What grinder?

[Shrek]

No fat in my burger. 35%-40% pork fat in my sausage. Tried to go lower on the sausage but I didn't like it. Too dry.

 

[MuleyFever]

As far as grinding venison or adding fat is personal preference and taste. As far as my family goes we do not add fat to our burger. If grilling venison burgers I will add 1 beaten egg per pound of burger and then make my party's. This will hold the burger together, not effect flavor or fat content.

This is great. The reason I thought to add fat was for hamburgers so they stay together and dont dry out.

I have never thought of doing sausage but once I get the grinder I know I will want to try.

 

[_Nick_]

LEM for me

Yup. 3/4 horse.

 

[Roy68]

Muley - also remember that venison burgers without added fat are super lean. Cook them past Medium and I doubt you or the family will like the results.

Sausage is easy especially if you want to do bulk sausage, all you need is the grinder at that point, and freezer paper. Obviously the main grinders mentioned are not cheap (not for me), but it will be the most used piece of processing equipment you will own next to a knife. So spend wisely. Again I think Cabelas or LEM are the top choices. I used a couple of Cabelas gift cards, one of those $100 off if you spend $XXX promo's, waited for the grinder to be on sale, and it wasn't that bad of a price.

If you are planning on several hundred pounds of meat each year then buy a good scale and a foot switch if you can. You will learn a lot in the first season of use, and you can add to your equipment as you require. This was our approach, and in 3 years I had what I needed to do all my own processing. Now it is a family affair, it is an excellent for my wife & I to involve our young boys in bringing the harvest to the table.

 

[Poser]

I prefer the Weston line. Whichever brand you get, make sure they sell replacement parts. Some of the brands do not sell replacement parts for the consumer lines.

 

[mtswampfox]

If your butcher shop has bacon ends, makes a good addition to venison

 

[Roy68]

I'm going to try the bacon thing. I heard it mentioned twice now.

2x on the parts availability

 

[5MilesBack]

This is great. The reason I thought to add fat was for hamburgers so they stay together and dont dry out.

I don't add anything when I grind it, but sometimes add some fatty burger when I cook them. This last weekend I had two packages of elk sitting in the fridge and didn't have any thawed beef burger so just cooked them up as is. Only cooked them for 5 minutes total, and these were probably 1/2lb burgers and they came out great. I know where the meat came from and how it was processed as I do it myself and never gut them, so I don't worry about e-coli.

 

[pyroducksx3]

I have the cabelas commercial 1 hp and love it. I wouldn't get below a 3/4 hp. Sounds like LEM is good also. Whatever model you get also buy the grinder foot pedal, not having to try and find your switch when your hands are covered with blood or ground up meat is so much more convenient. I don't always add fat, I leave most of it straight ground, but I use pork butts when I do, like for sausages. When make burgers out if the straight ground I usually use 2lbs elk or deer to a 1lbs pork sausage and mix it by hand when I make patties.

 

[5MilesBack]

I used straight elk burger last night in real Italian spaghetti with Pomi strained tomatoes, diced tomatoes, artichoke hearts, kalamata olives, and capers. Outstanding. I have the Cabela's 1hp model as well. Great grinder.

 

[Bughalli]

LEMs products are great. I haven't bought a grinder from them, but lots of other products. I process on avg one animal a year (deer, elk, antelope or pig), so I don't do that much grinding. But I do make everything from burger to sausages to slim Jim type beef sticks. I started out with one of the older cast iron Porker hand crank grinders. Just to see if I was serious or not. After that I've always done it myself. The hand crank one will last forever and goes faster than you might think. Still a chore, but done in a couple hours. Others asked about kitchen aid grinder attachments.....it's junk. Mostly plastic and slower than the hand crank porker.

Cabelas has good stuff and a great return policy. I might get the electric some day. Just don't want another thing to store. Invest in getting the white, tube-like freezer bags for burger. Make freezing much easier. For steaks and sausage I use a vacume sealer, which works great. But if price is a concern, plastic rap with paper over it works fine as well

I like Hi Mountain seasonings as we'll. FYI.
Have fun with it.

