Here’s a couple possible future topic ideas:
How to properly sharpen/care for knives. I’ve never really understood how to use a steel properly. Could also talk about how to use different styles of knives.
Maintenance of stuffers and grinders. How to properly clean them, oil them. Any other maintenance tricks/tips.

I also have been using my time at home to do some meat processing. I did 12 lbs of Bloody Mary snack sticks and 12 lbs of Hatch Green Chili brats this week. For both I used 7.5 lbs venison, 3 lbs pork shoulder, and 1.5 lb pork fat. I added 1oz carrot fiber to the brats. To the sticks I added 2oz carrot fiber and 2oz ECA.
The Hatch green chili is my new favorite brat flavor. I did half with hi-temp cheddar. Awesome!
The Bloody Mary Snack Sticks turned out great, but still can’t beat Willie’s. This was my second time using the hot water bath method. That’s the way to do it! I use a bull rack with my Jim Bowie GMG and can get all sticks on 3 trays without crowding. Smoked for 5 hours rotating trays every 30 minutes. Then into electric roaster with water at 170 for about 1 hour. Ice bath and then set out to dry for about an hour, then in the fridge for about 24 hours.
My first time using the hot water bath, I didn’t watch it and didn’t realize how quick it would finish. My water temp jumped to 185. Stick internal temp was at about 174 before I realized it. It seemed I had a little fatting out, and the sticks kind of plumped causing a different texture on that batch. This batch was perfect though.

I don’t think I’ve seen it mentioned on here before, so here is my little Meat Hack. Do any of you use an electric hand mixer to pull pork? I think it is the easiest way.
After smoking a Boston butt to 195 degrees, I let it rest for a couple hours. Then I use my hands to separate out the larger sections of meat to a bowl and discard the larger chunks of fat. I will usually use a knife to cut the longer meat fibers into more bite size lengths. Then, I use the hand mixer to pull. It does not take more than about 10 seconds with the mixer.
This technique works well with other pulled meats too, like chicken.

It gives me anxiety every time I vacuum seal any liquidy product (marinade, fruit, etc.) using my non-chambered vacuum sealer. I absolutely hate the idea of sucking up the liquid into my sealer…often times without getting as much vacuum as I’d like to get in my bag. And, cleaning this liquid out of my sealer is not fun either. I’m certain there are other good ways, but I saw Steven Rinella on a video one time, roll up a large wad of paper towels and place them above the liquid and below the point of seal all the way across the opening of the seal bag. Then, when he vacuum sealed, it created at least somewhat of a barrier to the liquid being sucked up into the sealer, while still allowing air to be sucked out. It is not perfect, but I’ve used this with some success! I’m open to other suggestions on this. Please share.

Cleaning out the freezer before Dove season opens tomorrow. Can’t wait for the fall hunting seasons! Found a package of dove that I didn’t know I had. That’s always a nice surprise.

First off, thank you to Walton’s for putting together some awesome deals this past week and during Big Monday. It was fun just to look through everything.
Second, I placed an order at 2:16 pm yesterday. I got an email notice that my entire order (9 items) shipped at 3:02pm. And today, I just noticed that my order is already supposed to be delivered to me by the end of today. Now, I realize that I’m only 2 hours from Wichita, but still that is a ridiculous turn around! That never happens!
As so many on here, this is just one reason why I will only buy my meat processing products from Walton’s!

I’ve become a firm believer in the benefits of keeping meat cold/semi-frozen, and how it helps the mixing and stuffing processes; however, I may have taken this to an extreme today!
Today’s project was 12 pounds of bloody mary snack sticks out of 7.5 lbs venison, 3 lbs pork butt, and 1.5 lbs pork fat, Sure Gel binder, ECA, and 21 mm smoked collagen casings.
I ground up the meat a few weeks ago and froze it. I thawed the meat in the fridge for a few days. However, I realized when I began this morning that the meat was still more frozen than I was expecting. I was able to break it up though and figured it would just keep things that much colder. It seemed to mix up ok in my meat mixer. I added seasoning and other additions, loaded up my stuffer, and started having problems a couple feet into stuffing. It was like my stuffer was plugged. I took the stuffing horn off, and realized there was a decent sized piece of frozen ground meat stuck in the tube. I pulled it out and started again, but again got stuck. I went back to the mixer and found that I had quite a few frozen meat pieces (1/2" or bigger). I decided to sift through and pick out as many of the frozen chunks as I could (it ended up being close to a pound of meat). Don’t worry, I didn’t let these go to waste. I let them thaw a bit and then later mixed them by hand and will use this as fresh sausage.
A couple questions:

1. These frozen pieces obviously would not be exposed to seasonings/cure during the mixing. Could this create any problems/safety risks in my final product?
2. I’m sure there were smaller frozen chunks (<1/2") that did go through the stuffing tube. Any problems here?
3. How can I keep this from happening in the future? Do I just need to be sure the meat thaws out pretty completely?

