Stuffing sausage with the grinder

[JBE]

Have any of you fellas used the cabelas carnivore 3/4 or 1 hp grinders or similar grinder to stuff?
I know the uprights work very well as I have used them but seeing as I have to buy one or both now, I want to know if I can get away with just using the grinder this year. Anyone have any input?

[Fastfred]

During my first year making sausage, I used the grinder. +

I really did not like the texture that the sausage had and before I made the second batch I bought a vertical stuffer.

I know others that have had no issues with the grinder but my experience was not good!

[SamSteele]

I use the Cabelas 1hp grinder to stuff. If you do go that route you need to get the foot pedal to keep control.



50 of 100 lbs I made this past fall. Grinder in the background.

[JBE]

Originally Posted by SamSteele

I use the Cabelas 1hp grinder to stuff. If you do go that route you need to get the foot pedal to keep control.



50 of 100 lbs I made this past fall. Grinder in the background.

Thanks.

[IronNoggin]

Yep. We used the 1 HP Cabelas unit to stuff for a couple of years.
Literally hundreds of pounds:



Simply didn't want to outlay the coin for a large, dedicated stuffer.
Buddy went and bought the Big One from Cabelas though, and he only charges us a link or two for it's use:



Depends on the type of sausage you will be making.
The stuffer REALLY shines when there are multiple chunky ingredients.

Cheers,
Nog

[WhiteTailAB]

Kind of off topic but on topic. I see you guys don't really twist your links so how do you manage the real long links? (Such as the last photo) do you smoke it and then cut it after? I'm a noob so I'm curious how you manage/pack it.

[SamSteele]

Mine are twisted, just hard to see in the big pile. Each link is about 2 feet long, but eyeballed as I’m stuffing.

[ghostguy6]

Once you get a dedicated stuffer you will never go back. I can put out 25 lbs in about 30 min with the 11lbs hand crank where the grinder attachment would take 3 hours or more.

[IronNoggin]

Originally Posted by WhiteTailAB

I see you guys don't really twist your links so how do you manage the real long links? (Such as the last photo) do you smoke it and then cut it after?

We simply shoot them into the long coils you see initially, and then twist them into links and cut once the lot has been shot.
Some are "smokie" size, others garlic coil size.
All depends on the product.

Originally Posted by ghostguy6

Once you get a dedicated stuffer you will never go back. I can put out 25 lbs in about 30 min with the 11lbs hand crank where the grinder attachment would take 3 hours or more.

While I do like the stuffer, we never encountered the problems you mention using the grinder. If the housing / auger are cold & the meat mix ice cold, the grinder should easily keep up with the stuffer. It is more a matter of the consistency of the sausage desired than anything else with us...

Cheers,
Nog

[jcrayford]

I have a LEM 1HP grinder and 20# Cabelas vertical stuffer.

Tried using the LEM to stuff a couple of years ago, turned everything into paste going into the casings. Now with the vertical stuffer, I've got a motor to stuff when working alone and a foot pedal control, or when working with buddies I can use the motor or hand crank. The vertical stuffer really shines when doing something with cheese (Jalapeno and Cheese pepperoni or Maple and Cheese smokies) as the cheese doesn't get "blended" into the meat and remains chunks.

Last time around, did 3.5" Summer Sausage with mustard seed and Hi-temp Cheese and they came out fan-fricking-tastic!!! Some might even call them exquisite.

Like Ghost says, once you have tried a vertical stuffer for stuff like I've mentioned above, you will never consider stuffing with a grinder again.

The only thing I'd change about my stuffer (and I'm working on this) is to get a longer small stuffing tube for the pepperoni sticks as the current one won't load on a complete collagen casing. The 20# tube definitely will hold enough meat mixture.

J.

[SamSteele]

I see a lot of guys mentioning that stuffing with your grinder makes the sausage consistency like paste. I can’t speak for the other makes, but on the Cabelas grinders you remove the grind plate and blade and simply insert the “stuffing star” (their term, not mine) and the stuffing tube pieces.

If you don’t do this you will be grinding already ground meat, making the texture really fine (like paste) and it would take forever to stuff as the auger doesn’t have much to “grab” and force through the plate.

If you use the stuffing star and tube, no plate and no blade you should have no change to your consistency and it shouldn’t take long to stuff your sausage. I stuffed 100 lbs in around an hour last time.