 

[rayporter]

be very suspect of half horse and under. i have burned up 2 Christmas presents.

we use a three quarter horse now. you will find what you like to add pretty quick.

 

[mtswampfox]

would suggest lem, but the cabelas are on sale now

 

[Big Sky]

I have had very good luck with my Cabelas 3/4 hp grinder. Last fall we ground nearly 200 lbs of elk burger in an afternoon without any problems.

 

[elkmule123]

Anyone have experience with the Kitchenaid grinder attachment. My wife would like the mixer so it sounds like a good option but I have no experience with them.

This is what I use and it does a pretty good job. My biggest complaint about it, is the hopper size. It doesn't hold very much meat.

Used one to grind green tomatoes for green tomato jam. Sold it shortly after. Not up to par with a real grinder.

I'm kinda spoiled though, as I rent processing equipment, cooler and freezer space from a game processor's widow. With a real commercial grinder I can do 70# with two passes through fine plates in about 10 minutes. I would suggest getting the biggest hopper and most horse power you can afford.

My buddy tells me with his Cabelas grinder, he has to partially freeze the meat to get a good grind. Not sure of the exact model # but it is in the high middle of the product line.

Keeping the meat "frosty" definitely is the way to go. It easily cuts a third of the time down. The other down side to it is when you are doing sausage, because the attachment is so high off of the counter top you have to support the sausage being cased so that the casing doesn't break. A second set of hands is almost a must. A foot pedal can be easily rigged for any set up and would definitely help while making sausage.

 

[elkmule123]

No fat in my burger. 35%-40% pork fat in my sausage. Tried to go lower on the sausage but I didn't like it. Too dry.

I'd agree with that on sausage links, I made some brats (20% ratio) and we made a patty at the end of the linking process and the fat to meat ratio seemed great. It had plenty of moisture and flavor. Then a month later I grill up some of the brats and they were dry. I initially thought it was because I cooked them to long, so the next set I paid close attention to them and got them off the grill and let them cool a bit. Nope still dry. So my next batch, I'm going to bump up the ratio.

 

[elkmule123]

I purchased the 1/2 hp grinder from Cabelas when it was on sale a few weeks ago. I'm really impressed with it. It process the meat faster that I could get it from the bowl to the feeding tray (granted I was using a kitchen aid one prior to this). I process some meat that was frosty and some that was just barely been cubed up from processing the front shoulder. It handle both like a charm.

 

[mtswampfox]

Are you carefull and remove all silver skin prior to grinding , or just cube it and go? The silver skin tends to wrap around the cutters on my lem and plug things up.seems like I waste a lot of meat trying to seperate the muscles before grinding.

 

[TheHardWay]

I started with a LEM #12 3/4hp, then went up to a #32 1.5 HP LEM. Now I have a #22 1 HP LEM with the big bite. Side by side, using the same meat, my 1HP LEM out grinds my buddies 1HP Cabela's.
The #12 was too small for me, and ended up taking forever to do elk, especially if I mixed any fat in with the meat. The #32 was a beast. I went in with some buddies on the purchase, but decided to let them buy me out because we all needed it at the same time, but lived in different parts of the state, so it wasn't working out. The #22 I have now works just as good as the #32. Before I let my buddy take the #32, I pulled the cover off of the motor of both the 1.5hp and 1 hp to see what the difference was. Other than the case being slightly longer on the 1.5, the motors looked to be identical. Same numbers and dimensions on the motors, so who knows what is going on there. While the #32 uses a larger auger, knife, and grind plates, the actual neck you stuff the meat into and the hopper are the exact same size. I'm sure the larger auger speeds up production, but you still need to cube your meat the same size in order to get it to feed down the hole.

 

[MuleyFever]

I ended up getting a Weston #8 because it was only $50. ML season opens Wednesday. Cant wait to try the grinder out.