Hey all. Sorry if this has been addressed before. I was wondering if there was a way to save (or mark, or favorite) particular posts on here? I often find myself remembering seeing a post about a technique or recipe but then have problems finding it or wading through the search results. It would be great if I could somehow save individual posts that I could easily come back to when I need them. Is this possible?

Jonathon Wasn’t there a Pizza flavored snack stick available not too long ago? I do not see it on the website now, but I know I did a batch of pizza snack sticks maybe about a year ago and I am sure I did not just modify the brat seasoning.
Now that I think of it, I think this was the seasoning that twilliams had some problems with.

I may have just answered my own question…I just realized there is a “Bookmark” function by clicking on the 3 dots in the lower right corner of each post. Then you can access your bookmarked posts in your profile. This should work well for me! Maybe others can benefit from this?!?
If there are other ways to save posts, let me know too!

Jonathon Wasn’t there a Pizza flavored snack stick available not too long ago? I do not see it on the website now, but I know I did a batch of pizza snack sticks maybe about a year ago and I am sure I did not just modify the brat seasoning.
Now that I think of it, I think this was the seasoning that twilliams had some problems with.

Jonathon How many pounds of snack sticks will the XXL hold at a time? And, is the temperature uniform enough throughout for the sticks to cook evenly? Or is there any problem with the ends at the bottom getting done sooner and drying out?

Band of BBQ’ers
Meatgist-keteers

It gives me anxiety every time I vacuum seal any liquidy product (marinade, fruit, etc.) using my non-chambered vacuum sealer. I absolutely hate the idea of sucking up the liquid into my sealer…often times without getting as much vacuum as I’d like to get in my bag. And, cleaning this liquid out of my sealer is not fun either. I’m certain there are other good ways, but I saw Steven Rinella on a video one time, roll up a large wad of paper towels and place them above the liquid and below the point of seal all the way across the opening of the seal bag. Then, when he vacuum sealed, it created at least somewhat of a barrier to the liquid being sucked up into the sealer, while still allowing air to be sucked out. It is not perfect, but I’ve used this with some success! I’m open to other suggestions on this. Please share.

Jonathon Cool. Hopefully I’ll be able to watch it live.

Here’s a couple possible future topic ideas:
How to properly sharpen/care for knives. I’ve never really understood how to use a steel properly. Could also talk about how to use different styles of knives.
Maintenance of stuffers and grinders. How to properly clean them, oil them. Any other maintenance tricks/tips.

First off, thank you to Walton’s for putting together some awesome deals this past week and during Big Monday. It was fun just to look through everything.
Second, I placed an order at 2:16 pm yesterday. I got an email notice that my entire order (9 items) shipped at 3:02pm. And today, I just noticed that my order is already supposed to be delivered to me by the end of today. Now, I realize that I’m only 2 hours from Wichita, but still that is a ridiculous turn around! That never happens!
As so many on here, this is just one reason why I will only buy my meat processing products from Walton’s!

Good response TexLaw . Yes I did add the appropriate cure. I didn’t think about the possibility of too much cure for the rest of the product.

I’ve become a firm believer in the benefits of keeping meat cold/semi-frozen, and how it helps the mixing and stuffing processes; however, I may have taken this to an extreme today!
Today’s project was 12 pounds of bloody mary snack sticks out of 7.5 lbs venison, 3 lbs pork butt, and 1.5 lbs pork fat, Sure Gel binder, ECA, and 21 mm smoked collagen casings.
I ground up the meat a few weeks ago and froze it. I thawed the meat in the fridge for a few days. However, I realized when I began this morning that the meat was still more frozen than I was expecting. I was able to break it up though and figured it would just keep things that much colder. It seemed to mix up ok in my meat mixer. I added seasoning and other additions, loaded up my stuffer, and started having problems a couple feet into stuffing. It was like my stuffer was plugged. I took the stuffing horn off, and realized there was a decent sized piece of frozen ground meat stuck in the tube. I pulled it out and started again, but again got stuck. I went back to the mixer and found that I had quite a few frozen meat pieces (1/2" or bigger). I decided to sift through and pick out as many of the frozen chunks as I could (it ended up being close to a pound of meat). Don’t worry, I didn’t let these go to waste. I let them thaw a bit and then later mixed them by hand and will use this as fresh sausage.
A couple questions:

1. These frozen pieces obviously would not be exposed to seasonings/cure during the mixing. Could this create any problems/safety risks in my final product?
2. I’m sure there were smaller frozen chunks (<1/2") that did go through the stuffing tube. Any problems here?
3. How can I keep this from happening in the future? Do I just need to be sure the meat thaws out pretty completely?

Cleaning out the freezer before Dove season opens tomorrow. Can’t wait for the fall hunting seasons! Found a package of dove that I didn’t know I had. That’s always a nice surprise.