Ok. So let me make a confession. I love hot dogs. I especially love Hebrew National all Beef Franks. It’s like a guilty pleasure.
Making an emulsified sausage is a little tricky. You need the right equipment, super sharp cutting blades, and very cold mince meat. If it’s done properly the texture and bite of a properly emulsified sausage is heavenly. If done incorrectly it’s a disaster.
Today I’ll show you how to make this awesome hot dog without all the fuss of emulsification. So technically this is more of a semi-emulsified sausage (and that’s totally ok too!!)
The main issue here is temperature. We want our meat and fat to be cold. I use a thermapen mk4 by thermaworks to check my temp. If you don’t have one of these then you really should look into fixing that. It’s that awesome!! I’ll be using an 80% lean beef and a 20% fat content. If you live in an area where your beef is grain fed and has nice marbling like chuck (which has a natural 80/20 mix) then there’s no need to add additional fat. Where I live the meat is all grass fed and very lean so I end up adding extra fat. Either way you want your meat very cold!!! This is super important. Keep it under 35F. This will preserve the integrity of your meat and fat while grinding.
Speaking of grinding you’ll want to grind your meat 3X. Start on a 10mm plate, then 4.5mm, then finally 3mm. Remember to keep the meat partially frozen each time you grind. This will ensure that you break down the particles of beef and fat into ultra small pieces.
Once your meat has been properly ground it’s time to mix in the spices. I like to use my kitchen aid stand mixer for this. Mix the farce (and seasonings) on a medium speed while slowly adding in the ice cold water. I’ll mix the meat until it looks like it’s well mixed and mostly homogenous. At this point it’s ready to be stuffed into casings.
I like stuffing my farce into a 21mm cellulose casing. Sheep casing is also very popular as it delivers a nice “SNAP” to your hotdog. Once you have your hotdogs formed all you need to do now is give them a little cook. If you are making all beef hot dogs then you’ll want to bring the internal temp to 135F-140. If you are adding pork then you’ll want the internal temp to be 150-155F. If you place your hot dogs into simmering water then it only takes about 10-12 minutes to finish cooking. I use sous vide cooking to keep from overcooking my dogs!! If you haven’t gotten into sous vide cooking yet the I suggest looking into it. It’s pretty cool!!
Enjoy your hot dogs and be sure to freeze what you don’t cook!
Here are a few things I found helpful when making this recipe.
- 21mm cellulose casings
- Cure #1 (optional if you plan on smoking the hot dogs)
- Meat Grinder
- Kitchen Aid stand mixer
- Sausage Stuffer
- Sous Vide Machine
- Vacuum Sealer (commercial grade)
- Vacuum Sealer (Home Use)
- Thermapen mk4
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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Hebrew National All Beef Franks (Copy-Cat recipe)
Ingredients
- 1000 g well marbled beef chuck 80/20
- 16 g salt
- 2.5 g Insta Cure #1 use if you plan on smoking or to preserve the color
- 2.5 g white pepper
- 5.5 g turbinado sugar
- 2 g garlic powder
- 2 g mace
- 2.75 g coriander powder
- 2.75 g dried marjoram
- 1 g ground celery seed
- 7.5 g mustard powder
- 8 g smoked paprika
- 30 g potato starch or non fat dry powder milk
- 250 g ice water (or crushed ice)
Instructions
- prepare your meat and fat (if you are adding fat) for your grinder. Slice into thin strips and place in the freeze to chill. You want the temp to be below 35F
- Once chilled grind your meat and fat together 3 times. First on a 10mm, next on a 4.5mm, finally on a 3mm. If you don't have a 3mm plate then grind it twice on a 4.5mm.
- Add your ground meat mixture to a stand mixer. Slowly add the seasonings. Add the water a little at a time as you mix on low/medium. Once you have the farce well mixed (be careful to not overmix) remove from the stand mixer and stuff into your 21mm cellulose casings and for the links.
- **If you are using Insta Cure #1 be sure to allow the hot dogs to rest in the refrigerator over night before cooking..
- Cook the hot dogs in some simmering water (176F) till the internal temperature reaches 135-140f (this is for all beef. If you are adding pork you need to bring the temp to 150-155f)
- cool in ice water and remove the casing. Your hot dogs are finished. Enjoy for lunch and freeze whats left in a vacuum sealed pouch for later.
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I really was inspired by you guys. I’m seriously thinking about doing this product especially the hotdogs. I would like to make a product that is delicious, affordable and most important halal. Since there is only one company doing it where I live I know I can provide an excellent product based on what I’ve seen on your videos. I would really like to know more.
After we butcher our cow next week, I plan on trying this recipe out. Have you ever tried leaving the curing salt out? What are the pros and cons of doing so? Is it just color retention or is it for safety as well?
Hello Amy. The cure does add a unique “hammy” flavor and preserves the color. If you don’t plan on smoking these hot dogs it’s completely optional. The end result will have a greyish poached meat appearance but will still be super tasty
Hi! I am looking to do a 150/lbs batch and want to try this recipe. any advice in regards to salt ratio and other spices? im not sure if I follow the algorith it will yield the proper meat to salt ratio as well as spices such as mace
regards!
