Doc-G

June 23, 2006

This was lunch from a couple of weeks ago. Thought I should get the camera out.

Whilst we didn't have noodles as such, we did have Wonton's which are sort of like noodles right?

Stock was made from the remnants of a roast chicken so there were plenty of nicely browned bits of bone and skin plus the lemon and garlic which had stuffed the chicken. After boiling and skimming this for a couple of hours, it was strained and chilled. The fat was scooped off the next day and kept for frying potatoes (yum!).

To make the soup, a small amount of stock was heated in a saucepan, some soya added with some ginger. Later, wontons with bok choi, coriander leaves all roughly chopped were added.

It was a very simple soup but very tasty and very cleansing after a weekend of heavy haute cuisine.

Asian Noodles (Doc-G style)

Anyway, any excuse for a little bit of food porn!!

Cheers,

Doc-G

June 23, 2006

Hi Guys and Gals,

Thought I would do a little update.

I have made some Spanish Chorizo and some Hungarian Salami. We had to make a couple of recipe adjustments for Salt as we have different versions of Starter Cultures, Nitrates and Nitrites here in Australia.

I have to say that we were pretty pleased with the results. I even made a little label from our company labels to make it up as a 'packaged product' to give out to friends as presents.

Hope you like!!

Spanish Chorizo

Hungarian Salami

Labeled up as 'Presents'

I'm following all the stuff everyone here is doing and have to say that this would surely have to be the most impressive thread on egullet at the moment. Well done to everybody for keeping the interest up.

Cheers,

Doc-G

June 17, 2006

Ok all you 'ultra-trash cuisine' food snobs!

Here is the version with bacon. So not putting in Tomato sauce improves the flavour slightly and caramelisation of the bacon lends itself to the sweetness of the donut. That said however after some advice from readers, I also fried the donut in the bacon fat for that full Luther burger experience. The overwhelming mouthfeel of grease and fat on the palate however gives this version a worse mouthfeel than the last version with the Tomato Sauce.

Even if you ask nicely, this is something that I will not repeat again EVER!!!

If you want more pictures, then some of you are just going to have to get off your high horses and do it yourselves!!!

For the sake of accuracy, I have updated my my full article, which is posted here.

http://www.foodologist.com/?p=34

Thankyou all for your feedback!

Doc-G

June 16, 2006

Do whatever you want with it. Put bacon or anything else in it. It will still be disgusting!

btw No one else seems to be doing it and for good reason...its bloody awful

June 16, 2006

I did it.

Here it is.

All I can say is that I went in to this with an open mind, not really knowing how it would taste. I wasn't expecting much but didn't think it would taste too bad.

It was one of the worst gastronomic experiences I have ever had. I have documented it in much more detail here if you are interested.

http://www.foodologist.com/?p=34

The only thing left to really say about this is...Dont try this at home!!!

May 10, 2006

Those jowls do look a little 'funky'. I dont know whether the stuff leached is from a gland because the gland should be inactive as the animal is dead. Dont quote me on this however.

However something else unwanted might produce those liquids (ie when meat starts to turn, it becomes slimy as a result of the bacterial build up). Smelling it should give you the answer.

When I did my smallgoods making course, we were told ALWAYS to look for small glands whilst trimming our pork. In the first piece I was given, I cut out 3 of the little suckers. They are about the size of your little fingernail and not quite meat coloured and obviously not white like fat. They were kind of 'pinkish-purple'.

Best of luck with your products. It will be interesting to hear what happens!

Cheers,

Doc-G

March 10, 2006

Just made some Maple cured smoked bacon.

I started with a pork belly.

This was then cryovaced for two weeks with a mixture of salt, brown sugar, maple syrup and sodium nitrite.

After being cured, the belly looks like this.

The meat has a more translucent look from the cure and has taken on more colour from the addition of nitrites.

The belly was then placed in the smoke oven at 30 degrees centigrade for four hours. This is to dry out the meat a little to allow the smoke to adhere to the meat by forming what is known as a pellicle. If the meat is too wet, the smoke will not attach itself to the meat.

After this, the belly was smoked with redgum sawdust at 85 degrees centigrade until the internal temperature of the belly reached 68 degrees centigrade. When it came out, it looked spectacular as can be seen in the two pictures below.

