Pork Back Fat
- Thread starter JakeSCH
- Start date
I was thinking pork belly for ground and back fat for sausage. I have ~120 lbs of trimmed and cubed elk meat that I need to grind. I will most likely save 40 lbs for sausage and 80 for ground / burger.
Going to make a batch of 25 lb of cheddar brats and 25 lb of jalapeno brats.
I have another 100 lb of steaks and roast...life is good! I may use some of the round roasts to make jerky, smoke some, and maybe even make some lunch meat.
For summer sausage and links I use pork shoulder. When I get a shoulder for pulled pork I will trim the fat and freeze it for later use.
Iowa meat farms on mission gorge. Pork fatback is what I use for my grind also. It’s cheaper than belly or shoulder also, though those things work fine for that purpose too. If you call ahead they’ll package up what you need and have it ready to go.
I was thinking thinly sliced, cross grain, in a dehydrator. I should definitely make some elk sticks though! I need more meat for all this! Lol
I’m surprised that’s all they have. I was able to get 20 lbs a couple months ago. I did a very simple 1 lb fat to 10 lbs elk for my burger this year and it has been excellent. Obviously for sausage you need more. But keep in mind the fatback is 100% fat whereas pork belly is like 60-70% fat.
Yeah, they may have more around but that is what they had packaged. Told them I needed a lot more, so we will see.
Yeah when I did pork belly last year I did 1 lb pork per 6 lb elk. Incredible burgers...but the sausage was a little on the dryer side until I added an extra 10% of high temp cheese.
Iowa Meats said that you should call ahead and order it through their meat department. They will get it shipped in.
Following up on this, made a batch of 25 lb of jalepino elk sausage and so far I am not very happy with the texture of the sausage using the pork back fat. Seems almost "spongey" mouth feel.
I will still stuff them in casing today, flavor is good but hoping that the texture will improve. Going back to pork belly for the next batch to see if it is a fat issue or if my grinder needs a new blade.
The other thing that could have caused my issue is that I added water when when mixing in the seasonings (before the last grind)...I usually wait to add water until the case stuffing process...maybe that is the source of my issue.
To be continued...
I will still stuff them in casing today, flavor is good but hoping that the texture will improve. Going back to pork belly for the next batch to see if it is a fat issue or if my grinder needs a new blade.
The other thing that could have caused my issue is that I added water when when mixing in the seasonings (before the last grind)...I usually wait to add water until the case stuffing process...maybe that is the source of my issue.
To be continued...
Did you put fat back and Elk in freezer for a while before grounding, not frozen but very cold. I found this helps a lot especially with fatback or any pork fat.