Hi Kenny. If you enter 68100 (150 pounds in grams) in the “servings” box the recipe will automatically convert the rest of the ingredients. If you want to see the results in OZ, then click on the US customary option. I just double checked and all of the conversions look good. Just a though though. Shouldn’t you just try a quick 2-4 pound batch to make sure you like it?
wish I could, im doing it in a commercial processing facility for family and friends… 150/lbs batch is the minimum they will entertain for me… acctually held off since last comment I made … planning on processing april 28th … hope it comes out okay
HOW DID IT GO?!
Hi, I plan to try this with venison and pork shoulder ( Boston butt). Which color mustard is Recomended? I have brown and yellow. Is the marjoram supposed to be ground? What ratio of pork to venison should I go with? I have a 44 lb meat mixer that hooks to my Weston 3/4 hp grinder. Is there a specific amount of mixing time I should shoot for? I plan on making at least 40 lbs, but was thinking of doing a test batch first. Thanks for any advice.
I use yellow mustard. The marjoram is not ground (although you can use ground if you want). I would do at least 30% pork fat and a 40% pork to 60% venison ratio (but that’s just a personal preference). Mixing should happen till your meat mixture is very sticky and tacky. It’s different for everyone..
this is the recipe I tried last time… came out not so great … ended up donating most of the batch … really need to up my game
110 LB LEAN or 85lb lean
40 LB fat or 65lb- 50/50
20 LB ICE
FRANK SEASONING f4009
3 lb MUSTARD
1.35 LB SALT,
.50LB GARLIC,
.35 LB SMOKE,
.10 LB BLACK PEPPER.
.60 PAPRIKA
.65 CHERRY POWDER
.65 CELERY POWDER
I like their hot dogs but I really loved their polish sausage. Does anyone have a Recipe clone for their polish sausages. They stop making them and I’d like to make my own.
So, If I want to smoke the hotdogs do I remove the casing before smoking them?
Thanks
Leave the casing on when you smoke them.
Thanks
do you par freeze before bagging for sous vide cooking? also if smoking do you suggest smoking on racks or hanging?
I didn’t in this video but you could par freeze and that would be ok. Also hang or place on racks to smoke would both be fine.. If you placed them on racks then the bottom will get smokier but it’ll cook more evenly..
So, I tried them, they turned out good, but mine turned out “soft” and a bit “dry” on the inside. I do not know why. I also feel like it is lacking something flavor wise, but I do not know. I also did not get that “bite” like you get with hebrew national 🙁 maybe you have some tips?
So, “soft” and “dry” means that something went wrong during your processing stage. Perhaps during the grinding you might have smeared the fat (meat wasn’t cold enough or blades on the grinder was dull). This would cause a “dry” sausage. The soft part comes down to texture. Did you add the potato starch? This really firms up the sausage when it cooks which will also give you a snappy hot dog
Idk what happened, I made extra ground meat during the process and it was delicious. I used potato starch for sure, it’s the only starch they sell where I live. I will have to try again and go from there. I was precise temperatures, even insuring I chilled the parts to the grinder. I could have been off with fat percentage tho, the butchers here really did not know anything about what percentage of fat the cuts were and I had to special order the fat from Munich because no stores sold any other than melted soft fat.
I did try again later and the dryness was no longer an issue just texture.
Would you say the the texture is soft and pillowy or rubbery and chewy.
felicitaciones excelente salchicha sin cutter
I’ve made these in the past and they turned out great…question…can I substitute nutmeg for mace? If so, do I increase or decrease the amount?
Sure. If you add nutmeg, I would double the amount of mace
So, I tried to make these using a silicone mold to avoid the casings. I tried steaming them and what ended up happening was all the fat rendered and they shrunk up and came out looking like breakfast sausages.
Anyway to keep the fat from completely rendering out of the meat when you cook it?
There’s a good chance that the fat smeared during the grinding step. Make sure that the temp of the meat is under 34F at all times. Also make sure that your grinder plate and knife are sharp (this can also smear the fat when grinding meat). When you cook the meat make sure your temp isn’t too hot. This can also leak out the fat. Hope that helps
Eric, Thanks for all the hard work. Any idea for modifications to this recipe or another recipe for making a copy-cat of the Hebrew National 97% Fat Free Beef Franks?
Not sure. I need to experiment with a few binders to see if we can get a low fat product put together that’s still nice and juicy. Soy Protein Isolate is a very interesting ingredient to use for low fat sausages.
Just started making sausage & have enjoyed your videos. I have two questions to making the hot dogs. 1. Can I just use Non-Fat Milk Powder instead of Potato Starch? 2. The website ingredient calculator has the “water” at 25%. Is this correct? Thank you.
Yes. NFDM is an ok substitute and when it comes to emulsified sausages you can add between 15%-25% liquid