Newbie Requesting Information

Crazy Canuck · January 04, 2005, 02:47:36 AM

Do not see much on people using the BS for smoking sausage. If any one is doing sausage I am interested in any info on how well the BS works.[?]

JJC · January 04, 2005, 03:06:12 AM

Hi Dan,

Welcome to the Forum. I'm pretty new here too and these folks are incredibly knowledgeable and friendly! Do a search for sausage anid you will find a wealth of info on the topic, from equipment to recipes. After that, if you have any questioons, folks here will be happy to answer them. I'm planning to start doing some sausage myself soon, so we're both in the same boat.

John
Newton MA

Crazy Canuck · January 04, 2005, 03:28:25 AM

Thank-you. Contemplating either buying or building a smoker. I do a lot of Moose, Elk, Venison, and buffalo sauges. I like it fresh so smoker will have to work overtime.[;)] After reading the forums I am leaning towards the BS. Alos I live in the North and temperatures are hovering around-26 degrees celcius or -14.8 degrees F for the Southeners. May be able to gain a few degrees in the Igloo.[8D]. How does this smoker perform in the cooler temps?

BigSmoker · January 04, 2005, 01:48:10 PM

C2,
As Olds has so correctly stated before the Bradley is a refined smoker and I don't believe many if any have been able to duplicate its consistant results. That being said I have recently started making bologna and have several sausage recipes just waiting on me. I live in Georgia so extreme cold temps are rare. My experience has been to keep the temp at 120°f or less for cold smoking and bologna drying I must use ice. For temps around 150°f I just use the smoke generator and unplug the main heating element. For hot smoking I preheat the unit to high(1-2 hrs), fill the rack(s) with food then adjust temp when internal box temp stabilizes. HTH and good luck.

Jeff
www.bbqshopping.com
Some say BBQ is in your blood, if thats true my blood must be BBQ sauce.

MallardWacker · January 04, 2005, 01:55:39 PM

Where is White when you need him. If you look under White Tail Fan's posts he has alot to say about this.

SmokeOn,

mski
Perryville, Arkansas
Wooo-Pig-Soooie

If a man says he knows anything at all, he knows nothing what he aught to know. But...

tsquared · January 04, 2005, 10:21:04 PM

Welcome to another Canucklehead! We don't get the temperature extremes here on Vancouver Island you do but I know Coldsmoke(Manitoba) and Whitetailfan(Alberta) seem to smoke successfully through the winter. I've had my BS for about a month now and can't say enough good things about it.
Tom

whitetailfan · January 04, 2005, 11:58:38 PM

Welcome Canuck,
I have smoked sausage on three different occasions, varying in outside temp and a total of 5 smokers full. In my opinion the Bradley is a top-notch unit for this chore. I receive rave reviews for the sausage I smoke, and if you put a coil of John's home smoke beside a coil that the abatoir smoked, my family will grab mine first everytime.

The "pros" are smoking either not long enough, or at the wrong temp or something, because theirs is consistently tougher/chewier casings and mine snaps clean with a way better flavour. (Note my family does up 30lbs at a time and then gives me a small portion to smoke for myself therefore the comparison I speak of is directly related to the smoking procedure, there are no other variables because its the same sausage made the same batch.)

Bassman convinced me you don't need sausage sticks, but I got some for Christmas this year so I'll try them next time. I used 4 racks and you can fit 3 1-lb coils per rack (approx). Bassman used inverted racks and therefore doubled to 24 coils per cabinet full, but I have not tried that myself.

I can't think of any problems that you should be made aware of at this point Crazy. If you have any more specific questions, let em fly, we'll try and help out.

Regarding technique, I use about 3 hours of hickory. Smoke to a 155deg internal.

Welcome to the Forum

whitetailfan
"Nice Rack"
Lethbridge, AB

Oldman · January 05, 2005, 01:00:28 AM

Crazy Canuck,

First this will be a long posting, I hope it does not bore you. [;)]

I smoke a fair amount of sauage. The better half of me is Polish and I make it like my Grandfather taught me as a boy.

The guys here have given you some good advice. Rather than write out how I do sauage, I got a simple easy to learn--how to find what works best for you and your sauage idea!

Go to the store and purchase some commercial fresh sauage. Generally (at least here where I live) you can get it in several smaller loops or in one long piece.

The reason I suggest this is all of the counsel/ guidance in the world is great...however making sauage is hard work. The last thing you want is do is to learn how your Bradley is going to handle sauage using your own homemade sauage. Even with all of the years I have smoked, my first two sauage smokings in the Bradley were with store bought fresh sauage. Frankly I'm real proud I did. The first time I did not take into account the water in the bowl of the Bradley.The second time I made an adjustment in the flow of the smoke that corrected the problem.

Maybe I'm wrong about sauage being alot of work, however, this is a rough outline of what I do:

1.) Bone out my pork
2.) Grind the pork
3.) Season the pork--being very careful to spread out the seasoning in such a way that I don't overly knead the mixture and breaking up the fat pieces, while making sure the seasonings gets applied to all of the meat.
4.) Boil the pork bones with seasonings that cannot be applied in a dry state to the meat.
5.) Combine the seasoned broth with the season pork again making sure not to overly knead the meat.
6.) Refrig pork over night
7.) Clean the casing out (natural) and make sure there are no holes in them
8.) Stuff and tie off casings.

