The sticks….

These started out as 17 pounds of ground meat, 12 pounds of well trimmed venison and 5 pounds of pork shoulder. Stuffed into 26mm casings after seasoning with a blend of jerky seasonings they were first brought to temperature in the oven, then shifted directly to the smoker where they got about 3 hours of active apple and cherry chunk wood smoke, then allowed to finish the charcoal used for heat. They were allowed to cool naturally as the heat level died off with the charcoal. Finished they weigh between 12 1/2 and 13 pounds. I tried a short link that I tied to a hanging rod and can say I am plenty pleased with these puppies. Now I can dismantle my grinding and stuffing equipment and store it until next season. Been a fun sausage year here at our house. I have the venison to do a twelve pound batch of something if I mix in some pork….thinking hard of those polish sausage yet. But I’ll be busy chewing on these until then.

I’ll be right over!

You’d get a fresh one. And a beer probably.

Those look dynamite Tom!!;

Sure wish you lived closer Glenn….I’d fatten you up.

damn!! I need to find some union shop down there. We currently have some field guys working somewhere in Rochester.

OMG those look delicious and from your description of how you made them I can smell them all the way from Price County Wisconsin!

dont look Sheldon,dont look,dont look,DAGNABBIT I LOOKED!!
I knew I shouldnt have!! sigh,this weekend I will be shopping for meat that is on sale and trying to duplicate this.
looks fantastic Tom !!

Stick seasonings have gotten sort of off-track as far as flavors go so I started using jerky seasonings in my sticks. I had a couple half-packs of two different LEM jerky seasonings from a year ago sealed up in a vacuum bag plus a bit left over from my Waltons seasoning after doing whole muscle jerky this fall. The cherry/apple blend of chunk wood fired on charcoal really put a unique flavor in these sticks. I made these sticks using 26mm collagen casings so they’re wider than a standard stick. As mentioned, I also basically did the cooking to get the meat to 152 degrees in the oven first, then they went straight to the readied smoker. The warmed meat and the smoker at ready allowed a better smoke penetration in the sticks even though the smoke duration was less than what I would have given the stick had I hung and smoked them starting cold.

I brought in a short link and savored it while watching tv tonight and I think that this batch is the best I have made. Ever. Not dry in the least, yet not mushy. The natural clear casings took smoke very evenly. And the flavor of the seasoning blend is just spot on….not too spicy yet pointed enough to stand out as a great snack stick. Very, very happy with these.

Thanks for the comments guys.

Tom, as usual these look great.
These are collagen casings? They look like they stuck to the meat well. And that’s good, at least in my opinion. Allot of time’s they will loosen up for people and separate from the meat. I’m not a fan of that.

We have some meat to do yet and we’ll have snatch sticks also. We use natural casings for ours.

Nice job again on the snack sticks!

I really like the idea of getting them to temp in the oven first. I have done sticks in my pellet grill and it’s got some hot spots in it but the smoke flavor is good. I’ve always found what the seasoning recipe calls for is pretty weak taste wise. I have yet to make sticks that I would claim to be great tasting.

riverruns wrote:

These are collagen casings? They look like they stuck to the meat well. And that’s good, at least in my opinion.

They are collagen. I found some smoked 26mm on-line and thought I’d try the larger diameter this year. I also used a 50-50 venison to pork meat ratio and wet the seasoned meat well before stuffing. The casing is stuck to the meat like its been glued on.

I’d always used the 19mm casings and pure venison in my sticks. While they were very good tasting, they were also pretty dry….almost tough. I liked them but others liked a softer stick. You mentioned last fall about blending the venison and pork at 50% each so I tried it and will do so in future batches. And the larger diameter casing really makes for a nice stick size. Using the jerky seasoning in the sticks was a great move for me too as I really prefer jerky over sticks, but now I can have my jerky in a stick.

I have enough venison trim yet to do a 10 pound batch of polish sausage and have the casings and seasonings ordered. I need to grab a pork butt to get the ten pounds. I plan to stuff 4″ links and cook in the oven, no smoke, then cold pickle the sausages in the fridge. Great with a cold beer bud!

John Timm wrote:

I really like the idea of getting them to temp in the oven first. I have done sticks in my pellet grill and it’s got some hot spots in it but the smoke flavor is good. I’ve always found what the seasoning recipe calls for is pretty weak taste wise. I have yet to make sticks that I would claim to be great tasting.

