Ok, Ok. I know that this version of the Bunnings Snag is WAY too fancy!!! The actual Bunnings Snag varies from store to store and is generally a VERY cheaply made sausage consisting of meat scraps, fillers, stabilizers, color enhancers, and so forth. Depending on where you are at it may be an emulsified sausage or just may be a very finely ground sausage. There is no specific standard for this sausage. With that being said, the Bunnings Snag has less to do with the sausage and more to do with the event. Hang at the local hardware store with the fam or the boys, support a charitable cause and enjoy a snag at the Bunnings Sausage Sizzle!!
I have written out 2 recipes at the bottom of this post. The first recipe is the one you will see me make in the video. It’s an emulsified sausage that’s slightly smoked. The second version is a much easier sausage to make and more than likely is a closer adaptation to the actual snags used in the Bunnings Sizzle (although I still use premium cuts of meat so there’s that). Version 2 is not smoked, uses the classic ruck filler, and has a touch of mace. If you give it a go, let me know how it turns out.
Here are a few things you might find useful when making this sausage.
- C-Bind
- Breville Sous Chef Food Processor
- Digital Smokers (I use the model 4D Pro-series WiFi)
- Bella’s Cold Smoke Generator
- Kamado Ceramic Grill
- High Quality Natural Casings (AA Grade)
- Thermapen ONE (Accurate Thermometer)
- Sausage Pricker
- Kotai Chef Knife
- Sausage Stuffers
- Meat Grinder
- Meat Mixers
- Stuffing Horn Cleaner
- Butcher Twine & Dispenser
- Small accurate Scale for spices
- Large Capacity Scale (33 pounds)
- Drying rack and tray
- Custom Cutting Board
- Jende Lapping plate for sharpening our grinder plates and knife
- Digital Smoker from Smokin-it
- Cold Smoke Generator
If you want to see the different things that we use in operation our be sure to check out our new Amazon Store.
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Bunnings Snag (v1)
Have your very own sausage sizzle!
How much do you want to make? 1000 grams
Ingredients
- 500 g lean beef
- 300 g lean pork
- 200 g pork back fat
- 200 g crushed ice
- 15 g salt
- 2.5 g Insta Cure #1
- 4 g white pepper
- .5 g marjoram
- 1 g mustard powder
- 1 g mace
- 2 g garlic powder
- 1 g onion powder
- 1.5 g sodium erythorbate this is a cure accelerator
- 10 g C-Bind or any binder that you already have (use the recommended amount that your binder calls for)
- sheep casings 22mm-24mm
Instructions
Prepare the Casings
- Rinse and flush your natural casings. Soak overnight in the refrigerator. If you are using collagen casings, they do not need to be soaked.
Phase 1: Grinding the Meat
- Clean your meat of any arteries, sinew, or unwanted parts. Cut the meat and fat into pieces that are small enough to fit into your grinder. Separate the meat and the fat into 2 piles. Chill your meat and fat. The temp of your meat and fat should be below 34f (1.1c)
- I just want to interject right here to remind you to sharpen the grinder knife and plate. If either one of these are dull it will produce a subpar grind and could ruin the texture of your emulsified sausage.
- You are going to be grinding your meat and fat separately during this first step. The first grind will be on a 10mm plate. The second grind will be on a 6mm plate and if you want to make your job even easier a third grind on a 4.5mm or 3mm plate would be great. Rechill your meat between grinds. You always want the temp of the meat and fat to be below 34f (1.1c). This is ultra important.
Phase 2: Protein Extraction
- Another interjection. Make sure the blades on your food processor are razor sharp. If they are not, you will "whip" the meat instead of chopping it and that will produce a sausage with an undesirable pillowy or fluffy texture.
- In your food processor (with sharp blades) add the meat, the spices (not the binder) and 1/3 of the crushed ice. Chop your meat till it becomes a smooth paste. The temperature needs to stay under 45f (7.2c). After several times chopping and scraping the meat off the side of the walls I usually add another 1/3 of my ice and continue chopping. The end result should be a smooth meat paste.
Phase 3: Emulsification
- This is the step where it all comes together. The fat does not need to be partially frozen here. Just cold fat is fine.
- Add the cold fat, the binder, and continue chopping for another 30 seconds. The temperature of your meat farce should not exceed 55f (13c). This is CRITICALLY IMPORTANT.
