Beef I like the boneless blade section. Poor man's ribeye, Denver steak, stir fry (poor man's flank steak right beside the Denver), plenty of stew and burger. I usually braise large chunks of stew and pull it, I make wicked "carne asada" nachos with it. My favourite cut to cook and eat is the very first chuck end ribeye, failing that a nice 1.5" striploin or a bavette if it's for lunch. Making prime rib roasts is fun. For charcuterie I'm interested in using the "baseball" muscle from the sirloin to make basturma.

Pork I use whole shoulder for sausages mostly but I'm partial to the midloin chop when it comes to eating. The t-bone pork chop. I like it 1.25" thick. Heritage breed aged for two weeks is God tier chops. I usually go for Mangalitsa breed but our farm didn't have any this time so they sent me Meishan and I'm impressed. Meishan fat is pork fat properties but closer to beef fat flavour. Wow. I have tons of pork products planned in the pipeline. Deli meats, charcuterie, smokies etc.

Lamb I only eat rib or loin chops but use everything for sausage. I LOVE processing lamb racks but unfortunately market conditions led our shop to order them pre-cleaned. Every chance I get I'll clean and french a lamb rack. It's fun.

Chicken is all about the thigh for me. Breast meat is trash these days. North America has overbred our hens to the point they're stacking breast meat TWICE as fast as ten years ago. Problem is the heart can't pump oxygenated blood to the muscle fast enough so the collagen doesn't develop and the spaghetti-sized muscle fibres split apart and look and eat like crap. Thighs are still excellent, almost impossible to overcook and full of flavour. Wings when I'm entertaining (fried in schmaltz ofc). Leg drumsticks when I'm cooking just for me or for staff meal.

Turkey. Don't get me started. It's stupid for every reason imaginable. BUT I am going to make turkey bacon at work soon for the first time and I'm optimistic. Last Thanksgiving I made a turkey breast roulade stuffed with turkey sausage. Year prior it was a spatchcocked bird brined overnight in saltwater and liquid smoke. Divine. This year my brother is cooking it but I'll provide the bird and brine it in the smoke brine again. When I eat turkey I prefer sausages. I make amazing turkey sausages (I leave the skin on when I grind). I find nearly any formulation I use for beef or pork works just as well with turkey. I make a wicked turkey pepperoni that doesn't require fermenting. Mustard powder replaces paprika and bacteria culture to retain the tangy notes.

Aside from the odd custom order that's the bread and butter of what I enjoy at work.

Most independent butcher shops will make their own sausages in house. Feel comfortable asking about ingredients and what specific cuts end up in the grind.

Poultry sausage is the leanest and lowest salt percentage. I prefer turkey over chicken but both can be great.

Thanks.

I can't wait to share the lap cheong post. Expect it mid October, after our Thanksgiving. My first time making it but I'm already planning a Szechuan version for next time.

Everything but the crust. I don't use binders or fillers.

Ingredients are salt, pepper, tomato paste (neutralized with baking soda), dried oregano, chili flakes, ham or cooked bacon, high temp mozzarella (I make my own) and canned pineapple. There's some nuanced technique beyond that but it's literally a Hawaiian pizza on a bun.

The pancetta is tiny, it'll be ready pretty quickly. The coppa is whole and will take a month or two.

I will absolutely post when I begin and again what I glean.

My sausage already has a local fanclub, you'll have to do a bit better than that🤣

Hahaha. Not here. I work in an open shop so everyone can walk back to the window and watch us cut and work. Kids are fascinated watching me make sausage. We have milk crates I'll setup so the younger ones can see over the half wall.

I wouldn't trust a mass produced sausage. The amount of waste I remove...there's a reason we charge more than factory sausage.

Learn what cuts make good cured versions. Pork belly is an excellent starting point.

Get cure salt and optionally a cure accelerator. I use sodium erythorbate but it isn't required.

Tons of tutorials and recipes online, I'm just getting into it so I can't recommend one over another but Two Guys And A Cooler (website and YT channel) is where I began.

You'll need some consumables, whether it's natural or synthetic casing or a collagen dry aging wrap. You can also get dry aging vac bags but they're not the greatest.

Then finally a cure chamber. For some stuff I'll use the cold cellar at my dad's house, for others a standard refrigerator is just fine.

Curing meat is scientific and you MUST be precise with ratios of cure salt, accelerator as well as everything else. Learning the difference between a recipe and a formulation is beneficial as the latter you can tailor to any raw weight and reproduce the same result time and time again. Everything is a percentage or ratio based on raw weight. Cure #1 is 0.25% to 0.3% depending on region. Sodium erythorbate is half that. Everything else has wiggle room based on personal tastes. In my experience less is often "more".

Thanks for sharing!

Always good to meet another sausage maker. So cool those euro recipes are being produced in Korea and they look delicious!

I make a bulgogi beef sausage at work. Still trying to perfect it before I share the details but it's one of my favourites.

Marianski is awesome. I've been watching a lot of Duncan Henry stuff lately too, he's great for technique and general knowledge and also a fellow hoser. Every October Two Guys And A Cooler does a Celebrate Sausage series on YT with a new recipe every day. I'm submitting several for next year.

Another sausage great is Len Poli. He's a bit more advanced but I make versions of his formulations and they're all excellent.

Purpose built machines for both tasks.

LEM has a solid reputation amongst home cooks and hobbyists but Hakka Bros/MEAT/whatever other brand the Chinese factory wholesales to are perfectly viable options too. If I had to buy my own gear for home use I'd go with Hakka/MEAT Chinese gear.

The hobbyists all agree you should "buy once, cry once" with this hobby. Get the size up from what you need now so you can scale up production in a year without buying new machines.

If you eat a lot of sausage it pays itself off quickly.

I cook the barese as a whole coil. Pan fried or charcoal grilled. When we sell it at the shop the owner prefers I make links but I'll do coils on request no problem. Coils are the traditional style.

The Cubano is everything but bread. It's meant to be eaten on a buttered and toasted sausage roll. Ground pork, salt, pepper, mustard seed, mustard powder, ham, pulled pork, Gruyere cheese, pickles. This formulation took years to perfect and was the reason I began researching proper sausage craft. Without it this post wouldn't exist. I'll share a proper Cubano post next time I make it and include my technique for making any cheese a "high temp" sausage cheese.

I've never made it before but from what I understand you need to use salt and cure #1 on the breast then you can stuff it in whatever casing and netting you have. Once cured you can smoke or roast or sous vide it until cooked. Ice bath, rest at room temp for 30 minutes then into the cooler overnight before slicing.

The salt will catalyse protein extraction which will make the meat bind to itself once stuffed, creating a seemingly solid sphere of turkey breast. The cure will preserve colour, give it that smooth deli meat texture and also prevent botulism while you slowly cook it through the danger zone.

That's my two cents but as I said I've never done it nor researched it properly so I could be wrong or incomplete. YT is always my go-to when I want to learn a new process.

This tray would retail for approximately $S155 here. It's specialty pork, if I used regular pork it would be closer to $S110. Not counting my labour this tray cost me less than $S40.

Note to self: get a Singapore work visa