in a cooked texture similar to papier-mâché—pulpy and
dry. Ugh. Place the grinder and all of its parts (or the food
processor bowl and blade) in the freezer for at least one
hour before grinding (I store my grinder in the freezer).
Keep your meat well chilled right until ready to grind. If
you are making sausage that will require several grinds,
chill the meat in between grinds to ensure perfect texture.
If using a food processor, freeze the meat for 15 minutes
before attempting to grind.
- Watch for smearing. Keep an eye on the meat as it
comes out of the grinder or flies around the food
processor bowl. Ideally, it’ll come out of each die hole in
discrete little pieces. You should be able to clearly identify
fat and meat. If it starts coming out as one mass, looks
wet, and collects on the surface of the die, you are in
trouble. Similarly, if it smears around the bowl of the food
processor or chunks of fat ride along on the blade, it’s
getting too warm. Remove the meat, rechill it, and try
again.
- Keep your blades sharp. In a meat grinder, the blade is
the only part of your grinder that should ever need much
care or attention. A dull blade will smear meat. Luckily,
the blade and plate should actually get better and better
with repeated use. The metal grinds down microscopically
each time you use it, so the contact between the blade and
the plate gets tighter and tighter. Nothing grinds as
smoothly as a well-taken-care-of, well-used grinder. You
will occasionally need to get your blades resharpened if
they’ve gotten way too dull; once a year or so for a
moderately-well-used grinder is more than enough. Or
