Fat rendering, Salt... and wild boar

[brennuvarger]

I apologize in advance if my question(s) seem confusion, but they are all connected and will hopefully make sense...

I've been making sausage for a few months now and things seem to be going relatively smooth, but I'm still feeling pretty novice when it comes to troubleshooting. The last two weeks I've had at least once batch which, according to my manager, had the fat render. My manager says he can tell that fat has rendered by looking at it; ie once the sausage has been stuffed some of the fat looks smeared. He also says that when it feels 'greasy' to the touch, that it's fat seeping out. That's issue number 1.

I was talking to a co-worker who seemed a bit confused when I told him my problem. He doesn't think that the fat is rendering. (We put our fat/meat in the freezer before we grind and mix it. At the very least it's always going to be cold) I then told him that we use roughly .135# of salt, or about 1%, for every 10#s. That's when his eyebrow raised and said he's never used less than about 2% salt per batch. He also point out that the pork we use isn't 100% domestic pig. One of our pork suppliers breeds a pig that is half Eurasian wild boar, half Tamworth. During the past few weeks, that farm has been sending us 100% wild boar.

The same co-worker also finds it odd that we freeze our meat and fat before grinding. Before working at our current job, neither of us saw sausage makers freeze the meat or fat before grinding. Usually meat and fat kept in a walk-in should be cold enough. The typical walk-in is usually 35 degrees (F), ours is a little warmer, 40F, but that doesn't seem very drastic to be an issue.

I'm not ruling out that I may be mixing too much, but when my manager showed me how he mixed the sausage it seemed not different than how I do it.

So, after that long winded explanation; does anyone have an idea what's the culprit? Is the fat even rendering at all? Is too little salt creating a whole different issue? Doesn't using wild boar create any issues? Is freezing the meat/fat even necessary (I do know that it does help with wild game)?

I know that's a lot of questions, but I thank any who can answer even part of them.

[Wunderdave]

low salt levels might affect binding which would have a similar effect as fat smearing or what you call "rendering". However I don't think that 1.35% is low enough to cause this (or more accurately, to not cause binding).

I'd say your product probably got smeared when grinding or mixing. 40F isn't cold enough to guard against this. You really want your meat partially frozen - I try to keep my mix below 36 if at all possible for the entire process.

Sorry but I can't speak to the effects of wild boar meat.

[Dogfish]

Maybe the meat's extra tough and the blades are somewhat dull? Or the pigs are being fed food high in unsaturated fat and so their fat's softer?

[brennuvarger]

I've been thinking the grinder theory, too. We freeze our meat and fat and I'm usually finding myself forcing the meat and fat down with a baton (I don't know the technical term for it). I know it's not good to force meat or fat into a grinder.

Also, I just hung out at 4505 Meats and assisted their sausage maker. I noticed that a particular sausage had fat in that looked kinda smeared, but definitely not bad looking. That particular sausage primarily had belly in it, and because belly fat is not as dense or hard as back fat, it tends to give a more 'smeared' appearance, but the fat is in no way rendered or broken.

[NCPaul]

The interaction between the salt and the meat is one of the keys to getting a good bind for the sausage. How are you adding the salt to the meat? Before grinding, after grinding, in water? I have taken to sprinkling it over the cubed meat before grinding to help extract the myosin.

[Dogfish]

Did you taste the sausages that your boss described as broken, and was it? I was surprised to see the difference in overall look between beef and farm pork when put in a casing, as the beef looked proper and the farm pork looked smeared (but wasn't).

The 4505 guys wrote that book correct?

[brennuvarger]

I tasted it, it was a spicy Italian, and it didn't taste off or broken at all. I even cut in half to see if it would crumble, it didn't.

I mix the salt in with the rest of the seasons. My manager has me add the seasoning post-grind. His argument being that grinding the meat with the season would require me to clean the grinder after each batch, which is not really an inconvenience to me, who's doing all the work. I'd personally would like to grind batch by batch because, rather than grind all the meat and fat for the day in one sitting, because it would allow me to get each batch back in the walk-in quicker.

The 4505 guys are currently writing a book on sausage. They have a book on whole animal butchery, which has great visuals.