This outline is easy to read, but if you look back the meat after grinding is handled 3 times--each of those effect the texture of fat; which is something you do not want to do. I cannot not explain this but adding the seasoning that I use on the meat to the broth never works out correctly. So it has to be a two step process.

Now you can see why the first couple of times I smoked sauage in the BS I used store bought.

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Do not see much on people using the BS for smoking sausage. If any one is doing sausage I am interested in any info on how well the BS works<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

It works great. Takes hours of worrying off of you when compaired to an in-gound fire pit, that feeds the smoke though an in ground tunnel to an above ground smoke-chamber 10 feet away. The only drawback if there is one is I like Oak and the Oak from Bradley is not quite as sweet the Oak I used before--like when I would pick out tree, cut it down and age it for smoking--of course given the varying sizes of the tree/ branches etc. this process is from 9 months to 15 months. Some folks will split the tree when first cut down to even out the ageing period... My Grandfather never did. He would only split after after ageing. If I remember correctly he said, "I want to dry out the wood...not bleed the flavor out."

At my age could I make a better sauage the old way when compaired to the Bradley? Yes, but not that anyone but myself would notice. [:D] As I just said, at my age who needs all of that work. Finding the correct tree. Cut it down, ageing it, dry storing it and then spliting it....no thank you! I will just stick with the Bradley.

If you have read all of this then I hope you have figured out I'm not a pulled-pork smoker. Sorry guys no insult directed to those who smoke for pulled-pork. I'm a refined smoker and have come to believe that the best refined smokers that I have ever run across in my life are here. IMO the Bradley is the best cotton-pickin' refined smoker out there today and that is why we are here and not on some bombshell/ gas grill BBQ forum! Don't get me wrong I love a good BBQ like pork neck bones. BTW, IMO pork neck bones are far better than baby back ribs~~!

One last thing...Welcome to the Bradley family.
Olds

http://rminor.com

Crazy Canuck · January 05, 2005, 02:42:04 AM

I thank you all for your input. I have been successfully hunting for the last twenty years but only started stuffing sausage in the last five. Tried something different last year and smoked 150 lbs of moose/pork polish sausage. I'm hooked. Been using my brothers converted refrigerator to smoke. I want my own. Call me greedy, I dislike sharing my smoked bounty.[;)] Not really, but we find it hard to get the same time off. Been looking at building one but my wife God Bless Her Soul Told me to go buy one.[:D][:D][:D]
So here I am. Again thank you for your professional opions.

Chez Bubba · January 05, 2005, 03:16:26 AM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Crazy Canuck
 Again thank you for your professional opions.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">CC,

I think I can speak for most on the forum, and if I mis-speak, they are welcome to correct me. We aren't professionals, just experienced amatuers that like to share the sensation of a great smoke with a great smoker with others.[8D]

Feel the love.[:X][:0][:I][:D][:D]

Kirk

http://www.chezbubba.com
Ya think next time I check into a hotel & they ask "Smoking or Non?" they would mind?

Oldman · January 05, 2005, 03:22:56 AM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Been looking at building one but my wife God Bless Her Soul Told me to go buy one.[:D][:D][:D]
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

God you got to love a good woman. Mine said to me a few days back isn't time for you to upgrade your gaming system....Yepper nothing like a good wife.
<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">So here I am. Again thank you for your professional opions.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Now this is funny....speaking just for myself I'm no Pro...As a Pro I work with fuzzy stuff and dirt [:D][:D][:D].

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Tried something different last year and smoked 150 lbs of moose/pork polish sausage. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Was this a blending of two meats?

http://rminor.com

Crazy Canuck · January 05, 2005, 01:06:04 PM

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Oldman
 <blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Been looking at building one but my wife God Bless Her Soul Told me to go buy one.[:D][:D][:D]
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

God you got to love a good woman. Mine said to me a few days back isn't time for you to upgrade your gaming system....Yepper nothing like a good wife.
<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">So here I am. Again thank you for your professional opions.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Now this is funny....speaking just for myself I'm no Pro...As a Pro I work with fuzzy stuff and dirt [:D][:D][:D].

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Tried something different last year and smoked 150 lbs of moose/pork polish sausage. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Was this a blending of two meats?

http://rminor.com
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Polish sausage was a blend of 120lbs moose to 30lbs pork shoulder, spices and about three hours of birch smoke. Have a few good recipes for wild meat sausage. Just bought a 600 lb buffalo grain fed. Lots of meat now. [8)][8)][8)] Smoke, Smoke Smoke

MallardWacker · January 06, 2005, 09:35:02 PM

GOT MEAT? 

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Crazy Canuck
 

.....of 120lbs moose to 30lbs pork shoulder, ......Just bought a 600 lb buffalo grain fed. Lots of meat now. [8)][8)][8)] Smoke, Smoke Smoke
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Ho~ley Shla~mo~ley, got love the Low~Card Life Style. Man my mind can go wild with that much meat.

SmokeOn,

mski
Perryville, Arkansas
Wooo-Pig-Soooie

If a man says he knows anything at all, he knows nothing what he aught to know. But...