I’m wanting to make brats soon for the first time. My question is will the fresh collagen casings allow me to link and separate before packaging easily? If so can I separate the brats from each other as soon as they’re linked or should I stuff, link, firm up in freezer, and then separate and package? Thank you in advance for your information.

Snake River Smokers have you ever used the collagen, or are you giving your preference on tubed vs non-tuned in the naturals?

Planning to make some jalapeño/cheddar brats soon. I plan on doing 25 lbs with blue ribbon brat seasoning, hi-temp cheddar, and jalapeño flakes. I’d like input on how much jalapeño to add. I don’t want them to be overpowered by jalapeño. Any suggestions on jalapeño quantity would be appreciated.

Snake River Smokers have you ever used the collagen, or are you giving your preference on tubed vs non-tuned in the naturals?

Jonathon so you’re suggesting I stuff, twist, freeze, then seperate to individual links before final packaging?

Tex_77 my main concern is with the ends opening up after I cut the links into individual sausages at the twist. I’ve never used the hog gut or fresh collagen casings. Being an admitted novice, the no hassle fresh collagen approach interest me, but I do not wanna have trouble maintaining links due to taking the easy route on the front end.

I’m wanting to make brats soon for the first time. My question is will the fresh collagen casings allow me to link and separate before packaging easily? If so can I separate the brats from each other as soon as they’re linked or should I stuff, link, firm up in freezer, and then separate and package? Thank you in advance for your information.

s.a.m
Thanks for the reply; I recently used the dehydrated version as well and am rather happy with the flavor. The only thing I wish was better is the color of the rehydrates jalapeños. They were well short of vibrant and some were somewhat brownish. While doing some online browsing i noticed most jal/cheddar summer sausage recipes were calling for fresh.

I’m curious what most people prefer when adding jalapeños to a snack stick or summer sausage product, fresh or rehydrated and why? Thanks for your input.

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I’ll likely try a small amount of the batch just to experiment. If it’s successful I’ll report back! Have a Blessed day.

I actually lay my sticks on large racks to smoke rather than hanging. If I lay long ropes of linked sticks on racks and smoke, then cool down and in refrigerator overnight prior to separating and packaging, they will likely suffer minimal opening up?

Thanks, Jonathan! My main purpose in wanting to do this was presentation. I didn’t realize there would be issues with them opening up after smoking and separating.