and all the spices, knead thoroughly, and keep in the refrigerator for a day.
- Freeze the lard, cut into cubes 5-6 mm in size, add to the minced meat, stir well.
- Stuff the shells to the required length with minced meat.
The further process is similar to that described above. The “semi-finished product” also requires sediment before smoking and drying after it.
DIY cold-smoked smoky sausage
Necessary:
- lean pork – 2.5 kg;
- beef – 4.5 kg;
- pork fat – 3 kg;
- nitrite salt – 80 g;
- garlic – 2-3 cloves;
- sugar – 20 g;
- ground black or red pepper – 10 g.
Preparing cold smoked sausage:
- Cut the meat into large pieces, cover with salt, and place in the freezer for 5 days.
- Freeze the lard and chop into cubes 5-6 mm in size. Also freeze for 5 days.
- Grind the meat through a meat grinder, add lard and spices, knead thoroughly, and put in the refrigerator for 3 days.
- Stuff the intestines tightly with minced meat.
Important! The settling of the “semi-finished product” here takes longer – 5-7 days.
Cold smoked Krakow sausages
To prepare you will need:
- medium fat pork – 1.5 kg;
- lean beef – 1 kg;
- pork belly – 1 kg;
- garlic – 3-4 cloves;
- nitrite salt – 70 g;
- glucose – 6 g;
- any seasoning for meat (only from natural ingredients) - to taste.
DIY cold-smoked Krakow sausage recipe:
- Trim all the fat from the pork.
- Grind the lean meat in a meat grinder with a large grid.
- Knead the minced meat together with nitrite salt and keep it in the refrigerator for a day.
- Add the remaining spices and chopped garlic, mix thoroughly. Pass through a fine sieve in a meat grinder.
- Keep the trimmed lard and brisket in the freezer for a couple of hours, cut into small cubes, and mix with minced meat.
- Stuff the casings, form the sausages, and hang them to settle overnight at room temperature.
Important! To monitor the temperature during cold smoking, it is recommended to insert a thermometer probe into one of the sausages.
Useful tips
Any culinary process has its own important nuances. Cold smoking sausage is no exception:
- To emphasize the taste and aroma of the finished product, you can add ground cloves to the minced meat to taste. Coriander seeds and star anise are also good, but these are “not for everyone” spices;
- to flavor the smoke, add a couple of handfuls of dry mint leaves, coriander seeds, and 1-2 juniper sprigs to the wood chips;
- If you smoke the product in cool weather, it will last longer. The pattern is not obvious, but it is true;
- a positive result depends on both the intensity and constancy of the flame. It is recommended to start cold smoking by treating it with weak smoke and then gradually “thickening” it;
- When tying sausage loaves, you need to pull them as tightly as possible. This will help compact the minced meat into the casing as much as possible.
Storage rules
Homemade sausage prepared in this way will last in the refrigerator for 3-4 weeks if the casing is not damaged. The shelf life of slices is reduced to 12-15 days. It is recommended to wrap it in foil, wax paper, or cling film.
It can be kept in the freezer for up to six months. Here, on the contrary, it is recommended to store cold smoked sausage in sliced form, packaged in small portions in airtight containers or ziplock bags. Defrost it gradually, first putting it in the refrigerator for 3-5 hours, then finishing the process at room temperature. Repeated freezing is unacceptable.
Conclusion
Cold smoked sausage, prepared at home, has an excellent taste. Indeed, unlike what is sold in stores, the “homemade” delicacy is completely natural and does not contain harmful chemicals. However, the result will correspond to the desired one only if you follow the cold smoking technology, and you cannot do without knowing some important nuances.
I think for cold smoking, especially if the sausage is cooked in cold weather, sodium nitride is not needed at all.And it is valuable not only for its taste and smell, but also for the absence of any artificial additives and preservatives. And you suggest using nitride salt, that is, a mixture of salt and sodium nitride. You probably noticed, and many others did, that if you cut regular store-bought smoked sausage into circles and leave it on the table without even covering it, it doesn’t even spoil, it just dries out. I think it's from an excess of this sodium nitride. The smoking temperature should be significantly lower than the melting point of lard. And this temperature, combined with a long smoking period, not only allows smoke to penetrate into all pores, but also dries out the sausage, which significantly increases shelf life. I can’t give you the exact shelf life, because we kept it at home for no more than a month. And if it weren’t for the mother’s control, the shelf life would not even last up to a week.