After placing the belly in a cooler for 24 hours and the bacon reaching an internal temperature of less than 4 degrees centigrade, it was ready to slice and eat.

Conclusions

This bacon was very easy to make and similar results could be achieved merely with the use of an oven rather than a dedicated smoke oven.

The recipe called for approximately 15g/kg salt. By Australian standards this is very lightly salted for a bacon. The results confirmed this with nearly everyone who tried it saying it was not salty enough except for one person who was known for not liking things with any salt added. Next time I make it, I will add closer to 22g/kg salt to the cure. Some people also said it was a little sweet although not overpowering. This was acceptable given that it was a sweet maple cured bacon.

February 23, 2006

Hi People,

Just a quick update. The course starts next week proper but we have just met eachother and gone through the first week of admin/get to know eachother/get our reading.

We are an eclectic group with people of varying ages, educational backgrounds and ethnicity. However what is clear so far is that we all share a profound interest in food. I would have to say it bodes well for an interesting course from this perspective.

We just received the reading for the first 6 weeks. I'm sure anyone would agree that it truly is a huge amount of reading!! Having looked through it however, it all looks interesting and varied. The first subject is called 'Principles of Gastronomy'. The subject matter is of course self-explanatory.

I will update this thread again at some point in the future when I have something relevent to add. Maybe someone else on the course will have something else to say!!

Cheers,

Doc-G

February 13, 2006

Hi Ronnie,

I wouldn't worry about these 'spider lines'.

I speak here from my previous life as a physiologist rather than as a meat guy (as I consider myself now!). I am pretty sure that these 'spider lines' are the remnants of blood vessels within the gut wall. During rest in man, a whopping 30% of the cardiac output goes to the GI tract via the splanchnic blood supply. I'm sure a similarly impressive amount is supplied to the GI tracts of the animals that supply the beautiful sausage skins that we use. After the majority of tissue is 'washed' away during the cleaning and salting procedure to make the sausage skins these lines that are left over I'm pretty sure are what is visibly leftover from the larger blood vessels.

Back with my 'meat guy' hat on now, these lines are present in the majority of the premium sausages that I have judged in competitions and are THE easiest way to see that a natural skin is being used as the 'curve' can be replicated in collagen skins.

I just changed the picture from the one I previously posted to one of some Kranskies we made today. Here the 'spider lines' are very prominent.

I think these lines 'show off' the fact that you have bothered to use a a good quality natural casing and are indicative of a well made sausage.

Well done.

As a side note, I am about to make my first batch of 'American style' sweet maple cured bacon from the book. The bacon we make in Australia is usually 'pumped' with brine and then held in a holding brine overnight before smoking and also incorporates the eye fillet (is this the same as Canadian bacon?). The type of sweet, streaky bacon that you guys in the US make is sure making me excited. I have just spent half the night readjusting the 'basic cure' recipe from Charcuterie to account for the curing agent that we use (ours has twice as much Sodium Nitrate to the pink salt described in the book). I'm not sure if I'll bother posting pics as so many people have already made the bacon and documented their post beautifully, but I will let you know how it tastes. I'm really looking forward to it.

Cheers,

Doc-G

February 1, 2006

Hi,

For our R&D department we have the same one as Melkor. We find it very useful for doing small runs of new varieties of sausage for tastings. It is easy to use and easy to clean and you can easily control the rate at which the filler works. Only possible drawback is that with the more tricky things, you may need a second person to help!!

The other thing is that you also get 3 different sized nozzles for filling different sized casings so you can 'thins' and 'thicks' (as we call them) as well as really big salamis etc...

Just my 0.2c worth!

Cheers

Doc-G

January 31, 2006

Hi

I just received my copy of Charcuterie in the post from Amazon in the US. I would like to take the opportunity to congratulate Michael and Brian on producing such a great book and making all this information accessible to the average home chef.

Again, well done.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 28, 2006

Saw this topic and thought it looked interesting.

I cant think of a single self respecting Australian house that does not have a fridge full of beer and soft drink sitting in the garage!!!

I say go for it....

