Cured Sausage
Enjoy delicious, Spanish-style chorizo.
- Difficulty (0 = Caveman, 5 = Thomas Keller): 5
- Serving size: 6-8 sausages
- Prep time: 5 hours
- Cure time: 42-56 days
- Meat temp: Cured
Ingredients:
- 5 g Prague powder #2
- 62 g sea salt
- 2 tbsp white wine
- 10 threads saffron
- 1/2 cup paprika
- 3 tbsp onion granules
- 1 tbsp nutmeg
- 5 lbs short rib meat (excluding bones)
- Beef casings
Directions:
- Ground the short ribs to a fine ground in your meat grinder. It is very important to weigh your ingredients here. Prague powder can be toxic in high amounts, so eyeballing it isn’t a good idea. The ratio I’ve given you is perfect. Don’t be scared by the “can be toxic”, it’ll be okay I promise.
- Add the Prague powder, white wine, sea salt, saffron, paprika, onion and nutmeg. Mix for 5 minutes. It needs to be very well incorporated (you do not need the Prague powder if you’re going to make fresh sausage).
- Let the mix set refrigerated overnight.
- Soak the beef casings in water for one hour. Then, open the ends and rinse the insides free of all their salt.
- Tie an end to the sausage with a double knot, and begin to stuff the sausage, pack them full. Fill to your desired lengths and repeat. Weigh and label each sausage
- Take a corn holding pick or a clean needle and stab the casing all over. Don’t stab downward or use a knife as this will cause the weight to collapse and the sausage to rip open.
- Hang in the back of your fridge tied to SOMETHING. I use string to tie to my sausage ends then tie around the back of my fridge shelves. Make sure nothing touches them while they age.
- After about 6 weeks, weigh the sausage again. When they have lost 30% of their moisture, they’re ready to slice and eat! You can let them age another 3 weeks if you like a very dry sausage.
Need more help?
Have questions on the recipe or how to prepare your Designer Beef? Shoot an email to our Chef: myk@designyourbeef.com
Myk Walton is a Professional Chef who loves to share his culinary creations (and music, family, etc.) on Instagram (@mykwalton). He named his Designer Beef cow “Gomer” and has dedicated himself to making the most of Gomer’s sacrifice by helping others do the same!