- Add the last 1/3 crushed ice and chop till your meat paste is homogenous. The meat temperature needs to remain below 55F (13c). If it gets too hot the emulsion will break. If at any time during this process you see that the meat mixture is heating up too quickly, you can always chill it in the freezer and pick up where you left off once the meat has been rechilled.
- The end result should be a meat paste that is very sticky, a little dense, and the meat and fat should look like one mass.
- Stuff your farce (meat paste) into the sausage casings and twist into links
- If you used a cure accelerator you can cook your sausages immediatly. If you did not, then you will have to let your sausages rest in the refrigerator overnight before cooking.
How to cook an emulsified sausage
- POACHING | Heat a pot of water to 165f – 176F (73.8 – 80c) and poach the sausage until you hit the desired internal temperature.
- SOUS VIDE | Place the sausages in a vacuum sealed bag and cook them in a water bath. Your immersion circulator should be set to 145f (62.7c) and you will cook your sausages for 2 hours. If you have a very large diameter sausage like mortadella (100mm) then you might want to cook that one for 4 hours. Once finished, cool in an ice water bath. I generally cook my sausage sous vide for 1 hour for every inch that the sausage is wide. A 1-inch-wide sausage (25mm) I will cook for 1 hour
- SMOKING | Set your smoker to 165f (73.8c) or 175f (79.4c). Add a tray of boiling water in the smoker for increased humidity. Apply your favorite smoke. Cook till your sausages reach the desired internal temp.
- SMOKING/POACHING | Set your smoker to 165f (73.8c). Add a tray of boiling water in the smoker for increased humidity. Apply your favorite smoke. Cook till your sausages reach an internal of 120f (48.8c). Once you hit your internal temperature, transfer the sausages to a pot of water that's been heated to 176f (80c). Poach till you reach your desired internal temp.
- STEAMING | If you have a steam basket or a steam pot, you can cook your sausages like this till you reach the desired cooking temperature.
- STEAMING/SMOKING | Cold smoke your emulsified sausages for several hours using your favorite smoking wood. Next remove the sausages from your smoker and set the temp to 300f (148c). Add a water tray directly on top of your heating element (this is easier to do in a vertical digital smoker). Let your smoker preheat and allow the steam to form. Finally add your sausages back into your smoker and cook till you reach your desired internal temperature.
- Once cooked you can refrigerate, freeze for later, or enjoy now!!
Bunnings Snag (v2 – non emulsified)
This version is not emulsified and a lot easier to make😉
How much do you want to make? 1000 grams
Ingredients
- 400 g lean beef
- 300 g lean pork
- 200 g pork back fat
- 100 g rusk you can also use bread crumbs
- 100 g cold water
- 15 g salt
- 2.5 g Insta Cure #1
- 4 g white pepper
- .5 g marjoram
- 1 g mace
- 1 g mustard powder
- 2 g garlic powder
- 1 g onion powder
- sheep casings 22mm-24mm
Instructions
Prepare the casings
- Rinse off the salt and flush the casings with some cool water. Place the cleaned casings in some fresh water with some baking soda in it (I use 1 tsp per quart of water) and place in the refrigerator. If you let your casings soak for at least 12 hours, they will be nice and tender by the time you use them.
Prepare the Meat
- Clean meat from any silver skin and arteries. Cut the meat and fat into pieces that are small enough to fit into your grinder. Chill the meat and the fat so that the temperature is below 34f (1.1c)
- Grind chilled meat and fat on a 6mm plate. If you wat a more traditional Bunning Snag, regrind on a 4.5mm or even a 3mm plate. Rechill. Keep the temp under 34f (1.1c)
- Combine the rest of the ingredients (spices, liquids, rusk) and mix till the meat turns into a sticky batter. The meat mixture will stick to your hand when you grab a small handful of it and turn your hand upside down.
- Stuff mixture in your casings and link them to your desired size. If you notice any air pockets, be sure to prick them out
- Place the sausage in your refrigerator overnight so that the cure can do its job
Cooking this Sausage
- Heat your grill to between 250f (121.1c) and 300f (148.8c)
- Grill your sausage till you reach an internal of 150f (65.5c)
To Serve
- Clearly, this can be eaten however you like but the traditional way is to serve this is on a slice of white bread with caramelized onions (optional), and whatever topping you like. Mustard, ketchup, or BBQ seem to be popular choices. If you are feeling extra rebellious place the onions on top of the snag (instead of underneath) prior to eating.
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This is a great video to show people how to properly make emulsified sausage!
