We are big fans of homemade breakfast sausage around here. We like to make sausage patties, fry it up and make sausage gravy, topping on our pizza, and sometimes in place of beef in our spaghetti.
Oh, I almost forgot cheese dip with sausage and salsa served with tortilla chips. Ok, I’m hungry now.
We’ve been making our own homemade breakfast sausage since 2011. We prefer our meats to be free of MSG, Nitrates, Nitrites, Preservatives, and any other unnecessary things in it.
Finding meat like is was hard. Meat like this that we can afford? Almost impossible and when you do find it, be ready to pay a pretty penny. That left one option- raise and make our own sausage!
It took quite a few tries and years to finally hone in our sausage seasoning recipe but we’ve got it down. We raise and butcher our own pigs and grind our own sausage but this recipe can be used with store bought pork as well.
If you raise pigs but have them butchered for you, you may be able to send your own sausage seasoning mix to the butcher for your sausage.
Just a couple of days into January, I went to cook breakfast and we were down to our last pound of breakfast sausage (gasp!). Oh, the horror. I mean, we’ve been through some rough times but no sausage? It couldn’t be.
Ok, I’m getting carried away but this definitely needed to be remedied quickly.
We butchered our pig soon after and went to work parting it out and making our sausage. Now, we will happily be eating said breakfast sausage (and lunch, and dinner, and snack ;)) for a while.
Homemade Breakfast Sausage Without Nitrates or Nitrites (or pink curing salt)
We cut the pork up into (about) 1 1/2″ cubes. and sprinkled our seasoning mix over it. We then used our hands to mix it, making sure it was mixed well so the breakfast sausage had evenly distributed seasoning.
Now, we fed the meat through the throat of our meat grinder. Out it comes into the bowl.
Once all the meat was ground, we replaced the grinding plate on our meat grinder with the stuffer attachment. Now fed the ground meat through the throat again and into our packaging.
Next, we sealed up the packaged and made sure they were marked and dated clearly. We freeze our breakfast sausage and thaw as needed.
Making homemade breakfast sausage is simple. We are very happy to have a freezer full again. I just hope we don’t run out before of our next set of pigs are big enough to butcher.
Breakfast Sausage Without Nitrates
Ingredients
- 1 lb Ground pork
- 1/2 tbsp + 1 tsp Raw sugar
- 2 tsp Rubbed sage
- 1 tsp Salt Sea salt or Pink Himalayan
- 1/2 tsp Red pepper flakes optional but tasty!
- 1/4 tsp Black pepper
- 1/16 tsp Red Pepper
Instructions
- Mix all dry ingredients together.
- Sprinkle seasoning mixture over pork and mix well with your hands.
- If using cubed pork, grind with a meat grinder with seasoning.
- Once seasonings and pork are well mixed, cook or package for later use.
Do you make a less spicy version of the sausage ? I will be going to Whole Foods Friday to try it. Also, can it be cooked in a microwave?
Thank you in advance for your response.
MSG is NOT bad for you. That’s some old-timey asian-focused racism. Your recipe calls for salt, replace it with msg for less sodium, and a ton of added flavor!
Please read the science, you’ll feel embarrassed you ever believed it was toxic.
Monosodium Glutamate is the MANMADE chemical used to replace GOD’S version of celery salts or powder. Go GOD’S way…… read the science!
Agree with Swordman. MSG is a natural ingredient that’s found in lots of things, including tomatoes and Parmesan, but we don’t see anti-Italian rumors.
Also, screaming “GOD” back as the ultimate answer is not very polite to a harmless suggestion. A bit aggressive, especially in reply to an anti-racist comment.
You can see my response to Swordsman for my opinion on what you and they have to say. Have a good one.
MSG that is synthetic and man made is toxic to humans. It is a neurotoxin and inflammatory. I am personally very allergic to it. There are naturally occurring versions of it and the human body can process them much more easily as opposed to synthetic versions. My avoidance of MSG is not steeped in some made up racism, that is very presumptuous of you and an ignorant statement. Also, real mineral salt is extremely good for you and is needed for your body to be healthy. I’m sure you can easily find a sausage recipe full of toxins and man made chemicals if that’s your preference but for me and mine, we choose to eat naturally and the way God made foods and intended for us to eat.
I need to buy pork at the grocery to make the sausage. What cut(s) do you recommend for the sausage? Looks delicious!
Butt roast the best
Just curious but any difference in having it seasoned in cubes then grounded vs. doing it with a pre-grounded pork?
Thank you so much for this post. If I’m making sausage from store bought pork, what cut should I buy?