Here are a few things you might find useful when making this sausage
- Calabrian Pepper Paste
- Calabrian Pepper Powder & Fennel Pollen
- 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
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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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!!
Salsiccia Fresca
Fresh Italian Sausage
How much do you want to make? 1000 grams
Ingredients
- 800 g pork shoulder
- 200 g pork back fat
- 14 g kosher salt
- 3 g black pepper
- 1.5 g fennel pollen
- 1.5 g fennel seed cracked
- 7 g mustard seed
- 1.5 g dried parsley
- .5 g dried thyme
- 4 g Calabrian pepper hot
- 5 g Calabrian pepper sweet
- 20 g potato starch
- 10 g Calabrian pepper paste
- 4 g minced garlic
- 15 ml red wine
- 60 ml water
- hog casings 29mm-32mm
Instructions
Prepare the casing (If you plan on having a cased sausage)
- 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 and spices
- In a small bowl, combine the garlic, wine, water, and the Calabrian pepper paste. Let this mixture hang out for several hours or overnight so that the flavors can mingle.
- Clean your meat of any silver skin, sinew, arteries and cut into small strips or cubes. Place in the freezer for an hour or until the temp reaches 32f – 34F. (0c-1c)
- Grind your chilled meat on a 6mm plate. If you prefer a coarser grind, then grind on an 8mm or 10mm plate
- Mix the chilled meat with the spices and the bowl of liquids prepared earlier till it becomes very tacky. If you grab a small handful, it will stick to your hand if you hold your hand upside down.
- OPTIONAL – Stuff your sausage into a casing and prick out any air pockets. Link the sausage to your desired size and refrigerate overnight. This is a fresh sausage so technically you don't have to refrigerate overnight but if you do the spices will come together better and the little twists between each sausage will dry up. This will keep the meat from spilling out while you cook it.
- Cook the sausage till you reach your desired internal temperature
Cooking a fresh sausage:
- GRILL METHOD | Bring the temperature of your pit to 225f – 300f (107.2c – 148.8c). Place the sausage on the rack and cook till you reach the desired internal temp. Flip often so they cook evenly.
- POACHING | Heat a pot of water to 165f – 176F (73.8 – 80c) and poach the sausage until you hit the desired internal temperature.
- 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.
- 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
- SIMMERING | In a skillet with a little oil and on medium heat, pan fry your sausage till they take on a little color. Add your favorite cooking liquid (water, stock, beer) and simmer your sausage covered till you reach your desired internal temperature.
- BAKING | In a skillet with a little oil and on medium heat, pan fry your sausage till they take on a little color. Then place the sausage in a preheated oven 225f – 300f (107.2c – 148.8c) and bake till you reach your desired internal temperature.
Storage Instructions
- Fresh sausages are more perishable than cured sausages. So, refrigerate them and eat them within 1-2 days.
- You can also place these sausages in a vacuum sealed bag and freeze for later.
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Howdy Eric, thanks for another fun and informative sausage making video. I plan to get more sausage equipment in future.
i very much enjoy your dried cured meat recipes and am now curing a Spanish style lomo after making some great Italian cured beef
SamWise
Thank you
looks great, can’t wait to try it
thank you Eric. Just finished packing up a 20 lbs + batch of this sausage. absolutely love the flavor and slight mouth burn.
Would you be opposed to sous vide the sausage, the pan fry to color without the baking?
Sure, That would work great!!
Haven’t tried it yet but sounds great! I’ve been looking for a “good” fresh Italian sausage recipe! Thank you!
Look great. Thank you for this recipe
This recipe really may be tasty but I looked up the cost of some of the ingredients and I can’t afford them.
There are 1000’s of variations of this recipe. You can use fennel powder instead of fennel pollen, you can omit the Calabrian pepper or sub it with a smoked paprika and even add a little cayenne for heat. It won’t quite be the same but it will certainly be delicious. The only limitation this recipe has is your imagination.
what style of red wine are you using. I am not a wine drinker and do not know the difference between any of the 100s of bottles on the shelves. Thank you and please keep providing such great recipes and videos
Any red wine works. In this case I was using a dry red wine
this recipe looks very good and easy have to get ingredients
Hi Eric, this recipe looks delicious! In the video you use potato starch as a binder, but it’s not in the recipes. What was the percentage that you use? Thanks
I have fixed that. Thank you
Thank for the show. Lot of great information, just great
I looked up prices at Amazon and compared them to Craft Butchers Pantry and did the math and Amazon was $1.38 an oz for their Hot Calabrian (Tuttocalabria Brand 12.34 oz). Craft Butchers Pantry for their Hot Calabrian ( Scalzo Conserve Brand ) was 27.50 for 500g ( 17.64 oz ) or $1.56 per oz. It would be nice to purchase smaller amounts but they seem to be MORE expensive per Ounce as it shrinks in weight. By the way Craft Butcher Pantry is out of Calabrian Sweet Ground Pepper until November sometime. I had bought Calabrian Pepper (Hot) from them a while ago and it took a very long time to use it all up. I did not buy the brand from Amazon this go round due to some consumer complaints. I guess they did not like insects in their ground spice. Anyway this product is hard to source locally…Impossible where I live so mail order is my only option. Maybe you can share the ground pepper and paste and therefore the cost with someone? Good luck.
Hello! Amazing recipe! I’d really like to try it out soon. But I would like to try it out a bit differently. What would you say if I add a bit of meat from the leg, a bit of baked bacon. If I did, what would the quantities be ? For 3kg sausage should I make it 1.9kg shoulder meat, 500g ham meat and 600g fat and about 300g of crispy bacon? Also can the calabrian pepper be replaced with cayenne ? And I think I’d like to add some ground sichuan pepper but I’m really not sure about the quantity..
If in anyway, by what I said above, do you find it offensive, I apologise, I did not mean to offend.
Thanks! :)
made this this morning. absolutely delicious!! only made 4.5lbs. will definitely make a much larger batch next time.