I have been teaching myself how to make sausage at home.
The process is incredibly easy once you have the proper equipment.
One of the more important decisions you must make when making sausage is how the final product will be stored.
If you are making a bulk sausage like a typical American breakfast sausage then you can store the end product directly in vacuum sealed bags.
If you are making either link or rope sausage (Polish, Italian or Bratwurst) then you will need to use a casing.
There are three types of sausage casings readily available; natural, collagen and fibrous.
Fibrous casings are made from plant fibers and are usually dyed dark red.
This is the type of casing you would use when making a large diameter product like Summer Sausage.
In general fibrous casings are inedible and need to be removed from the sausage before consumption.
Collagen casings are a synthetic product made from the collagen extracted from animal hooves.
This type of casing is desirable as it is shelf stable without refrigeration which means many sporting goods stores carry them as part of their regular inventory.
In addition to being readily available this type of casing is ready to use out of the package without any rinsing or flushing.
Additionally since this is a manufactured product it is highly consistent from and is consistent from package to package.
Natural casings are actually the small intestines of a hog.
Prior to being packaged the intestines are cut into two foot sections and quickly flushed with water.
The sections are then packed in salt and are then packaged for sale.
Natural casings are by far the most difficult to use.
It is difficult to find natural casings for sale and if you do it will be at a small local grocery store.
Once you get them home you will want to soak them in water for an hour to remove the salt.
Afterwards they need to be detangled and flushed on the inside to make sure they are perfectly clean before being stuffed with sausage.
The advantage of natural casings is that it is extremely easy to form links.
If you simply twist sausages made with natural casings you can form very nice links that hold.
This is unlike sausages made with collagen casings where the links must often be tied.
Another great benefit of natural casings is that they will naturally curve during stuffing.
While the shape of the sausage does not influence the final taste it is nice to be able to make spirals of sausage.
The final benefit of natural casings is that, when cooked, they snap when bitten.
Sometimes collagen casings will become chewy, especially when overcooked.
Making your own sausage can be very rewarding.
If you decide to take up this hobby I suggest you experiment with natural casings.
They are a little more work than ones made from collagen but I feel they produce a superior sausage.