Landjäger – German Hunter Sausage
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If you are ever traveling through Southern Germany and you stop into a local grocery store or, better yet, a butcher’s shop, you may have noticed pairs of rectangular sausages hanging or on the shelves. These sausages are famous among hunters and hikers throughout southern Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. I am speaking, of course, about Landjäger. I have been a fan of this sausage for years, and although I have made many varieties of sausages over the years, I have always thought of the landjäger as somewhat intimidating to make. Because of my reservations, I reached out to a friend, Mathias Trinkl, a professional butcher, long-time hunter, and a breeder of hunting dachshunds (including my beloved Artie).
Mathias and I had recently shot two animals, a roe deer (Mathias) and a one-year-old boar (me). Because of the mix of animal protein available, our landjäger reflects the same, although you can use just about any wild game for your lean protein in this recipe. To make this recipe the classical way, you will need a landjäger sausage press. Luckily for me, Mathias is loaded with charcuterie gear, and we were able to go the traditional route. If you don’t have a press, it’s just an aesthetic thing and nothing to worry about. Should you be determined for that classical look, though, I have included a link at the bottom of the article on how to make a press.
On the difficulty scale of sausage making, I would say this one is a little more on the advanced side, but the skills acquired while taking the dry-cured sausage plunge are well worth the effort. Because this is a little more advanced, some skills are assumed (such as how to stuff sausage) and not in the instructions below.
This recipe is for 1 kilo of meat, making about 25 individual pressed sausages. Although the recipe is in grams, most electronic scales can toggle between metric and imperial.
Landjäger is a dry-cured sausage that keeps quite well outside without refrigeration. If vacuum sealed, it will easily keep for months and is an excellent protein snack when hunting or hiking in the field.
I sincerely hope you get the chance to make this wonderful bit of German charcuterie, and if you do, please tag me on Instagram @huntingmuscle And as always, if you harvest something, tag me in the photo, and I will give you a traditional German hunting salute.
Landjäger press: https://www.1-2-do.com/projekt/landjaegerpresse/bauanleitung-selber-bauen/9023
Looking for more wild European sausage recipes? Why not check out this wild Austrian Kasekrainer recipe?
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Landjäger – German Hunter Sausage
Course: Venison, Wild Pig, Wild Recipes25
servings0
minutes0
minutesKeep the screen of your device on
Ingredients
- Meat: 70/30 protein/fat
400 g 400 wild boar meat
300 g 300 roe deer meat
200 g 200 pork belly without the skin
100 g 100 back fat
- Seasoning & Cure
25 g 25 Curing salt / NPS (nitrite content 0.4%-0.5%)
4 g 4 Ground White Pepper
4 g 4 Garlic Powder
0.5 g 0.5 Paprika
2 g 2 Ground Ginger
2 g 2 Whole Caraway (toast for better flavor)
2 g 2 Ground Nutmeg
1 g 1 Ground Cardamom
3 g 3 Dextrose (amount may vary based on your starter culture)
Starter culture (we used a starter culture called BiTec Advance LD-20 which is a combination of two bacteria, Lactobacillus sakei, and Staphylococcus carnosus. You can definitely use other starter cultures but be sure to follow the instructions on it)
Preparation
- Before you get started, prepare your sausage casings for stuffing so that you can go directly from mixing to stuffing.
- Cold is your friend. Chill your grind equipment and cut your pieces into cubes depending on the size of your grinder. Chill them to almost freezing.
- Grind all of your meat through a 4.5mm die
- Thoroughly mix all of the seasonings and starter culture with the ground meat. The mixing will lead to kneading, which you can do by hand using the scoop and press method or the paddle attachment on a mixer. You are going to want to knead for a couple of minutes as that will firm up the meat and help everything bind as one.
- Load the meat into your stuffer and begin stuffing and linking. Each link should have about 40g-62g of meat. If you will be using a sausage press, do not fill the casings too firmly, as they will burst when you press them. To be honest, this will take a little bit of trial and error to get just right, and your first batch will not be perfect. If you are not using a sausage press, fill the casing to firm. You will shoot for links that are about 6-8in long.
- Cut the sausages into pairs of 2 links each. If you are using the press, place the pair in the press and then press until they are about ¾ of an inch thick. Lay the pairs in a non-reactive container with plastic sheets separating each layer.
- Place the sausages in a refrigerator for three days to cure.
- On the third day, you can begin to cold smoke them. Ideally, you will hit them with 2-3 cold smoke sessions of 6-8 hours using beechwood (traditional), but this will vary based on smoke preference and the smoker you are using.
- After smoking, let the sausages hang in a dark, cool place for at least a day. If you want a firmer sausage, let it hang longer.
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So delicious and thanks for sharing!