Making Spicy Snack Sticks (Sausage Maker Kit)

welcome to the two guys intercooler channel my name is Eric and today we're gonna be making snack sticks from a kit that we received from the sausage maker we've gotten a lot of requests to do snack sticks and in this video you're gonna see the entire process come to life utilizing this kit snack sticks can be a little tricky to make so through the course of this video I'm gonna share with you some tips and tricks that are just about guarantees success every time as I open the kit I've got some collagen casings you do want to refrigerate those so as soon as you get your kit put those in the fridge we have a little bottle of natural chicory liquid smoke in the event I don't have a smoker and I want to use my oven we also have the seasoning mix in this case I got the spicy variety and we have instant cure number one the kit looks pretty simple so let's go ahead and start making it now before we begin I want to start off by saying making amazing snack sticks does require the use of some special equipment the first piece of equipment you should have is a meat grinder a meat grinder gives you total control over your finished product not only do you know exactly what's going on in there but you get to choose the quality of the grind that your meat undergoes the second piece of equipment you should have when making snack sticks is a sausage stuffer these come in all shapes and sizes with prices to fit everyone's budget but the reason you want one of these is because a sausage stuffer maintains a very low friction it keeps the meat cold ensuring that it doesn't smear or melt the fat ruining the texture of your snack sticks alright now that that's out of the way let's go ahead and pick the tube that we're gonna use for the sausage stuffer the smallest one I have is a half inch stainless steel tube which is a little bigger than I'd like but I'm gonna show you how we're gonna make it work with the 19 millimeter casings snack sticks can be made with an assortment of meats venison pork wild game it doesn't really matter in this case I'm gonna be using all beef and pork fat so 70% lean beef I've got I of round top round and I'm gonna be using 30% back fat so what I'm doing right here is I'm cleaning up my meat silver skin arteries veins any of that stuff I'm getting rid of I'm trimming it into small portions so it fits into my grinder real easy and I'm gonna lay it on a tray so I can stick it in the freezer and partially freeze it I'm gonna do the exact same thing with my pork back fat the first absolutely critical tip when making snack sticks is ensuring that your meat and fat is partially frozen 32 degrees that 34 degrees is ideal while that's chilling I'm gonna go ahead and get my grinder ready I want to make sure that my knife and my plate are sharp and ready to cut the one thing I don't want is for my grinder to ruin the texture of the meat using this knife sharpening system I got from the sausage maker ensures that my knife stay sharp and my plate stays sharp and flat and all it is it's too wet stones that fit perfectly into my grinder and by replacing the knife or the plate tightening the ring and then running the machine for three to five seconds ensures that my knife and the plate are both sharp and ready to grind it's great p.m. for your equipment and I highly recommend it so let's go ahead and grind I've got my chilled partially frozen meat my very first grind is on a 3/8 inch plate a 10 millimeter plate as you can see I'm grinding the meat and the fat together and I'm working fairly quick I don't want the temperature of the meat to rise because I don't want that fat to smear when I'm done I put a piece of bread in there and that just ensures that all of that meat gets pushed through this next grind is completely optional but I like to do a second grind on the same plate so once that meat has been back in the freezer and partially chilled I'm gonna regrind it through a 3/8 inch plate once I'm done grinding it I'm gonna add all of my seasonings mix the meat and then chill it one last time getting it ready for the final grind my final grind is gonna be on a quarter-inch plate or in my case of four point five millimeter plate and this is what it should look like the strains should not be smeared our meat is nice and chilled it's already seasoned and we're gonna go ahead and mix it now you can choose to add your seasonings when you mix it but tip number two mixing it is the second most critical part of making snack sticks I'm gonna be using a KitchenAid mixer to mix my meat today I'm gonna work in small batches because five pounds won't fit in that bowl and I'm gonna make sure that I mix it for at least eight minutes if you're gonna be mixing this by hand make sure that your meat is properly chilled and make sure you mix it for at least 15 to 20 minutes this is going to give you proper protein extraction and when you're becomes incredibly sticky and starts to look like a paste if you hold a little bit in the palm of your hand and it sticks to it when your hand is upside down you know you can move on to the next step adding 1 cup of ice-cold water for every 5 pounds of meat is gonna actually aid in that protein extraction giving you much better results now that our meats properly mixed we're gonna stuff that into our sausage stuffing hopper ensuring that we don't create any unwanted air pockets we're gonna be using a 25 pound electric sausage stuffer today and now it's time to load up the casings these 19 millimeter casings are just a tad small for this half-inch tube so in the style of an accordion I'm just gonna slide that casing right onto that tube and when it's completely full clip the end and give it a twist there's no need to tie it off to prepare the stuffer I'm gonna put a little bit of oil on the o-ring power it on reduce the speed to about three to three-and-a-half and now I'm ready to go the name of the game here is nice and easy you don't need to overfill your snack sticks just enough to fill that casing you're not twisting them unlike regular sausage and so as soon as that casing is full allow it to naturally flow off the tube notice any air pockets with your sausage pricker prick those air pockets out and now you're ready for the refrigerator snack sticks require refrigeration from one day before smoking this is gonna allow the cure number one to do its job before you put it in your oven or in your smoker the day you're gonna smoke your snack sticks make sure you leave them on the counter bring them to room temperature first this is gonna allow the smoke to adhere to your snack sticks much better you're smoking schedule should look a little something like this by starting off really low and slowly increasing the temperature you're allowing for maximum smoke penetration and reducing the possibility of having your fat render out if you're gonna be baking this in your oven preset your oven to the lowest possible setting 160 170 degrees and bake it until the internal temperature reaches 150 - after a few hours in my smoker let me show you what its gonna look like the casing is nice and dry it's starting to take on that really rich mahogany color and we're just getting started after about eight hours of smoking my internal temperature is 150 - and it's time pull them out and look at these snack sticks they look absolutely amazing notice there's not a lot of rendered fat at the very bottom of my smoker the casing is nice and tight and I want to quickly go ahead and take these and throw them into an ice cold water bath ice water bath does a couple of things it reduces the temperature it keeps the snack sticks from continuing to cook and it actually gives you a really nice presentation keeping that casing from shriveling up after about 10 minutes in the water bath I'm gonna set these on the counter to air dry for about two hours this is gonna be in room temperature and what this is gonna do is encourage bloom help that sausage firm up a little bit and get ready for the cutting if you've made it this far congratulations because you officially now have smoked snack sticks and let's give it a taste these are so much better than conventional snack sticks they're smoky there's a freshness to them that casing has a real snap to it whenever you bite into it I love how moist they are the fat content was absolutely perfect it's spicy but not too spicy and then there's that signature tankiness that generally we find with your store-bought snack sticks so in order for me to package these up all I'm gonna do is make sure that there are room temperature free of any moisture I'm gonna vacuum seal them and then I'm going to store them either in the refrigerator or the freezer [Music] and that's how you make snack sticks using the snack stick kit from the sausage maker they came out amazing it was a little bit of work but well worth it in the description box below I'm gonna have all the instructions so that you could follow them step by step very clear easy to follow and you will be guaranteed some amazing snack sticks as well if you're new to this channel consider subscribing and clicking that notification bell each week we post new videos and new content we'd love it if you were a part of it thanks for watching we'll see you in the next video

Channel: 2 Guys & A Cooler

Views: 15,639

Keywords: Making snack sticks, cured meats, slim jim, Making sausage, Smoked meats, beef sticks, italian meats, Kits

Id: OUlj0KyvzLM

Length: 8min 5sec (485 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 05 2019