Hot Italian Sausage

I have been pretty swamped lately between weddings, vacation, and the pending arrival of our first child so I haven't had much time to update the blog. I am still cooking just backlogged getting posts up.
Here is my second attempt at fresh sausage. It was even better than the first and didn't take more than a couple hours to get some great homemade sausage. I am looking forward getting my own BBQ soon so that I can smoke sausage as well as continuing the fresh sausages. So far it has been worth the effort.

Ingredients:

• 5lbs pork butt (boneless)
• 1 package Backwoods Hot Italian seasoning package
• ~ 5 feet LEM Collagen Casings (32mm)
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 2 red peppers

Directions:

1. Trim your pork butt into 1 inch square pieces.
2. Freeze the meat for about an hour and thirty minutes.
3. Grind the meat with a medium blade. 
4. Refrigerate for 30 mins.
5. Brush the garlic and peppers in olive oil.
6. Roast them until the skin starts to darken.
7. Allow to cool then peel the skin off the peppers.
8. Puree in a food processor.
9. Mix the seasoning package in 3/4 cup of ice cold water.
10. Add the puree and seasoning to the meat and mix thouroghly.
11. Add the meat to the hopper and put the casing on a 3/4 inch stuffing tube.
12. Tie off the end of the casing and stuff. Try to avoid air bubbles and over filling the casing. I didn't have problems with bubbles but the sausages were pretty plump when I twisted them into links.
13. Grill on medium/low or until they are cooked through.