But, as far as Bunnings sausage is concerned, you went way over the top. Your sausage is at least three times above the maximum permissible quality standard for Bunnings sausages! :-)
Bunnings sausages are famous for being cheap and nasty. No-one ever seeks out a Bunnings sausage for its taste. Instead, people buy them—despite their taste—out of a sense of civic duty, because they are sold to support a good cause.
The sausages are usually beef, but can really be anything. As you say, they are whatever the local school, Boy Scouts, or Surf Life Savers managed to get at the lowest possible price. Mostly, they are mainly anything but meat. A proper Bunnings sausage contains at least 20% (preferably more than 30%) filler, such as rice flour, rusk, or any other kind of cereal, and the fat content has be 30% at a minimum. More fat is better, because it means less meat and therefore lower cost.
Bunnings sausages are NEVER smoked, and they NEVER have proper natural casings. Instead, they have rubbery collagen casings that are guaranteed to not give you a snap. They are also NEVER blanched.The farce gets stuffed into collagen tubes and that’s it. Before going on the hot plate, they are very soft, fragile, and almost liquid. Once cooked, they are sort of dry and crumbly because the emulsion tends to break; most of the fat renders out and ends up on the hot plate, aided by the collagen casings that split long before the sausage is cooked.
The Bunnnings sausage is a great Australian tradition. It belongs Down Under the same way that Lamingtons and Vegemite do. And it has firmly established Australia as the world record holder for the worst sausage ever.
As usual, we Aussies are punching above our weight ;-)
😂😂😂😂 That is one heck of a description!!
You’re mind reader 👍
Howdy Eric and Family, greetings from my house on the tropical island of Phuket in Thailand.
Being an Expat Aussie now living in Thailand and a long time Charcutier and Sausage Maker I have been trying to find a recipe for Snags for many years. One of the things I get asked is can you make Snags like back home, the answer is I could if I knew what is in them. How to make a Snag/ it’s like how to make English Richmond Sausages, there is no recipes on line and the general conclusion is they are made of scraps, fat and meal.
There are no recipes on line for Snags, and from what I have learned and know from experience most of the everyday BBQ thin and Thick Snags that are available these days are made by the big supermarkets, Coles, Woolworths, Safeway, Costco and Aldi. Some small Butcher Shops still make Snags the ones I have spoken to are way too young to remember the Snags that were available back before the local Butcher Shops were run out of town by the big players. The butchers say it’s easy just add so much meat and fat to one bag of Meal and add water. The Meal is made in 25kg bags they come in many flavours and have everything added so butchers just mix and grind their scraps they have no idea what is in the blends and don’t care.
I remember driving over 130klm to buy BBQ Sausages in bulk from a Butcher Shop in Benalla Victoria, it was a butcher shop that had been handed down four generations and their Snags were the best I have ever eaten, alas they were driven to breaking point in the early 80’s and closed their doors.
From what I can remember their sausages were 18 cm long, 20 cm – 25 cm wide and light pink colour you could actually see fine meat in them, I’m not sure if they were emulsified but I would say they contained Rusk like English Sausages, the flavour was subtle with a hint of Nutmeg or Mace, White Pepper and probably Ginger Powder, Garlic powder and Onion powder. I don’t remember any herb taste or seeing flecks of herbs or Black Pepper in their Snags.
Current Snags made from packets of Meal have taken over and having you come up with a starting point is great, I don’t think the Snags are emulsified but they are definitely ground through a 3 mm or smaller plate. I was planning on making a test batch using some emulsified sausage meat a few weeks back when I saw your lead up video to season 5 of celebrate sausage where you mentioned the Aussie favourite so I’ve been holding off until now to see what you came up with. I will definitely be giving your recipe a go, I have all the right gear, #32 all Stainless Steel Grinder with a 2200W 3HP motor, and 7 stainless steel plates from 23 mm down to 3 mm each with it’s own matching SS knife. A 10kg electric Sausage Stuffer with foot pedal and auto reverse to stop back pressure when filling small sized sausages, 2.5ltr and 1ltr Manual Stuffers for small test batches, a 5ltr all stainless steel bowl cutter, 10 ltr and 6 ltr stand mixers, Gas Smoker, Cold Smoker, Curing Chamber all ready to go, wish me luck.
By the way I watch your Sausage and Charcuterie making videos almost every day and love Celebrate Sausage that I jump out of bed at 5am to watch for the remainder of the month, so far I’m going to try them all.
I have 2 versions of this recipe. You might want to check out v2. I think it might be closer to what you are looking for
good information