My virgin snack sticks making adventure…
The deets:
75/25 ratio pure Michigan whitetail venison/pork fat.
Half Willie’s and half habanero seasonings.
Ghost pepper cheese.
Carrot fiber binder.
Encapsulated citric acid.
19mm Smoke Collagen casings.

Lessons learned:

1. Don’t buy a cheap mixer. One blade bent during mixing and it would not crank in the reverse direction! Also, have some way to secure the mixer to your work table…it took two of us to hold it and crank.
2. Don’t use the full amount of carrot fiber binder recommended in the recipe. It came out kinda pasty…I’m thinking maybe using half next batch.
3. Stuffing: Had a heckuva time threading the 19mm casing onto a 3/8 inch tube. Had about 3 blowouts during the 11 lbs of stuffing.
4. Stuffing: It’s a [censored] cranking the stuffing through those small diameter tubes! Definitely a 2 person job…
5. Stuffing: Find some way to secure the stuffer to your work table…C clamps, wood clamps, whatever. It took two of us wrestling to hold it in place, crank the handle, and guide the casing.
6. Smoking: I laid the sticks flat on four wire shelves. I’d figure out some sort of rotation schedule to move the shelves so that you get more even cooking of the sticks. The lower shelves were over cooked a bit and the upper ones under cooked.

The results:
Taste is awesome! And baby they got some heat…:-) Here’s a couple pics.

Jonathon I never cook, or process…without wine.

Jonathon thanks!
Here’s a pic of the summer sausages ready for smoking (bbq/habanero seasoning with ghost pepper and cheddar cheese)

chippewa thanks! yup, slight tang but mostly overwhelmed by the heat…:-)

Minnesotameat Sounds awesome! You should put together a video for YouTube…:-)

Is the thermal processing the same for both snack sticks and summer sausage? In the summer sausage recipe, it uses the words “snack sticks” in the Thermal Processing section…
I would think that it would take a helluva lot longer to get those thicker summer sausages up to an internal temp of 160 degrees with smoker temp set at 175…? Would the other temp and time recommendations apply to summer sausages too?
“THERMAL PROCESSING
Either hang on smoke sticks or lay on racks in your smokehouse or oven. Just be sure to leave a slight gap between the snack sticks. A simple cooking schedule you can follow is here:
125F for 1 hour
140F for 1 hour
155F for 2 hours
175F until internal meat temp of 160F”

Jonathon Thanks! Please check your chat messages…I have a couple questions for you.

Jim

My virgin snack sticks making adventure…
The deets:
75/25 ratio pure Michigan whitetail venison/pork fat.
Half Willie’s and half habanero seasonings.
Ghost pepper cheese.
Carrot fiber binder.
Encapsulated citric acid.
19mm Smoke Collagen casings.

Lessons learned:

1. Don’t buy a cheap mixer. One blade bent during mixing and it would not crank in the reverse direction! Also, have some way to secure the mixer to your work table…it took two of us to hold it and crank.
2. Don’t use the full amount of carrot fiber binder recommended in the recipe. It came out kinda pasty…I’m thinking maybe using half next batch.
3. Stuffing: Had a heckuva time threading the 19mm casing onto a 3/8 inch tube. Had about 3 blowouts during the 11 lbs of stuffing.
4. Stuffing: It’s a [censored] cranking the stuffing through those small diameter tubes! Definitely a 2 person job…
5. Stuffing: Find some way to secure the stuffer to your work table…C clamps, wood clamps, whatever. It took two of us wrestling to hold it in place, crank the handle, and guide the casing.
6. Smoking: I laid the sticks flat on four wire shelves. I’d figure out some sort of rotation schedule to move the shelves so that you get more even cooking of the sticks. The lower shelves were over cooked a bit and the upper ones under cooked.

The results:
Taste is awesome! And baby they got some heat…:-) Here’s a couple pics.

I’ll be mixing 25 lbs of venison/pork fat at about a 75/25 ratio tomorrow.
I’ll mix 12.5 lbs. at a time in my 20 lb mixer. I have pre-measured the seasonings and cure into one bag for each 12.5 lbs. I also have the carrot fiber binder measured for each 12.5 lbs of meat.
Question 1: Would it work to mix the seasoning, cure, and carrot binder with the ice cold water, then pour into mixer for more even dispersion of ingredients?

Question 2: On the subject of even dispersion of ingredients…how can only 60 seconds or less of mixing get the encapsulated citric acid evenly dispersed?

Thanks!

Jonathon got it! thanks

Joe Hell thanks!