Regards,

Doc-G

January 28, 2006

Hi Ray,

That is an interesting point. Is the redgum the same as the red gum that we have here in Australia? The reason I ask is that Redgum is seen as a very good thing to smoke with here in Australia. It's a pretty well established thing here and people pay a premium to buy small goods smoked in red gum.

That said however, I will try something else tomorrow if I can.

Thanks for the advice anyway. Let me know however if you can about whether your redgum and the one we have here are the same. The redgum here is a type of eucalyptus (Eucalyptus Rostrata) and is a hard wood with a red colour. Having seen some pics on the web, your Liquidambar styraciflua looks very different. That is all I know about it. You would think that the smallgoods industry here would know if it was toxic or not but I wouldn't put it past them to use something toxic!

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 27, 2006

Thanks for the tips.

I'll lighten up on the smoke next time and make sure it is a little better ventilated.

To answer a couple of the questions:

Redgum is a type of wood. It is pretty popular here in Australia for smokng smallgoods.

I have also left out celery on the rub and cut down on the paprika. So hopefully will improve the flavour.

I will let you guys know how it all works out.

Thanks again.

January 27, 2006

Greetings fellow foodies,

I have a question to ask. I recently smoked some pork ribs. I smoked them in my SmoKing 1100 Turbo Smallgoods smoke oven at 100 degrees centigrade for 3.5 hours with RedGum wood chips.

I used a rub which contained from memory: salt, pepper, paprika, brown sugar, celery powder, cayenne pepper, onion powder, garlic powder.

Due to lack of time I used a store bought BBQ sauce.

The flavour was good but they had a slight bitter or acrid taste. I ever so slightly remember something about certain smoking conditions that could cause this. Could somebody tell me if this is the case?

Could it possibly be caused by the rub or the sauce?

I know paprika can be very bitter if too much is used. A combination of paprika and smoke perhaps?

For the next batch I am using ColKlink's rub and a home made BBQ sauce. The rub was excellent on my brisket so I assume it will also work well with the ribs. The sauce I made is much better than the store bought one. I also removed the membrane from the ribs this time so I expect to get a better result this time rather than chewy ones I got last time.

Any other tips that anyone can give?

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 27, 2006

Hi Pam

Great job. You are right, they do look a little 'plasticy'. Now that I've seen them , I really do wonder if they are more designed for cured or smoked sausages ..

Next time you order some casings, ask for either natural sheep or hog skins or if you want synthetic ones, ask for collagen casings. The ones we use are made by Devro-Teepak in Germany. I'm sure you can get these or something similar where you are.

Anyway, well done. I think they look great.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 26, 2006

Hi Pam,

I'm not exactly sure what sort of casings you have but if they are collagen casings made possibly by Devro then they are totally edible. Collagen is the stuff your skin is predominantly made of and this stuff is basically grown in tube shapes. It is popular because it does not break and produces VERY consistent results.

It is possible that it is skin designed more for smallgoods which are inedible and are not supposed to be eaten. However without knowing exactly which skins you have, I cant tell for certain.

Sounds as though it well well however. I loo forward to seeing the pictures.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 25, 2006

Hi Pam,

You might want to consider adding some chicken skin to the mix. You will find that you will not only get a better flavour but the mixture will bind much better too. I would if possible add 25% of the weight of the meat with chicken skin.

Personally I would add (btw I have not tried this recipe and have just made it up now, this is just an idea):

Per kg meat weight (includes skin):

Salt 16g/kg

Black Pepper 2g/kg

Ground Cinnamon (to complement the apple) 1g/kg

Chilli Powder 1g/kg

Onion Powder 2g/kg

Optional ingredients:

MSG 1g/kg

The other thing you could consider adding is some breadcrumbs to 'loosen' the mixture somewhat. I leave the amount you add up to you as I have forgotten the usage that we would use (sorry!).

Apple (peeled and cored) chopped or grated and added as you see fit. (1 apple per 1.5kg meat?).

Coarse mince chicken and skin through the large plate (10mm). Then add all dry ingredients and mix well by hand for 10minutes ensuring that temperature of mixture does not rise above 5 degrees centigrade. If temp rises above 5 degrees, refridgerate until temp reaches 2-3 degrees centigrade.

