Summer sauage length of smoking time question

[Gman74]

neighbour and I will be doing a batch of the summer sausage exactly as the Bradley Savoury Summer sausage recpie listed here http://www.bradleysmoker.com/hickory-bisquette-recipes.asp#8

Our question is, the recipe says to smoke/coke for 4-5 hours, does that mean we smoke it for that many hours for should we only smoke for 2-2.5hours?

Reason I ask is we did some indian candy before which advised to smoke/cookr ofr 6-12 hours depending on preference so we put in enought pucks for 8 hours and someone commented we should've onlty smoker for maybe 3 hours tops.

Any feedback or suggestion is appreciated.

Thanks.

Cheers G.

[OU812]

Gman
When doing summer sausage I do 18 lb at a time. In casings though. When I start let the sausage hang at room temp for 1 hr wile the smoker is warming up to 140 F then put in the sausage and watch the cabnet temp till it gets to 120 F and reset the smoker temp to 120 F and hold that temp for 1 hr with no smoke then turn the temp up to 130 F with the smoke rolling for another hr then turn up to 140 F for 1 hr then up the temp to 150 for another hr. (That's a total of 3 hr smoke.) Then bump the temp up to 160 for 1 hr and then up to 170 and hold that temp till the IT is 156 F for at least 1 min.

With a load this size and this cook routine it takes about 10 hr to finish and only the first 3 hr with smoke and the rest of the time is cooking.

I no this sounds like a lot of hassle but if you turn the heat up to fast the outer surface will cook much faster than the inside and the sausage will be crumbly on the surface and mush on the inside also if to high of temp you will render out the fat and fat is what keeps the sausage moist. The reason for the first hr with no smoke is the sausage will swet for a wile when you first put it in and smoke wont penetrate the swet.

Hope this made sense.

[smokeitall]

OU812 has you pointed in the right direction, that is exactly how I do it.  If you get it too hot or cook it too fast if will not turn out like you want it to.

[Jinglis]

Okay, so I'm right there with Gman, what do we do once it's done cooking?  I mean I haven't used any casings as the recipe didn't specify any, just got ground beef rolled in to rolls 2" in diameter wide and 6 inches long. 

Do we have to let it set and cool before trying a piece?  Do we have to let it cool before putting it in freezer? What is the reason for putting it in the freezer and what should we wrap it in?

Thanks in advance,

Cheers,
Jinglis

[NePaSmoKer]

Maybe i can help.

What kind of summer sausage are ya'll trying to make.


nepas

[Jinglis]

The exact samke summer sausage recipe above that Gman mentioned, the bradley savoury summer sausage.

Thanks, in advance

Cheers,
Jinglis

[NePaSmoKer]

Ok i make loads of different kinds of sausage.

Never start your smoker at 200* or you will fat out the sausage.

Pre heat your smoker to 130* when it is at this temp load you sausage on the top shelf. Keep it there for 1.5 hrs until the casing gets tacky. If not using casings roll into logs about 3" in girth and 10" long. Bump the heat in 10* increments every hour. Dont exceed 180*

Start smoke when after the first hour. Use whatever wood you want and only smoke for 2 hours (6 pucks)

You want your sausage to get an IT of 152*

Making summer sausage without casings is different than making with casings. Whichever you make your going to need cure #1 for 5lb of meat you need 1tsp of cure, not the 5 like they are saying. Summer sausage is 80% beef and 20% pork. However you can use all beef 75/15 or 80/20.

nepas