Please be patient while I learn how to navigate this site.

My “group” has been making cold cure venison summer sausage for a few years. We are having serious challenges with mold, air pockets, and non-uniform shrinkage (instead of nice round shape, think violin). We use the Walton’s H. We have a huge smoke house with an outdoor firebox and piped in smoke. We have accumulated all the right equipment to make the work fun. We typically make 250 pounds.

Our process: Double grind equal amounts of pork and venison. Mix spices and cure into meat. Stuff in 2.20 inch X 16 inch fibrous casings. Hang in smoke house and immediately begin 2 days of smoking. Let hang for approximately 6 - 8 weeks.

We have added full spectrum lights and a fan with the hopes of reducing mold but it doesn’t seem to be working.

Any comments would be most welcome.

I’m an idiot. I got into Dry Cured Sausage but cannot figure out how to get to meat processing section. Normally at this stage of confusion witht he internet I get someone under 40 to help me.

Wow! Thanks so much. That provides the direction I needed.

I apologize for my clumsy responses - still learning how to navigate this site. Thanks for your patience because we seriously need help.

We are using no culture. We purposely hang sausage during winter so as to keep temp in a range of 40 - 65 degrees. We try to manage humidity with vents and a fan. We raise temp with a space heater in a roughly 8 x 8 smoke house and use the fan on low to disperse heat more evenly in smoke house.

Our ability to monitor and control heat and humidity is crude at best, but my suspicion is the bigger issue is our process. An old timer (defined as anyone older than me) said the reason for the deep crevices in finished product, the small amount of mold, and the open cavities is we are encasing/trapping moisture inside the sausage by applying our smoke on day one. He said we should hang for 3 days with no smoke so that the sausage can breath, then apply smoke.

processhead We are attempting cold smoke but I cannot guarantee that the temp doesn’t get slightly elevated during the smoke process. Fibrous casings are stuffed using hydraulic press. We attempt to stuff as tightly as possible without splitting casings.

Jonathon Thanks for your assistance. We are using Walton’s Sure Cure which I beleive is a nitrite. We are attempting cold smoke versus heating the sausage however, it is possible that the heat is slightly elevated during the first day smoking. We really need to add a thermometer and monitor this but that won’t be possible until next batch, which will be next year.

My “group” has been making cold cure venison summer sausage for a few years. We are having serious challenges with mold, air pockets, and non-uniform shrinkage (instead of nice round shape, think violin). We use the Walton’s H Summer Sausage Seasoning and Sure Cure. We have a huge smoke house with an outdoor firebox and piped in smoke. We have accumulated all the right equipment to make the work fun. We typically make 250 pounds.

Our process: Double grind equal amounts of pork and venison. Mix spices and cure into meat. Stuff in 2.20 inch X 16 inch fibrous casings. Hang in smoke house and immediately begin 2 days of smoking. Let hang for approximately 6 - 8 weeks.

We have added full spectrum lights and a fan with the hopes of reducing mold but it doesn’t seem to be working.

Any comments would be most welcome.

I’m an idiot. I got into Dry Cured Sausage but cannot figure out how to get to meat processing section. Normally at this stage of confusion witht he internet I get someone under 40 to help me.

Thanks. I’ll give that a try.

Please be patient while I learn how to navigate this site.

My “group” has been making cold cure venison summer sausage for a few years. We are having serious challenges with mold, air pockets, and non-uniform shrinkage (instead of nice round shape, think violin). We use the Walton’s H. We have a huge smoke house with an outdoor firebox and piped in smoke. We have accumulated all the right equipment to make the work fun. We typically make 250 pounds.

Our process: Double grind equal amounts of pork and venison. Mix spices and cure into meat. Stuff in 2.20 inch X 16 inch fibrous casings. Hang in smoke house and immediately begin 2 days of smoking. Let hang for approximately 6 - 8 weeks.

We have added full spectrum lights and a fan with the hopes of reducing mold but it doesn’t seem to be working.

Any comments would be most welcome.