Sure, sausage isn't the haute couture of meat, and maybe sometimes I wish that we came from an Italian proscuitto culture, or a Maine lobster culture, even a Maryland crab shack culture. But we're sausage folk up here, and I have come to embrace it.
I'll admit this was an eye-opening experience...and actually kinda fun, with the entire family getting involved. Family + raw meat + stuffing sausage casings = fun. Who knew? For the uninitiated, I present a photo journey through the process.
Step 1: Mix the meat (50% venison, 50% pork). Venison from the Badlands, pork from family pig-farming friends. What, don't know any pig farmers? I didn't either, I married into those connections.
It helps if you wear your official sausage-making shirt for this process, or at least something with a gun-totin', pickup-drivin', Toby-Keith-lovin' theme to it.
Who needs proscuitto when you've got family like this?
Add the seasonings and mix again. We get seasonings from Butcher Block Meats in Mandan. Just tell them how many pounds of sausage you want to make, they'll measure out the seasonings for you. Bada-bing.
Put the mixed seasoned meat in the stuffer and start cranking. Yes, those are intestines being used as casings. Old school.
Sausage making is so easy! "How easy is it?" you ask? It's so easy, a five-year old can do it. Granted, a tough feisty five-year old, but still...
In case you don't have a sausage stuffer (or a feisty five-year old), skip the stuffing and just form the meat into patties and cook it up in your favorite cast iron pan. Or crumble into your spaghetti sauce. Or add to that white bean soup that you've been craving now that the cold weather has arrived.
Who needs proscuitto when you've got family like this?
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