I am going to try and save some money this year by grinding and making my own breakfast sausage and ground meat. My wife does not think venison sausage or ground meat taste as good as beef. She like Owens regular and hot breakfast sausage if anybody has a recipe that ends up tasting simular, I would appreciate the help. Also, I would like to know if any of you have tips how to make ground venison have simular texture and taste to beef, we usually eat 85/15 or 90/10 ground meat for reference. Gigem "83".

We had all of our link sausage made by the pros this year but did all of our pan sausage/hamburger meat on our own.

We've made our own pan sausage before, but this year it turned out the best we've ever made. Basically, what we did different this year than in years past:

1) use beef fat instead of pork fat, even for the pan sausage. In the past we've used pork fat for pan sausage and beef fat for burgers, but this year we used beef fat for all of it. Our local grocery store meat dept gives away the beef fat, so the price was right.

2) 80/20 lean to fat ratio. So, 2 lbs of fat for 8 lbs of venison/pork gave us 10 pounds of meat. We probably made close to 100 lbs between pan sausage and burger meat. In the past we've made it closer to 90/10, and it is so much better this go around.

As far as spices go, we used Zach's country style sage pork sausage seasoning.

https://www.zachspice.com/online-store/!/Old-Fashion-Pork-Sausage-Seasoning-For-25-of-Sausage/p/45179401

We followed the amounts on the package pretty closely, but we made sure not to over-season the sausage meat and then fried some up to make sure it was to our liking. It's easier to add more spice than to get it out.

Edit to add: my mom (who isn't much of a country gal, but is getting better every year) loves the venison hamburger meat and pan sausage we made, which is saying something considering she won't even eat the Jimmy Dean pan sausage. I think we convinced her that, at least with our homemade sausage, she was there every step of the way and knows exactly how it was made, which is more than she can say about any of the stuff from the store.

Here's my recipe for breakfast sausage

5 lbs of Venison cubed into 2" chunks
2 lbs fatback (you'll have to ask a butcher) cut in 2" chunks. Pork belly may work too.
2 lbs Pork Butt cut in 2" cubes. Many stores have it as carnitas already cut up

Take meat and spread it out on sheet pans and freeze for about 30 minutes

In a large bowl, make a rub using;
1/4 cup Kosher Salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 Tbls fresh ground pepper
2 Tbls fat replacer
1 Tbls red pepper flakes
1 Tbls rubbed sage
1 Tbls ground ginger
1 Tbls garlic powder
1 Teaspoon nutmeg

You can also add:
Mace, allspice, clove, finely chopped rosemary. Just experiment until you find what you like


Add the meat and toss with the spice rub to combine and evenly distribute Venison, Pork, and Fat.

Run it through a grinder at your preferred setting.

my only advise is to season the meat before you grind it.

My favorite kind of deer sausage is 100% pure pork

Mix your venison with bacon 50/50. Buy the ends and pieces at HEB. Or try the mixtute you like best. We started 50/50 and are now 60/40. Great burgers, season like you would a burger

The Owens sausage she likes is 100% pork. You can get butts on sale and make your own 100% pork breakfast sausage as well. I do this from time to time.

KW02 said:

---

The Owens sausage she likes is 100% pork. You can get butts on sale and make your own 100% pork breakfast sausage as well. I do this from time to time.

---

Grind up everything but the bone from a pork butt/shoulder, and it will still be leaner than any commercial sausage I've eaten.

Which is why my deer/pork grind, using pork shoulder, is a lean mix (by any commercial standard). Very versatile in our cooking. Some is seasoned (ala pan sausage), other just plain.

We make venison burgers. Grind half venison and half I trimmed brisket with some of our homemade bacon.

Breakfast Sausage:

We use 17lbs of venison to 8 lbs of pork.

For pork we buy HEB pork butts when put on sale at $1 a lb.

Debone venison and pork, use 1 package of Legg's Breakfast Sausage seasoning. Season before you grind and mix the meat together well before you grind. If you want hot sausage, add whatever peppers you want before you grind. Grind meat, package, freeze. Tastes better than any sausage you can buy in the store.

50lb venison
8lb pork shoulder
half brisket

LEM/Backwoods breakfast & spicy breakfast kits are tasty

Thanks for the input. I will be trying soon. Any good beef or venision summer sausage receipts

aggie7405 said:

---

Thanks for the input. I will be trying soon. Any good beef or venision summer sausage receipts

---

Based on the suggestions here,I used the REO summer sausage mix and it turned out good. Bought the casing from there too. This was a test run. Next batch will have cheese, jalapeno and some 1/2 cracked black pepper.