re: Sausage drying rack

Here’s a picture of a batch last year. It’s pretty small, I can only do a little at a time. Man, I wish I could just roll that rack in and do it all at once! I talked to my wife about simply doing the smoking in the back porch but it would stink up the whole house. Maybe one day I’ll build a real smoke house.

In the picture you can see my old rack. I had to continually transfer the sausage from the drying rack to the smoking rack and back. This year I set up some bricks inside the smoker that will hold the dowels. The bricks also cover the opening to the fire box to keep the heat down. That works pretty well. I was burning apple wood in the firebox last year but this year I’m going to try using charcoal briquettes and soaked apple wood chips. That should further help keep the temperature down. This is cold smoking, baby! Going for the cure, not the cook.

Speaking of apple, I out the wood from a friend nearby whose next door neighbor is the widow of a man that was very very serious about smoking. The wide let’s is take what we want since it doesn’t get used anymore. This guy had a beautiful smoke house. I should go there and ask to copy the plan.