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Advanced Grilling Tips — From Fritz

Follow these easy tips to become the Grilling Guru of your neighborhood this summer.

When preparing sausages on the grill follow these steps to earn expert status and avoid incinerating your sausage links.

The links you will be grilling should come from the refrigerator, not rock hard directly from the freezer. All sausage should be thawed in the refrigerator prior to use.

The grill. Gas or coals, the plan is the same.  Low and slow to avoid temperature shock to the links because they will split and lots of the flavorful juices from inside the sausage will be lost. Use the grill cover to keep in the heat during the beginning.

For a gas grill, warm it up on high, then just before placing the links on the grill turn the heat to low. Start the sausages on low and every few minutes turn the links and increase the heat just a little bit. Follow this sequence for about 10 minutes. Then the next 5 minutes is where the real cooking begins and you need to baby that sausage. Bring the heat up to high, you want to brown the link and “crisp up” the outside casing and cook the link to the center.

Charcoal grill. The coals need to be completely white, then you can start. Spread the coals out. Start the links on the outer perimeter where there is less heat. Turn the links often and gradually move them to the center of the grill. Follow this sequence for about 10 minutes. The center of the grill should be the hottest and this is where “crisp up” happens during the next five minutes until the sausages are cooked through.

Once the links are well browned, you hear them hissing and sizzling they are ready to enjoy.

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Dog Daze

Longing for the “Hot Dog” daze of Summer?

 

Around here we love our brats, but there really is nothing better hot off the grill than a natural casing wiener or frank garnished with garden fresh tomato dices all packed into a fresh warm roll. Yum!

Call them what you want franks, hot dogs or wieners they’re all cousins.  We make lots of them at Usinger’s in all beef or pork and beef varieties.  Both are smoky with lots of spices working together and the all beef has a hint of fresh garlic added.  What you won’t find is MSG, Gluten, fillers or milk powder in our “dogs”.

My favorite is the curved link of a natural casing wiener that “pop” when you bite into them. The casing provides a firm bite and holds all the flavorful juices and spices inside the link during cooking.  Try to avoid splitting them while grilling, usually this is done by cooking slower over a lower heat.

If you prefer a softer bite on your hot dog, we also make them without the casing. These are called “skinless”. They are made with the same recipe; we just peel the casings off before they go in the package.  Skinless wieners are very popular with kids, so if you’re grilling out for some youngsters they make a great choice.  Look for the links that are straight without a curve.

Fritz