# Real Cold smoking venison



## jessejames

Hey guys, I'm new here and sort of new to Cold smoking. Years ago we ground and stuffed our own sausage after deer season. Many of the old German fellas passed away and we had no one to cold smoke for us. So fast forward 20 years and here we are doing it by ourselves. 

A couple issues we have been running into is sometimes the sticks are loose in the centers and if your knife is not real sharp you can actually squash the sausage. 

The other issue we've ran into is sometimes the centers will be Brown. I'm told the stick is garbage when this happens. I've always took the old timers word for it and chucked it to the dogs, they love it. 

We have a old smoke house. We generally smoke in January when we can keep the temp low around 40° in the smoke house. Usually stays in there for about 7-10 days. One of the older guys in our group makes the call on when to pull it out. 

Any ideas on what we may be doing wrong or what may cause these issues?

Thanks in advance.


----------



## crankybuzzard

Welcome to SMF!

What type of sausage are you making?  Fresh, SS, or cured sausage?  Also, what type of casings are you using?  A SS casing that is loose when COLD SMOKED is usually an indication that it was understuffed, where as a loose casing on a warm/hot smoked SS and other types of sausage would indicate a potential fat out scenario.


----------



## jessejames

We put pink curing salts in our sausage.  The local butcher shop sells casing marked venison. It's a very thin paper like material we soak in warm water before stuffing.  We are using a hand crank stuffer. We try not to stuff too fast otherwise the o ring pops off stuffer.


----------



## jessejames

http://s410.photobucket.com/user/jkloth81/media/IMG_20170211_103337505.jpg.html


----------



## geezer

JesseJames said:


> http://s410.photobucket.com/user/jkloth81/media/IMG_20170211_103337505.jpg.html


Whoa!


----------



## crankybuzzard

Now that's a LOT of SS!

Most all of those look pretty tight from my seat here.  As for the "brown spot" in the middle, that would typically indicate that the sausage hadn't cured, but that would be kind of strange since the cure is mixed in with the sausage. You're talking about cold smoking, how are the sausages finally cooked or are these a true fermentation only?

If you think the casings may not be completely full, and tightly packed, you can use a piece of 1" PVC pipe with a cap on it to tamp down the sausage into the casing.

Looks like that smokehouse has seen a lot of use!


----------



## jessejames

Yeah, we packed over 780 lbs in there a few weeks ago.  It's a true cold smoke, no cooking just natural fermentation as we try not to let the smoker get above 48° for the entire 7-10 days. The casings did feel tight after we stuffed them. 

Typically the brown ring is also accompanied by a hollow spot down the center of the sausage. 

I'm curious to know more about the PVC trick. Do you know of any YouTube videos showing how this is done?

Thanks for the info and suggestions.


----------



## crankybuzzard

JesseJames said:


> Yeah, we packed over 780 lbs in there a few weeks ago. It's a true cold smoke, no cooking just natural fermentation as we try not to let the smoker get above 48° for the entire 7-10 days. The casings did feel tight after we stuffed them.
> 
> Typically the brown ring is also accompanied by a hollow spot down the center of the sausage.
> 
> I'm curious to know more about the PVC trick. Do you know of any YouTube videos showing how this is done?
> 
> Thanks for the info and suggestions.


I don't know of any videos, but think like this, you have a sack and you drop dirt into it, then you use the end of a 4x4 to tamp it down into the sack to maximize the amount of dirt you can get in it.  Same with the sausage casing and the PVC with the cap.

The hollow spot down the center of the sausage may be from a rookie on the stuffer not allowing the casing to fill up, the void is from the stuffing horn pulling out without sausage filling in the space.


----------



## jessejames

Oh ok. Instead of twisting it off and clamping it when stuffed, you tamp the sausage in the casing before twisting it off. Makes sense. I'll have to make one up before next season and give it a whirl.

I'm usually the one cranking so I'll have to monitor the guy doing the stuffing. We have the stuffer mounted to a bench and even with the stuffer sitting on the bench and the guy cranking standing on the feet the bench still likes to twist a bit. Either we need to make a heavier bench to sit on or buy an electric stuffer.  



Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk


----------



## crankybuzzard

JesseJames said:


> Oh ok. Instead of twisting it off and clamping it when stuffed, you tamp the sausage in the casing before twisting it off. Makes sense. I'll have to make one up before next season and give it a whirl.
> 
> I'm usually the one cranking so I'll have to monitor the guy doing the stuffing. We have the stuffer mounted to a bench and even with the stuffer sitting on the bench and the guy cranking standing on the feet the bench still likes to twist a bit. Either we need to make a heavier bench to sit on or buy an electric stuffer.
> 
> 
> 
> Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk


Do you have any pics of the stuffer?  I have all kinds of crazy things going through my head right now...


----------



## jessejames

Imagine something like this except the stuffer is mounted on the end not the middle. The crank comes out the end of the bench and the guy doing the stuffing sits on the bench and comfortably makes the sticks of sausage between his legs.  Pretty nice little setup.













10688256_1_x.jpg



__ jessejames
__ Mar 17, 2017






With this style stuffer, not an old school cast iron.













h6252-5b5244e67ca60c8e18a2a617d6bcfe61.jpg



__ jessejames
__ Mar 17, 2017


----------

