Store bought ground beef

[angel4us]

Wanted to try some ground black angus from Kroger for summer sausage. Does store bought ground beef need second grind for making summer sausage or can I just add seasoning and encapsulated citric acid and stuff away?

[Jonathon]

@angel4us When you buy ground beef from the store it has normally already been ground twice so it should be ready to use to make Summer Sausage. We recommend once through a 3/16th plate and then the second grind on a 1/8th plate. It might be difficult to tell if Kroger did a second grind at 1/8th but even if they did it twice at 3/16th that shouldn’t cause you too much difficulty, you just want to make sure you are getting good protein extraction when you are mixing it. Remember, if you are adding Encapsulated Citric Acid go right to the smokehouse after stuffing as it acts as a cure accelerator. Let us know if you have any other questions.