Breakfast link casings

[Big Mike]

I recently made a bunch of breakfast links using collagen casings and everything went perfectly until I put them in the pan where the casings all split and curled up and came off of the meat. Does anyone have any suggestions for me. Thank you!

[Jonathon]

Big Mike When you say put in the pan, I am assuming you didn’t add water right? I wouldn’t think that you did but whenever someone has problems with collagen that is one of the first things I point out, edible collagen will not stand up to boiling. What collagen did you use, was it fresh or clear? Most likely it was cooked at a too high temperature too quickly, that expands the meat inside and pops the casing. To try to fight this you can try cooking at closer to medium heat, obviously, that is assuming you were cooking on high. It could also be the casings were stuffed a little too full, you could try to stuff your casings a little less full which would give the meat a little more room to expand.

Anyone else have any thoughts?

[gadahl]

Mike:
For breakfast links I use only the tubed natural sheep casings. They are expensive, but the tubed casing mounts on your stuffer tube so much easier than the sheep casing in a hank that they are well worth the price. Austin–not an excuse to raise prices! Mike, I think you will be much happier with natural casings.
Good luck!
G

[Parksider]

gadahl I second that! pretubed sheep casing is the way to go. I also think whoever is “manufacturing” the pretubed are using the best casings. I never have issues with them. While they are more expensive, I think they are a better value.
We smoke them for about 2 hours around 150F, then into a water bath at 170 to bring them up to temp. Everyone loves them and never had any issues with them splitting open.

[Jonathon]

Parksider Do you package them first before finishing them up in the bath? Or is it like your summer sausage where you just put the sausage directly into the water. I’m sticking with my recommendation of Collagen over natural but they do stand up better to direct contact with the water. gadahl I’ll make sure Austin doesn’t get any ideas!

[Parksider]

We cook them before packaging them. I understand your point but you have some of the best pretubed casings and we prefer them.

[Big Mike]

Big Mike