You can either pay someone else to make venison sausage for you, and hope you get your own deer back. Or, you can do it yourself for a fraction of the cost, and you will know how the meat was handled from start to finish.
Jamie Carlson has the information you need to get the job done in an article for Outdoor Life.
We have all heard that old saying, You don’t want to see how the sausage is made. I disagree with that. I think we should all know how sausage is made, and we should all try making it ourselves at least once.
Making sausages with your wild game can be a great way to enjoy the meat you bring home. It’s also a great way to share wild game with friends and family who might not be familiar with it, or reluctant to try it.
Making fresh sausage at home may seem overwhelming, but truly: once you have the equipment and a little know-how, it goes very quickly. Best of all, it can be done with any kind of wild game you have handy.
The first thing you will need is a meat grinder. This can range from a cheap hand-crank grinder to a fancy multi-horse-powered grinder. You can pick up a very good quality grinder that will meet your needs for around $80. If you have a Kitchen-Aid stand mixer, you can buy a grinder attachment for it that works very well.
If you want to make cased sausages, you will need a sausage stuffer. You can find these at most hardware stores or online for 75 dollars. You don’t have to make links however if you just want to make bulk sausage you can do that as well and then freeze your sausage in one-pound bags for later use.
There is only one rule I go by when making sausage: keep it cold. The colder the meat is, the better your final product. During any down time in your sausage-making process, keep the meat in the freezer. If the meat warms up too much (over 40°F), you can end up with a grainy texture in your meat and the sausage will not bind together well. So, keep your meat as cold as possible without actually freezing it.
Ingredients for venison, maple and cranberry sausage
- 4 lbs. venison
- 1.5 lbs. pork fat
- 5 cloves garlic
- 1 cup fresh cranberries
- 1/2 tsp nutmeg
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 40 grams kosher salt
- 1 tsp fresh thyme
- 1tsp fresh sage
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/2 cup powdered milk
- 1 tsp black pepper
