When it comes to meats, sausages are as versatile as it gets.
Not will sausages make any meal taste better, but they will bring even the blandest meal to life.
Nevertheless, I must admit there is one issue with making your own sausage at home.
How long do you smoke sausage at 225°F?
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Should I Smoke My Sausage?
Of course, you should smoke sausage. It’s literally the perfect candidate for smoking.
Best of all, save your leftover sausage, freeze it, and use it whenever you have a craving for sausage.
The sausages will still retain the smoky flavor even though they are frozen.
Furthermore, smoking sausage in your pellet smoker is probably one of the easiest meals you will cook in your smoker.
Additionally, sausage cooks faster than other types of meat.
For example, it can take more than 6 hours to smoke a large cut of beef, while it takes much less time to smoke sausages.
Can You Smoke Any Sausage?
There are nearly as many sausages as there are steaks on a cow. Luckily, there are several types of sausages you can smoke.
For example, you can smoke kielbasa, beef sausages, Italian sausage, and chorizo. You can also smoke chicken sausages and bratwurst.
You can’t go wrong with choosing sausages for smoking since you will end up with delicious, juicy sausages.
What Are the Two Types of Smoking Meat?
There are two methods for smoking meat: hot smoking and cold smoking.
Sausage is no different. It can either be hot smoked or cold smoked.
Hot smoking simply refers to when sausage is completely cooked while it smokes in an electric smoker.
In contrast, cold smoke means fermenting the sausage while it smokes in your offset smoker.
Before the sausage is cold smoked, it is usually cured with nitrates, salt, or sugar to preserve the meat as well as add flavor to it.
In addition to this, the curing ingredients also give sausages their distinctive color.
Cold smoking allows the smoke to serve as another flavoring agent.
What Is the Best Wood to Smoke Sausage With?
Smoked foods are so addicting because smoking them gives them a special flavor that can not be replicated by the stove, crockpot, oven, or instant pot.
Smoking the sausage allows the smoke to permeate the sausages and give them the most delicious flavor.
However, when it comes to smoking sausages, the wood plays an integral role.
You cannot throw any wood chips into the heating chamber of your propane smoker. That’s too risky.
You must carefully select the wood you choose to smoke your sausage with.
Sausage pairs well with apple, cherry, pecan, and apple woods.
However, you should choose the wood based on the flavor you want the sausage to have.
I’m sure you’ve had the pleasure of tasting hickory-smoked bacon and noticed what a robust flavor it has?
That’s because hickory is known for its rich, bold flavor.
In contrast, applewood has a milder flavor that is somewhat sweet.
Therefore, if you have never smoked sausage before, it’s best to start out with a mild wood-like sausage and work your way up to strong woods such as hickory.
How Long to Smoke Sausage at 225
In general, smoked sausage will take about 2-3 hours when smoked at a temperature of 225˚F.
Although this does not seem like a fast window, compared to large cuts of meat such as pork butt, which can take up to 15-20 hours to smoke, 3 hours seems like 2 minutes.
Nevertheless, the cooking time will differ according to the type of sausage you are smoking.
Additionally, make sure your smoker maintains a temperature of 225˚F and 240˚F.
If your smoker’s temperature fluctuates, the sausage will not cook evenly and will lengthen the cooking time.
How To Tell if Sausage Is Cooked?
The best way to tell if sausage is done smoking is by using a meat thermometer. An infrared thermometer is handy for this,
If your smoker thermometer has a built-in thermometer on the dome, do not rely on it.
While it will give you the temperature of the unit, it will not give you an accurate reading of the sausage.
It’s best to use a separate thermometer to monitor the temperature of the sausage.
Sausage is officially smoked when it has a temperature of 160°F-165˚F.
You can also check the color of the sausage for doneness. It should have a light color and be free of blood when you cut into it.
The sausage’s juices should also be clear and free of any coloring.
Can You Overcook Sausage?
