Venison Sausage is a sausage that is made with venison or deer meat. This is quite popular in the American and European cuisines. It has a strong flavor, which is characteristic of game meat. The fat content is high and tough in the meat; however, if used from the right part of the meat and ground thoroughly, the sausages turn out just perfect. Various flavorings too are used for making variations of this sausage. Porcini, a woodland mushroom, is a natural complement to venison and the when added to the sausage, it adds a good flavor. This sausage can be used fresh as well as smoked.
Ingredients
Venison Sausage is made with deer meat and at times mixed with elk meat. Because these meats are lean, lamb or beef too can be included in the preparation of this sausage. The other ingredients include - fat (from venison; lamb or beef are optional), gin, red wine, garlic cloves, minced shallots, ground black pepper, ground dried porcini mushrooms, minced sage, kosher salt, Instacure No. 1 (optional), and hog casings.
Method of Preparation
Venison Sausage is prepared by tossing chunks of the meat in garlic, shallots, spices and herbs and then refrigerated. This not only helps in chilling the meat, but also hardens the fat. Meanwhile, hog casings are kept in a bowl of warm water. The chilled meat (with fat) is ground and mixed thoroughly with red wine and gin. This sausage mixture is stuffed into the hog casings and pinched wherever required and hung in a cold place to dry. Once dry, the sausages are refrigerated. They can keep for at least a week.
Venison Sausage Recipe Variations
Venison Sausage is a popular dish with many, because of which there are different variations to this recipe. Listed here are a few variations –
Smoked Venison Pepperoni –
Ingredients: Trimmed venison, pork fat, kosher salt, paprika, ground black pepper, sugar, cayenne pepper, crushed anise seed, ground cumin, dried oregano, dried thyme, non-fat dry milk powder and Instacure.
Preparation: Ground venison is mixed with a paste made of milk powder, Instacure and all the spices (in ice cold water). The contents are kneaded well so as to blend in the spices. This meat mixture is stuffed into hog casings and refrigerated for at least a day. Once the sausage (venison sausage pepperoni) has aged, it is smoked till done. The sausage is ready to be consumed as is and it can also be used in combination with other ingredients in stir fried foods, gravy dishes, etc.
Polish Homemade Venison Sausage – This recipe is similar to the Smoked Venison Pepperoni, with the exception of the spices and herbs used. This recipe includes ground celery seeds, ground mace and ground marjoram instead of anise seed, cumin, oregano and thyme. The method of preparation is the same.
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