I just don’t care for the stick seasoning and tend to agree with you that its not as straight forward as one would expect. Jerky seasoning works better and has plenty of flavor. When I used packaged stick seasonings I used about 20% less meat than the recipe called for to get a decent flavor. With jerky cure batched at 25 pounds I use the full 25 pounds and the sticks have a super good flavor.

I lay a single layer of sticks on cookie sheets and slip them in the oven at about 210 degrees. I use a probe-type digital thermometer to pierce the links in the middle to test for the 152 degrees I want and as each link comes to that temp I slide it out onto a separate cookie sheet. When they’re all done like this, I wipe them down and hang them in the smoker and put “maybe” three hours of cooler smoke on them. That’s a great plenty of smoke. The sticks go from the smoker when they’re cold to a lug where they can rest a couple days in a cold garage to allow the smoke to mellow, then vacuum seal or wrap however you do it.

Stepping away from the 19 mm casings to 26mm really improved the sticks for me this year and since I stuff using a 1/4″ tube I keep the meat wet with bottled water so the filling adheres to the casing well. Finished sticks that seem too moist for you can be hung to dry a bit. As a test I hung one full link that was finished near perfect for me and it took only two days hanging to get pretty dry.

If this post is firing anyone else up about eating sticks I can tell you one place to satisfy that craving. The same place I get my venison sticks made. I guarantee they have one you will love.
http://www.hometown-meats.com/

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Don’t get your fingers in the way Suzuki. lol

Those look great Tom

Jeffery! The sticks are great!

suzuki wrote:

If this post is firing anyone else up about eating sticks I can tell you one place to satisfy that craving. The same place I get my venison sticks made. I guarantee they have one you will love.
http://www.hometown-meats.com/

Well I believe there is alot of money in the world when i see this.

I know there is an investment into equipment and time it takes, but holy smokes on those prices. I dont go to the meat market so I didn’t know. Ouch at best.

We are doing 130# of snack sticks the weekend of 2/22. Glad it’s not at those prices.

Yum. I get similar each year. I do not know how to make my own. I am envious.

Sticks are an expensive thing to make at home, worse to buy at a place that makes them for retail sale.

I have a lug with seasoned ground pork for more breakfast sausage ready to stuff today along with another lug of seasoned ground polish sausage to stuff later today. The grinder has been scrubbed up good, serviced for storage, and packed up. Tonight the stuffer will get the same. Its been a great run on fun foods this winter and time to enjoy them.

Snack sticks are expensive to make even @ home. I know cause I’ve got the equipment to make them, maybe not @ the scale that riverruns has but I can take an @ bat.

Shrinkage is hugh when you are doing a 17mm or 19mm casing. When they are @ a retail counter there is beef and pork unless the state allows exotic meats.

Think of the dollar that you at home spend for beef, at a good price. Add a bit of pork maybe, then add spices and cure, add manpower to cut, mix, stuff, smoke slice and package. Then the cost of equipment!

Riv, you need to make an evaluation on what you would think your product would retail @. Just say’in, add it up.

A person has to do sticks for the personal value, not the actual cost. I makes some sticks each year and enjoy doing them even though they are a ton of putz work. The eating more than makes up for the actual cost. All of my sausages are done with that line of thinking. Furthermore, I now exactly what is going into my sausages and a guy can’t put a price on that.

I did my sticks with some 23mm smoke casings I got from a private party this year and haven’t regretted it in the least. The 17 and 19 mm casings get so dry so fast. I also split the meat weight near equally between pork and venison on this year’s sticks and will never make a venison stick and not add pork again.

Knowing what goes into your sausage is worth a lot to me. I know how we take care of our venison and I know that by doing it ourselves we are getting our own meat. It’s also fun to make different kinds and to even create your own flavors.

We still use the 19mm. We use about 60/40 ven/pork mix when making them with venison. When making them with beef I like the 70/30 ratio.

We do them a bit different than Tom does. After stuffing and allowing them to sit over night we put them in the smoker without smoke, then with smoke and again without until the internal temp hits 135-140. When they reach this point they are water bathed in 160-165 degree water until the internal temp reaches 152 degrees. At this point they are placed in ice water to stop the cooking. They are then drained and alowed to rest overnight before packaging.

Both methods are very good. For us the water-bath just cuts the time down a lot.

Tom I refer to those that think of the retail costs of “Quality” snack sticks, “Not Your LocalGrocereyStore Brand Carp ( CARP,,IE MEANING THE FILTER FEEDER FISH WITH LARGE HARD SCALES)”

Sorry My left pinkie caught the caps key, my bad.