Andouille Time Again

It's November and time to whip up another batch of smoked Andouille sausage.

Here's the blueprint:

Pork shoulder
Garlic
Salt
Cayenne Pepper
Black Pepper
Paprika
Other Stuff
Tender Quick (curative)
Water

Cut the meat into inch or so cubes.  Mix the spices and make a slurry with some water.  Mix meat and slurry, bag it and let rest in the fridge for a couple of days.

Then cut one-quarter of the meat into tiny bits, grind the rest, mix and mix with a bit of powdered milk as a binder and stuff into pork sausage casing.

Dry in the fridge for a couple of days, then smoke at a low heat (170 F) until the internal temp reaches 165 F or so, but before the fat renders out of the sausage.  You want to cook the meat but not fry the fat.

So, here's the pork after 2 days of marinating in the spice and curative.  Notice the nice pink color it's developed and the chunks of garlic.  Cutting these strips into small chunks and adding them to the rest of the pork that's been ground coursely adds to the texture of the sausage.

And here is the stuffed sausage ready for drying in the fridge prior to smoking.  I used just shy of 10 lbs of pork for this sausage and I got about 10 feet of sausage.  I'll smoke it, cut it into portions, vacuum seal it and freeze it for use later in gumbos, stews, soups and other dishes that need a little spiced pork.