In the same way, you can overcook Denver steak; you can overcook sausage. If you overcook your sausage, you can still eat it.
However, instead of a juicy, flavorful sausage, you will end up with an overly charred flavor and dry texture.
If the temperature of your smoker is too hot, you must monitor the sausage carefully.
This is why we recommend smoking the sausage at 225°F.
Tips for Smoking Sausage
Only smoke cured sausage. As I mentioned above, salt and nitrates are two ingredients used to cure sausage.
These substances prevent pathogenic bacteria from developing in cured meats such as hotdogs, bacon, and sausage.
If you do not use cured meat, it increases the chance that you or anyone else who consumes the sausage will contract food poisoning.
Smoke cold sausages. Typically, when smoking meats such as pork shoulder or brisket, it’s best to let them come to room temperature.
However, sausages are a bit different.
The sausage’s cold sausage will act like a magnet for the smoke pulling it into the meat and giving you a delicious smoky flavor.
Soak our wood chips before you plan to smoke the sausage.
If you skip soaking the wood chips, they may not generate enough smoke.
Arrange the sausages on the smoker cooking grates at least 1-inch apart.
This makes sure that air can circulate around the sausages, which helps them cook evenly. It also ensures each sausage gets the correct dose of smoke.
When smoking sausage, change the wood chips at 90-minute intervals.
Periodically replacing the wood chips will ensure they are generating enough smoke to last the entire duration of the smoke.
Failing to replace the wood chips will result in sausages that are unevenly smoked.
Cold smoking sausages is not recommended for newbies since it can become a food safety issue.
Cold smoking will smoke the sausage at a low temperature that should not rise above 110°F.
Therefore, if you haven’t cold-smoked sausage before, it’s best to be safe and hot smoke your sausage.
Sear the sausage. If you are smoking sausage in your offset grill, you can sear it on the direct heat side.
It will give the sausage those characteristic grill marks.
Once your sausages have a temperature of 160°F, transfer the sausages to the direct side of the grill and sear them for 30-60 seconds per side until they have grill marks.
How to Smoke Sausage
We could not talk about how long to smoke sausage without showing you how to smoke sausage.
Load your smoker with your desired fuel and wood chips and fire it up.
Heat your smoker to 225°F for 30 minutes.
Next, fill an aluminum pan with water, and set it near the space you intend to smoke the sausage.
Place the sausage onto the cooking grate 1-inch apart.
If you are using an electric smoker or pellet smoker, you may be able to place sausages on multiple cooking racks.
Make sure the sausages do not touch the water pan. Close the smoker and cook the sausages for 3 hours, rotating them every 45 minutes.
In contrast, if you are using an offset grill, set up a direct and indirect cooking surface. Place your coal into a chimney starter to light it.
Once the coals ash over, dump them into the base of your grill on one side of the grill.
You can also create a charcoal snake in the bottom of your grill to create a 2-zone cooking surface.
Add a handful of your desired wood chips on top of the charcoal to give the sausage some flavor.
Place the cooking grill over the charcoal and close the dome.
Switch the grill’s intake and exhaust vents to open and let the grill heat to 225°F. It should take about 30 minutes.
Place the sausages onto the grill’s cooking grates. Switch the grill’s intake and exhaust vents, so they are about halfway closed.
You may need to adjust the air vents during the cook.
Place the lid onto the grill and cook the sausages for 3 hours, rotating them every 45 minutes.
Final Thoughts
Smoked sausages are satisfying and delicious.
You can add them to so many foods, including soups, mac and cheese, and BBQ baked beans.
Smoking sausages intensifies their flavor and makes it harder to eat just one.
Now that you know how long to smoke sausages at 225°F, you can smoke large batches of sausage, freeze them and have them on hand any time you are craving smoked meat.
I have been smoking and grilling meat from an early age and enjoy sharing my knowledge and expertise through the hundreds of articles I have written about BBQ. I hope to make everyone’s BBQ journey that little bit easier.