# Newbie making venison hot sticks



## stoney point (Oct 27, 2014)

Greetings from the Fox Valley Area of Wisconsin.













first batch.jpg



__ stoney point
__ Oct 27, 2014






First time making hot sticks...

5# ground venison (20% pork fat mixture)

LEM Hot Snack Stick mix

21mm Collagen casings

#10 LEM meat grinder/ sausage stuffer

Brinkman electric smoker

I have smoked hundreds of pounds of salmon, catfish, and pheasant before. But I have never made anything out of the deer I shoot...until Saturday.

My son and I made a 5# batch of snack sticks. Granted, we used the 21mm collagen casings, so they are on the large size of snack sticks.

I used a combination of apple and hickory wood ( having access to both of those trees is a bonus).

I smoked the sticks with the water pan until the internal temp was 160F. I then removed the water pan and added a large pile of hickory to get the darker color that I like, and a stronger taste of the hickory smoke. Some of them I kept with a less smoky flavor.

They are a little drier than most sticks, but I don't like the greasy feeling of some sticks with 33% fat.

The chips in the left side are my 12 yo son's first attempt at making jerky. I let him figure out why larger pieces of meat work better... he insisted on cutting smaller bite sized pieces, and lost 1/3 of them thru the grating in the smoker when they shrunk.


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## kesmc27 (Oct 27, 2014)

Your sausage looks great.

I usually dont take mine above 145 degrees since I use a cure. They tend to be more moist then.


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## kenn1320 (Dec 19, 2014)

Look tasty! Doesnt the LEM seasoning have a curing salt already?


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## stoney point (Dec 19, 2014)

Yes, it does, but I was just following the instructions on the packet.

We have made 25# of sticks already. They don't seem to last very long.


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## crazymoon (Dec 20, 2014)

Looks like a winner. You and your son will be making more!


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