Germany’s oldest and most iconic sausage
Follow basic sausage preparation practices when making this sausage.
- Clean and sanitize all of your equipment before and after use.
- Chill your meat to below 34f or 1c before grinding.
- Before you mix your meat make sure you rechill to 34f or 1c, if you add any liquid make sure its ice
- Mix the meat, liquid, and seasonings till the mince becomes very tacky.
- Stuff the mince into sausage casings and prick out any air pockets or just make sausage patties.
- Cook till you reach your desired internal temp.
Here are a few things you might find useful when making this sausage
- SavorYe Flavor Booster
- 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.
2 Guys & A Cooler Amazon Storefront
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!!
Thüringer Bratwurst
An iconic German Bratwurst
How much do you want to make? 1000 grams
Ingredients
- 200 g veal beef can be used
- 300 g pork belly
- 400 g pork shoulder
- 100 g back fat
- 15 g salt
- 2.5 g white pepper
- .5 g mace
- .5 g caraway seed
- .25 g caraway powder
- 3 g garlic powder
- 2 g dried marjoram
- 20 g milk powder high heat
- 7 g savorye
- 100 g milk cream can also be used
- hog casing 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
- Clean your meat of any silver skin, sinew, arteries and cut into small strips or cubes. Keep the beef/veal separated from the belly, shoulder and the back fat. Place in the freezer for an hour or until the temp reaches 32f – 34F. (0c-1c)
- Grind your chilled beef/veal twice on a 5mm plate then grind the belly, shoulder, and back fat once on a 10mm plate.
- Mix the chilled meat with the spices till it becomes very tacky. If you grab a small handful, it will stick to your hand if you hold your hand upside down.
- 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.
- 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.
We are Amazon Affiliates which means if you happen to buy something from Amazon after clicking one of our links, we get a tiny percentage. This happens at no cost to you and really helps us offset the costs of running this site. Thank you in advance.

The video shows marjoram (which definitely does belong in Thüringer Bratwurst), but the recipe above does not list the marjoram. Could you update the ingredients please?
thanks for catching that. I must have missed it when updating the recipe. The recipe now shows the correct ingredients.
Thank you sir! :-)