Nice way to end this Hunting Season

Today was the icing on the cake, or in this case sausage in the smokehouse. My Father in law, my Wife and myself made 200 lbs of sausage today, half will be made into dry and the other packaged to get us through till next season. I will be upgrading from a hand crank stuffer to motorized by next year, I feel like I have Popeye arms from pushing out 200 lbs of ground sausage through our stuffer!

Looks good!

Looks great Why the early end to your hunting season?

Looks good John. I feel sorry for whoever had to do all the tying. Got to be some sore fingers.

Hey Don, that would be my wife, she has it down pretty good, she uses water proof tape on her fingers so she doesn't cut into her skin with the string.

We reached our harvest recommendation's earlier than expected this year.

That looks like a pretty decent set-up and a good hand crank you have there. A little extra water in the mix will help A LOT on easing the effort to crank it, it will drip out during smoking/drying. We do 500-600 pounds a year using one that is similar, but we are also considering an electric one. We will keep the hand crank as a back-up.
We use duct tape, electric tape and even masking tape (what ever is handy) on the fingers when tying, when the string starts turning red, you know you have tied too much. A water proof medical tape sound like a good idea.
We will be back at it with normal bunch after the last weekend of doe/spike season.

Thank you for the info on adding water, I was having a problem with meat pushing through the top seal making for lots of resistance while crancking. My wife bought the finger tape at H.E.B it's the waterproof tape that stretches and held up the entire time. I had even cleaned out the cylinder several times applying cooking oil to the walls in an attempt to make the cranking easier. I found that only filling the cylinder 3/4 the way full helped. Thank you again!

Looks great I'm trying to get it down but mine is hit or miss yours looks yummy!

That sausage looks great. Congrats on a successful season

Thank you, This was our 32 year to make sausage, I was officially part of my Wife's Family when I made my first batch of sausage. I never question the secret family recipe. I just provide the muscle. I got moved up in the pecking order when I bought the new grinder, the old Hobart was tired from 20 years before me.

We cooked up a few rings of the smoked sausage on New Years day, it was very good but the flavor of sitting for a while in the freezer will only make it better. I believe the spices become more prevalent after a few weeks. The dry sausage is now in the smoker and will remain for about 5 days with this perfect weather.

Looks and smell good!! Great way for 2018