Monday, January 18, 2010

Haiti, Fog, and Sausage

What a week for Haiti. What a week for the world. Craptastic. I hope we all have a chance to help those who can't help themselves. I hope the Haitian people are able to rise out of this with some strong unity.

Happy Monday from San Francisco! Or maybe London? Actually, I'm still in Kansas City. It's just that we've had a thick fog hanging around since last Friday. Apparently when thick snow comes into contact with warm air you get ground clouds. Everybody wanted a white Christmas and then cursed the snow. They wanted the snow to go away and now they curse the fog. I'm just enjoying the crap out of all of it.

The end of hunting season (bow and arrow) was last Friday. In celebration I didn't go bowhunting....I made sausage. A lot of sausage. The guys came over Saturday and we went to work cutting and grinding meat. Then there was the mixing and stuffing. Everything was then put in the smoker and dehydrator. Finally we got to enjoy the fruits of our labor. And yes, it was good stuff.


Here we are cutting and grinding the venison and pork. Somebody (me) didn't get the meat thawed so we had a fun time getting it cut down to fit in the grinder. oops.


We did some summer sausage and then went to making snack sticks. Here the guys are rolling out the good stuff. We smoke this in large coils and then cut it down into snack size lengths.




And here's my public safety message for the week: If you've been handling extremely hot peppers wash your hands before you rub your eyes. Unless you want to walk around looking like this for 20 minutes. I basically pepper sprayed myself.

I always seem to leave this guy outta my pictures. It's not a conspiracy...or is it? Either way, here's my bro-in-law Dave, aka Honey, getting his hands dirty.

Prepare yourselves for a near future post on cheap wine. I've got 15 gallons ready to bottle and thought I might share some info about the whole process. Then again, I may just snap a few pics and call it a post.

4 comments:

Phoenix said...

First of all, you win an award for best random blog title, possibly ever. My hat is off to you, sir. Not many people speak Random as fluently as I do, but you take the cake :)

Also, watching people make sausage makes one hungry for sausage...and I didn't bring any sausage with me to work for lunch today. Boo.

Unofficially pepper spraying yourself in the face...I have no words. Except you look like you're in pain. Ouch.

jamie said...

Awesome post! I agree with Phoenix -- it's totally making me hungry. I'm curious how hot the sausage is, and how you season them. Also really interested in the wine making. Sounds like a healthy lifestyle to me. :)

Dave said...

Okay. So I'm a little lacking in the title department....The sausage is not at all hot. After watching me cry the guys decided to leave the peppers in the bag. Go figure.

VJames said...

How I got out the door without taking any sausage home is beyond me. I am amazed at the time and work you all do to create such masterpieces. :~) I found a sign "What is said in the garage, stays in the garage" and thought might be good for yours since you make venison there, as well as wine.....would you like to have it?