Pastrami snack sticks!? (crazy idea, with pictures...)

So the corned beef briskets were half off, so I got the wild idea of trying a cheap experiment and making snack sticks out of them: 


These points were really fatty, so I trimmed the fat off the best I could and ended up with 7# of leanish corned beef (somewhere between 90 to 95 % lean) and about 2# of fat.  I added 1# of fat back in, cut everything into chunks my grinder would accept...  


Ground up, mixed in 2/3 cup of NFDM, and into my Dakota stuffer...


I know most people on here insist on natural casings, and I like them too for brats and what not, but for snack sticks collagen casings are convenient and result in a good, consistent end product, IMO...



Decided just to tie off the links this time.  Twisting the links shouldn't be that hard, but I always manage to mess it up and have everything unravelling on me when I go to hang them in the smoker!


So I let them rest and dry in the smoker at 110 degrees for two hours.  Then added one row of  blended pellets to my AMNPS and raised the temp to 130 for and hour, 140 the next, 150, 160, final raise to 165.  Sticks got to 152 after about 8 total hours in the smoker.


Pulled them out and let the cool of in the basement overnight.  Here is the final result:


They lost a lot of volume from when they were stuffed, I am presuming mostly from the large amount of brining solution the meat was retaining.  The texture of the sausage inside is still plenty moist.  Good flavor too!  I don't know if i'd do this again, but my wife likes them, so it was worth the experience!

Thanks for looking!