Mince again through small plate (3 or 5mm plate) and mix in grated or chopped apple and mix well again for 10 minutes. The mixture should be VERY sticky. This means that the reaction between the salt and myosin has occurred and the protein has extracted. Refridgerate again until mixture reaches 2-3 degrees centigrade whilst you get your sausage filler ready.

Fill into casings and link, then refridgerate until ready for cooking.

With regards to your casings, I assume they look slightly yellow in colour but are completely dry and look like a long 'ruffled up' tube of skin. We refridgerate ours in the boxes they come in but you MUST ensure that they stay dry!!

I dont want to tell you how to suck eggs here but just in case you have not done this before, here is a very brief and possibly convoluted method for filling your sausages.

If these are the casings you are using (I assume they are made of collagen) you dont need to do anything to them before you start filling. You put the tube onto the end of your filler and start the filler to get the air out of the end of the filler then tie a knot in the end of your skin and start filling being careful not to overfill or underfill. You will eventually know from experience what this means! If the skin breaks, tear it off, tie the end and start again. You will end up with one reeaallly long sausage. You then have to link it. If you have not done this before, the easiest way is to grab the end and pinch with your left hand (I assume you are right handed) where you want the first sausage to end, then you pinch with your right hand where you want the second sausage to end (hint: it should be the same length as the first one funnily enough!!). Then you twist or 'roll' the link towards you a couple of times. You have now made the second link. You now get the long end and measure off again with your left hand and then again with your right and again twist or roll except this time, the other direction (ie away from you). Continue until you have a whole heap of sausages.

Enjoy!

If you do use this recipe or a modified version, please let us know (with pictures) how they worked out.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 15, 2006

if you mix and knead so hard, how do yo ustop the fat from smearing?
←

For a cooked sausage, (ie a banger etc) I wouldn't worry about fat smearing. However if you wanted to make a cured and smoked/fermented salami where the meat and fat granules have to be the same size, you would need to use a bowl cutter. The other thing is if you really wanted to prevent fat smearing would be to use very hard fat and keeping the mixture very cold helps too although the colder it is, the more mixing is required to extrude the myosin.

Hope this is of help

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 11, 2006

Doc-G, so many questions! I'll start small: how do you maintain the low temps with all that grinding and mixing?
←

Hi Chris,

I dont know what I've gotten myself into here!!!

For a start we have refridgerated rooms so it means that everything in the room is 4 degrees or less (except the people...I hope!!). I fully understand you wont have this situation at home though. Secondly, if the temperature of the meat (which is measured after every grind) rises to 5 degrees centigrade, we will put it back in the fridge until it goes back down to 1-2 degrees centigrade and then keep going. Generally speaking however, the meat stays between 1-4 degrees centigrade. Within the realm of Australian Food Standards, this is considered safe practice and this is something that you can do in your do in your own kitchen although you will spend more time waiting around looking for something else to do. We always have something else to do!!! Finally you can use ICE cold water (assuming you mix water in as an ingredient) which will help too.

Also, we dont make any emulsion sausages in production for sale. We occasionally make some for our own use like the Weisswurst earlier in the thread. If we did, we would buy a bowl cutter which would mean we wouldn't have to do 5 grinds on a 3mm plate. However if making emulsion mixes for our own use, we do the 3-5 grinds.

edit: Just looking over the thread, I see you are chilling before you start which is good. You may if you feel like want to chill the mixture again before filling it out.

I've only just ordered the Ruhlman book, so I'm not sure if I'm 'sucking eggs' here but a little secret is that the mixing time is 'ESSENTIAL'. Mixing salt with meat and working it hard by kneading or mixing, extrudes the myosin from the meat which makes the mixture extra 'sticky' and really helps the mixture bind. You will find that a properly mixed and made sausage will not have to be pricked when cooked and will not release much (or any) fat or water whilst cooking.

For someone making it for themselves in their own kitchen, I would say, have your ingredients ICE cold before you start. This can include your dry ingredients too! (When we make schnitzels, we can put up to 1 tonne of breadcrumbs in our chiller the night before the next days production in order to bring all the ingredients down to temperature). After you have finished mixing before you are ready to fill out your sausages, I would recommend leaving the mix in the fridge for an hour or two, to bring down the temp and then fill the skins and then back into the fridge.

