How to Make Homemade Sausage With a Meat Grinder

How to Make Homemade Sausage With a Meat Grinder

Making homemade sausage is not as daunting and difficult as it may sound. Sausage is really just a mixture of ground meat, fat, salt, pepper, other spices, herbs, onions, peppers or other diced foods. Have you ground your own hamburger meat? If so, making homemade sausage is just a few easy steps before grinding the meat.

The best sausage balances the ratio of meat, fat and spices. Store bought sausage can contain up to 50% fat, however, you can reduce the fat amount to 25% to 35%, if desired, and still produce great tasting sausage. Sausage fat below 20% is not recommended as a certain amount of fat is needed to impart good flavor and help bind the meat links together.

Equipment Needed

A meat grinder. If desired, a sausage stuffer and sausage casings. You do not have to use a sausage stuffer if making patties, however if making links, a sausage stuffer aids in producing well formed, tight links. Sharp knives Large bowls

Sausage Preparation

Put your meat in the freezer for up to 1-2 hours to get the meat very cold. Sausage is typically made with pork meat, but lamb, beef or wild game can also be used. Cut your meat and fat into 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 inch slices. Put the slices into a bowl surrounded with ice to keep the meat cold. After cutting all the meat, mix the meat, fat and your desired spices together. Put the meat mixture back in the freezer for up to 30 minutes. Grind the meat mixture in your meat grinder. Use a medium to coarse grinding plate. If making sausage patties, form the ground meat into the patties and refrigerate before use. If making links, place a casing onto the sausage stuffer's tube. Leave a tail of at least 6 inches off the end of the tube for tieing off later. Let the sausage come out of the sausage stuffer in one long coil, you will make the actual links after you have extruded all of the meat. Make the links. With two hands, pinch off what will become two links and tightly spin the casing at both ends. Work the links until they are pretty tight. Tie off the excess 6 inches of casing that you previously allowed for. Refrigerate the links until you are ready to cook and eat.