Sausages

[Gill]

Has anyone here ever made their own sausages? I'd love to know how to do this (my old electric mincer has a sausage making attachment) and where to get the sausage casings from. I'm afraid I don't trust the producers of commercial sausages - you can't be sure exactly what their products are made of.

Gill

 

[WoodPecker]

you can't be sure exactly what their products are made of

Actually you can be sure........ they're made of all the nasty bits. Can't help i'm afraid, but I'll watch with interest to see what other replies this gets. Butchers suppliers might be worth trying, I'm sure you can find them in the yellow pages. Then all you'll need is some nice recipes.

 

[mudman]

Google gives a good few hits here

The second link goes into stuff about the casings.

 

[wizer]

I have made sausages at catering college and when I was young with my uncle who was a butcher. You can get real animal sausage casings from any good butcher. Id love to help you more but its all a bit hazy for me. However, I can recomend the River Cottage Forums It's a massive forum and can seem daunting, but they're a good bunch and you should get the right sort of info.

Keep us posted how you get on!

 

[Gill]

Aha! Those links have led me to a sausage making forum. Thanks, guys - I'll let you know how I get on.

I'm having a new gas cooker fitted tomorrow so I'll have to spend some time getting to know it; that'll provide plenty of opportunities to grill, roast or bake a few bangers =P~ . Then there's my cold smoker 8) which could do with having some oak chippings added as I smoke some sausages too. Eventually, I'd like to cure my own bacon, but one step at a time.

Gill

 

[Taffy Turner]

Aha! Those links have led me to a sausage making forum.
Gill

I can't believe that there is actually a forum on sausage making!!!! :shock: :shock:

The Internet really is a wonderfull thing!!!

 

[Gill]

It's a fabulous forum - so much info for sausage makers that I'm definitely going to make my own once the upheaval in my kitchen is over.

Having dogs in my kitchen, it won't be possible for me to produce foodstuffs commercially. Nevertheless, the dogs are elderly and it's unlikely that they'll be around in a few years. So this morning I spoke to my local environmental health officer to see what facilities my yet-to-be-designed kitchen should incororate if I was to produce foodstuffs for retail. I was pleasantly taken aback by her answer ! She told me there are a lot of misconceptions about what is acceptable; for instance, you don't need floor to ceiling tiles, just work surfaces and flooring that are in good condition and capable of being wiped clean. However, you do need either a separate hand basin or a double sink with one basin dedicated to hand washing.

Anyone who's thinking of retailing home produce is also required to attend a basic food hygiene course. Moreover, with effect from 1 January 2006 they will be required to produce a hazards analysis sheet which will detail all the stages of their production, from purchase through to sale, and identify potential risks at each stage plus safeguards.

For anyone thinking of producing food commercially, a guidance leaflet can be downloaded here.

The upshot is that I'm probably going to be able to carry out most of my kitchen refurbishment myself and save a fair amount of money whilst achieving commercial environmental health standards .

Gill

 

[Adam]

Just an extra thought/question..... I thought you also couldn't use a kitchen if it was in an "older" house and has a toilet directly off the kitchen with only a standard door between. I thought it had to be a minimum of two doors between them - and newer houses are never designed like this now. Anyone else heard of this at all?

Adam

 

[Gill]

You may well be right, Adam, but when I told the EHO that our loo is upstairs she said I wouldn't have a problem. I didn't pursue the issue further, but you're right to draw attention to it.

Gill