Follow basic smoked sausage preparation practices when making this sausage.
- Clean and Sanitize all of your equipment.
- Keep your meat and grinder parts super cold (below 34F) at all times
- Any liquid that is added to the mince needs to be ice cold
- Mix your very chilled meat and seasonings till the mince becomes very tacky
- Add the blue cheese and mix for 20 seconds
- Add the encapsulated citric acid and mix for 30 seconds (this ingredient is added at the very end by itself)
- Stuff the mince into sausage casings and prick out any air pockets
- Dry the sausages out for an hour before baking
- Bake at 325F (162c) and bake for 20-25 minutes till the internal temperature reaches 165f (68c).
Here are a few things you might find useful when making this sausage
- High Quality Natural Casings (AA Grade)
- Iodophor Sanitizer
- Knives for processing meat
- MK4 Thermapen (Accurate Thermometer)
- Sausage Pricker
- Encapsulated Citric Acid
- Meat Grinders
- Meat Mixers
- Sausage Stuffers
- Smokers
- Bella’s Cold Smoke Generator
- Custom Cutting Board (Use discount code 2GUYS15 at checkout for a sweet discount)
Enjoy the video and the recipe. If you have any questions feel free to ask away. If you make this at home I’d love to hear about how it came out!!
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Buffalo Chicken Sausage
Just like Buffalo Chicken Wings but better
How much do you want to make? 1000 grams
Ingredients
- 500 g chicken thigh meat
- 300 g chicken breast
- 200 g chicken skin
- 16 g kosher salt
- 7.5 g cayenne pepper
- 2 g black pepper
- 2 g onion powder
- 3 g garlic powder
- 3 g smoked paprika
- 2 g celery seed
- 5 ml Worcestershire sauce
- 40 g non fat dry milk (high heat)
- 78 ml chicken stock
- 30 g crumbled blue cheese frozen
- 7.5 g encapsulated citric acid
- sheep casings
Instructions
- Cut your chicken thighs, breast, and chicken skin into small pieces. Place the meat and fat in the freezer for an hour or until the temp reaches 32f – 34F.
- In a bowl combine all of the spices (starting with salt and ending with non fat dry milk – from the recipe ingredient list above). Do not include the blue cheese or the encapsulated citric acid. Those 2 ingredients will be added at the very end of the mixing process.
- Clean and rehydrate your sheep casings
- Grind your very chilled meat and fat on a medium plate (6mm). Rechill if necessary. You want the meat to be very cold while mixing.
- Add the spice mix and the chicken stock to your mince meat then mix till it becomes very tacky. If you grab a small handful it will stick to your hand if you hold your hand upside down.
- Once your meat has become tacky add the blue cheese and mix to incorporate.
- Finally add the Encapsulated citric acid and mix another 30 seconds.
- Stuff your mince meat into the casings, link (optional), and prick out any air pockets.
- IF YOU USE ENCAPSULATED CITRIC ACID IN THIS RECIPE, IT MUST BE COOKED THE SAME DAY IT'S MADE.
Cooking Schedule
- Dry your sausage out for an hour. I set my smoker to 100F with the door slightly open for . Next raise the temperature to 325F (162c) and bake for 20-25 minutes till the internal temperature reaches 165f (68c).
- Enjoy!
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Hallo Erik. Wanted to thank you for your recipe. Made it today but with a twist. Used cure #1 and 21mm collagen casings, smoked with apple and Finnished to 165 with water bath. Cut back on the cayenne due to lower tolerance to heat and it is awesome. Juicy and flavorful. Thanks again and keep up the good work.
NICE!! Thanks for the feedback.
Hey Eric,
thx for this recipe. Is there any way to substitute the high heat milk powder?
Greetings from Germany
Paddy
Sure you can add potato starch, soy protein concentrate, corn starch even works
Absolutely the best buffalo style chicken sausage. I’m from Buffalo and I can say it is amazing!! You nailed the flavor profile!! Thank you for the great recipe! And easy instructions.
This is an excellent recipe!! I used skinless chicken thighs and regular citric acid since that’s what I had on hand, and it was still delicious. Thank you Eric! I’ve been binge watching your videos and really appreciate that you also touch on some of the food science behind the ingredients.
I really liked how this one came out. Did you find the texture a bit soft? Regular citric acid tends to make the sausage crumbly, still would taste great but a different texture
Yes, it was crumbly due to the regular citric acid, but not too soft (fried in a skillet). When I saw the price of encapsulated citric acid, I decided to stick with the regular stuff that I already had on hand. My wife and I still loved this recipe!
LOL. Next time omit the citric acid and let me know what you think.
Eric,
My son and I tried this recipe out this past weekend and it was, simply, amazing.
We made 4lbs and both decided that, next time, we’ve got to make at least twice as much (probably 4x) and that, as good as they were in sausage form, they would make for some fantastic burgers.
One more thing I wanted to ask…
Regarding the encapsulated citric acid. You say
IF YOU USE ENCAPSULATED CITRIC ACID IN THIS RECIPE, IT MUST BE COOKED THE SAME DAY IT’S MADE
I don’t quite understand. I mean, I understand those words on my screen but I don’t understand the reasoning. Could the sausages be firmed up in the refrigerator overnight, vacuum sealed and sous vide the next day to 135° F, then stored in the freezer? My understanding is that the hydrogenated cotton seed oil won’t melt until around 145° F so the citric acid should still remain… encapsulated. Yeah? Do you know the reasoning behind the “cook it right away” advice? I’ve seen it mentioned elsewhere and I’ve never had an explanation on the ‘why’ of it.
Sure. Cooking the same day minimizes any potential risk of the encapsulation breaking. It’s true that the oil melts at 150f but there have been situations where the encapsulation has broken through the night and it ruined the texture of the sausage. Most of the time it would be ok, but there’s a small chance of something going wrong if you wait to cook your sausage. It’s more of a precaution than anything else
Nice. Glad it worked out for you!