Torakris,

Having had a look at your mincer from the link you provided, I would use the large plate first and then mix in your water (if using) and dry ingredients and then mix it and then put it through the small plate and mix again, chill and then fill.

I hope this helps....

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 11, 2006

Kristin, those look great (and great photos, too). It looks like you ground the meat very fine, yes?
←
What size discs is everyone using??
Where can I buy more sizes?
←

You guys have all made some great looking 'snags' by the way!!!

We always first use 'kidney' plate and then a 10mm plate and then we mix in our dry ingredients and work it for 8 minutes and then we mince again through a 10mm and a 5mm plate or 3mm plate. If I am making a 'thick' sausage, I will probably use the 5mm plate and for 'thins' I use a 3mm plate. If I am making an emulsion type sausage, we will use the 3mm plate and mince it through 3-5 more times to really get a fine texture. We will then work it (mix) for another 5-8 minutes ensuring that the mixture does not rise above 7 degrees centigrade.

I dont know what machine you have so I'm not sure where you will be able to buy more mincing plates.

Hope this is of use.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 9, 2006

(chrisamirault Posted Today, 05:54 AM)
George, do you have any additional information about the program besides that which can be found at the link that Mel provided above?

Hi Chris, wish I could help you but that is the link with the best information. I've not been able to find any better. You can always get more info from Barbara Santich who runs the school.

(Carolyn Tillie @ Oct 1 2005, 07:56 AM)
But boy, did I ever want to...

Carolyn, there are a few funding opportunities available. I have just been awarded a scholarship that has paid 50% of my fees. I also await news of another scholarship that will pay for some more fees leaving me with just $2000-$3000 to pay which should be managable.

Whilst the applications for 2006 funding have now finished, there are ample opportunities to apply for 2007. The Culinary Institiute of America also offer a number of scholarships. Even eGullet offer scholarships. What you need to do though is get put your detective hat on and find those scholarships. Then you could study online and wouldn't have to worry about flying around the world to little ol' Adelaide!

Anyway, thats my 2c worth!

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 9, 2006

These are my current favourites from my collection that I have recently worked through which havent already been mentioned:

Cooking:

The Cooks Book: Various Authors

The Silver Spoon: Various Authors

Workin' More Kitchen Sessions with Charlie Trotter: Charlie Trotter

BBQ USA: Steve Raichlen

Gastronomy:

Food: A culinary history: Flandrin and Montinari

I also love this book which I read over Christmas.

Physiology of Taste: Or, Meditations on Transcendental Gastronomy: Brillat-Savarin, M. F. K. Fisher

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 9, 2006

What we call Porterhouse here is the Sirloin/New York Strip side of the T-Bone. The other side is of course the fillet.

We do serve T-bones here too but never for two!!! :wink:

It sounds to me like this is what he is referring to. As a participant in the Aussie meat industry, I hope my information is correct, however am willing to be corrected if needed.

Hope this is of use.

Cheers,

Doc-G

January 9, 2006

QUOTE(melkor @ Dec 28 2005, 05:01 PM)
the dogs had a texture I wasn't fond of. In a bun they are fine but on their own they are too soft. I suspect the 5 minute paddling time incorporated too much air into the forcemeat - next time I think we'll stop after 2 minutes.
*
QUOTE(Michael Ruhlman @ Jan 3 2006, 06:28 AM)
I know what you mean about the texture. It doesn't sound like a broken forcemeat. with home equipment, it's hard to get that really tight almost rubbery feel you get from vienna hot dogs. they use high powered choppers. Next time you do an emulsified, try reducing the water and the fat a little.
*

I'm not sure if this has been said previously and I've only just ordered Michaels book over the net so I'm not sure on what the recipe says but another way of getting a texture more similar to the emulsion sausages is to put the meat through the mincer 3 or 4 times, maybe up to 5 times. I know this is time consuming but that is what some butchers here in Australia do to avoid spending significant amounts of money on bowl cutters. You will not get a perfect emulsion but it will be significantly better than one grind and a mix. The other thing is to keep the mix very cold.

If I haven't repeated something someone has already said, I hope this is of help!

Cheers,

Doc-G

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