I am interested making my own sausages from my own produced goat meat. I would like to make the casings form my own goats, can anyone give me information as how to do this eg curing before using etc. In fact any information on goat meat sausages would be very welcome including recipes
I have an eBook with 92 sausage recipes and other info you can download Here (http://www.deejayssmokepit.net/SausageMenu.htm). A few of my members use goat and other meats but I can't help you with making your own casings. Sorry.
http://www.mixph.com/2007/06/how-to-prepare-sausage-casing.html (http://www.mixph.com/2007/06/how-to-prepare-sausage-casing.html)
try that. We did it in a similar way when we slaughtered pigs. Haven't done it for a while, though. No time, so I just buy casings by the hank.
Hey Deejay, just checked out your site. Its left me in a dilemma, wether to carry on trying to make cheddar, or to make sausages, or start pickling as well as learning to play an instrument I just hope I have time for all if them, thanks for the link, its fantastic!
Thanks Linuxboy for the info, the Bulgarians do it the same way apart from soak over night to cure the intestines. When you cook a home made Bulgarian sausage, it smells like poop! I presume the curing process reduces the unappetising smell?
You mean they put a hose in, run water through it and call that done? We never had a poop smell, and what we did is first starve the pig for, I think, one day, and then slaughter. Then we scrubbed, ran water through, soaked in a vinegar solution, that removed some of the smell, then rinse out with water again, then put in a brine solution, then rinse again with water, and then pack into a brine and store. Sometimes we would pack in salt.
I think it was the repeated washings that cleaned them out well, and also the scraping/scrubbing. We had this plastic pipe with the edges sanded down to get rid of sharp edges, and we would scrape down the outer layer, then just put the casing inside the pipe, take the edges, pull them to the outside, and then pull the casing edges through until the casing was inverted. And then wash down and scrub the inside. Not sure if we inverted them back or not. I do remember that it took a good two hours to finish the casings from two hogs; it was a lot of cleaning. But it was the only way we could make sausage; I don't think the stores sold casings where we were.
The casings still smelled like.. kinda meaty? Like commercial casings you buy from the store smell, this sort of meat-type smell. But they didn't smell like poop when we were done.
We used to do this with pork intestines during my growing up. I don't know when the family switched to using bought sheep casings, but that's what they use now. Younger siblings get off so much easier! ;D My husband and I don't eat pork, and don't have a stuffer, so I've not had link sausage in a long time.
My dad wouldn't let us stop cleaning until there was practically nothing left to the intestine. Clean the outside first, invert, and clean until we thought we were dying. ::) Dull knife works well. Didn't turn them back around though....so technically the inside became the outside of the sausage. There's not much difference as by the time they are cleaned well, there is only the one layer of membrane left.
Soaked the casings in vinegar overnight after cleaning - most of time slaughter was one day...carcass into the cooler, intestines, stomach and such cleaned, and cut, grind and package the next day.
Parasites will weaken the intestinal wall and then it's very hard to clean without tearing. Might want to plan ahead on parasite management.
Yes the locals just run a hose through it, and thats it! I did think there must be a better way to do it. Thanks for the info all of you. The reason for asking is the only place I can get casings locally, is from a smallholders suppliers in UK and get them shipped over, at a cost! After reading the work involved in making my own casings, Im now tempted to get them shipped out, but, again thanks for the info guys!
Quote from: SANDQ on April 05, 2010, 08:57:47 PM
Hey Deejay, just checked out your site. Its left me in a dilemma, wether to carry on trying to make cheddar, or to make sausages, or start pickling as well as learning to play an instrument I just hope I have time for all if them, thanks for the link, its fantastic!
You can do them all just not all at once. I spend most of my "free time" smoking meat, making sauages and cheese, canning only in the summer except for krauts and some jellies. Cheese is normally every other week. My musci has suffered lately though that I haven't made time for in almost a year now.
I know its been a while since the last reply, but I found that soaking the intestines in a little warm water with a couple of tps of vinegar not only made it easier to rid the intestines of any smell, but also made it very easy to scrape them clean.
This is infact the first time I am making sausages and I was wondering once I have stuffed the stuffing into the casting should I leave the sausages out to dry a short while before I seal and freeze them?
I reckon you cut it in both ends,
Run some warm water to empty it from any pre digested food, turn it over and repeat.
Then rub it in salt and dry cure it.
Once you want to use it you soak it in water to get the salt off and rehydrate it to become elastic again.
I heard of people soaking it in baking soda water to remove any odors\faul taste.