Hungry? Here’s How to Make Polish Sausage from Scratch [RECIPE]

Grinding, stuffing, and smoking sausage is a lot of work, but the results are well worth the effort. Here's how you can make Polish Kielbasa at home.

READ MORE: The Ultimate Guide to Making Delicious Indiana Biscuits and Gravy

I've been making my own sausage links for about a year or so now. While it does take some time and skill, it's definitely something I think anybody could do with practice. Now, at this point, you're probably like, "If it's so much work, then why not just buy it at the store?" The answer to that question is simple: I like making it, and it tastes better than store-bought sausage (to me). Here's how I go about the process.

Equipment Needed for Making Polish Kielbasa

To make sausage links, you'll need some equipment. The first thing you'll need is a meat grinder, and it doesn't have to be commercial grade. I made my recent 40-pound batch with this simple electric meat grinder I bought off Amazon. However, in addition to an electric grinder, you'll probably want a separate sausage stuffer. While most meat grinders will allow you to stuff sausage links, I've found it's a bit clunky and that the process is just easier with a manual stuffer, like this one.

Polish Kielbasa Ingredients

For this batch of Polish Kielbasa, I followed a recipe from Black Pepper Corn. While I may have gone about the process a tad differently, the seasonings I used were largely based on this recipe. The only difference was that I chose to use a hefty amount of garlic salt instead of just regular salt and garlic powder. This really wasn't for any culinary effect, but rather I just had a bunch on hand that I wanted to use up. Here is what you'll need for a five-pound batch:

• 5 lbs pork shoulder or fresh ham
• 2 tbsp garlic powder
• 3 tsp salt
• 3 tsp ground black pepper
• 2 tsp dried marjoram
• 1 cup cold water
• 1/2 cup skim milk powder
• 1 tsp pink curing salt
• sausage casings

Generally speaking, you want about a 70-30 meat-to-fat ratio when making sausage. You can usually get close to this using pork shoulder, which is what I did. However, I'll add that I don't waste anything at my house. When I smoke a brisket or rack of ribs, anything I trim off that cut of meat is put in my freezer for later use. Over the past year, I ended up with about three one-gallon bags of trimmings comprised of beef and pork, so I mixed those cuts with two whole pork shoulders to make this batch of Polish Kielbasa

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Overall, I ended up with about 40 pounds of meat total, so I just multiplied this recipe by eight. If this is your first time making sausage, I definitely recommend sticking to five-to-ten pounds of meat for ease. As I said before, this is not a quick and fast recipe, and it's important to take your time. The less meat you have to worry about on your first go, the better. (Trust me, I learned the hard way.)

Making Polish Kielbasa

The first thing you'll want to do is cube up your meat so it can fit through the meat grinder. After I cube mine up, I'll usually put it in my freezer to firm up so it's runs through my grinder without smearing. You don't want the meat totally frozen, so I reccomend only leaving the cubed portions in your freezer for about 30 minutes. The next steps are as follows:

1. Run all of your meat through a meat grinder, placing it all into a large mixing bowl or container.
2. Add all your dry seasoning into the ground meat, including the milk powder, and cure. The milk powder serves as a binder and also helps the meat maintain moisture, which is helpful if you're smoking it for a long period of time. The cure preserves the meat, preventing spoilage and the growth of nasty bacteria. It also gives the sausage its classic pink hue.
3. Mix your soon-to-be sausage with a spoon or your hands. Add the water as you do this.
4. Your mixture will be ready for the sausage stuffer when it is slightly sticky, and well incorporated. You'll want to begin stuffing your sausage as soon as your mixture is complete, as it will bind together.
5. Stuff your sausage casings based on the directions of your sausage stuffer. I usually go one link at a time, but you can do full ropes if that is what you prefer. I have natural hog casings listed above, but if you would rather use edible collagen casings, those will work too. I used both for my latest batch, making half my links with natural casings and half with edible collagen casings.
6. Take a load off. I recommend letting the sausage sit in the refrigerator overnight before smoking the next day. I find this helps the links hold their shape better. When doing large amounts, I usually use my garage refrigerator, as pictured below.

How to Cold Smoke Polish Kielbasa

Because the sausage has been cured, it's safe to "cold smoke," which is typically considered anywhere under 150 degrees (Farenheit). Black Pepper Corn recommends starting your smoker at 130F and increasing it by 20F every hour. It's important to make sure your kielbasa are not touching each other during the smoking session, as that will impact it coming up to temperature evenly. Ideally, you'll want to hang them in a vertical smoker, but I've had no issues cooking them on grates in my offset smoker.

After four hours of smoking, you can take the sausages out of the smoker and put them in a hot water bath to bring them up to 165F. Once the kielbasa has been in the hot water bath, Black Pepper Corn recommends dumping them into an ice water bath to quickly chill. If you'd like, you can then hang your kielbasa for a couple hours to ‘bloom’. Personally, I'll just take the sausages off the smoker once they hit an internal temperature of 165F and place them directly into an ice bath. After that, I'll let them sit out for a bit before vacuum-sealing them for freezer storage.

My latest 40-pound batch of sausage definitely took some time. It took me about four hours to grind and stuff all the sausage, and of course, clean the kitchen. I was very tired of staring at sausage links by that point, which was another reason I smoked that batch the next day. I had to smoke them in two 20-pound batches, which took roughly 10 hours. It was certainly a labor-intensive process, but it was fun, and the results were outstanding. I hope you enjoy this recipe and that you'll roll up your sleeves and give it a try.