How to Can Venison Sausage

Canning venison sausage step by step.
Written and lived by Stephanie Dayle.

Last week I wrote an article on how to make your own venison breakfast sausage, with a tasty recipe and step by step instructions. Click here for the article! This week I will show you how to can that venison sausage to prolong it’s shelf life. Canning meat is easy! Don’t let it intimidate you! In addition to this article there are MANY completely free and safe recipes and instructions online (see a few of  them at the bottom of this article).

Why Can Venison Sausage?

Canning the sausage gives you the ability to preserve fairly good tasting meat for several years, this helps prevent wastage and allows a person to put up a supply in advance.  Canned meat can also be part of a larger emergency supply of food for your home. With practice canning venison sausage is also something can be done without power to help preserve meat in a grid down situation. If freezing meat is no longer afood storage option, canning it is a viable technique to prolong it’s self-life and help ensure there is food to eat in the days ahead. Even if it’s not something that is done on a regular bases it’s still a very good preparedness/homesteading skill to learn.

Equipment You Will Need
(click on the blue text to find this equipment)

- Half Pint Canning Jars

- Frying Pan

- Pot for meat broth

- Two piece lids 

- Pressure Canner 

- Jar Lifter

How to can Venison Sausage - (Source 1) (Source 2)

• When canning venison one can add one part high-quality pork fat to three or four parts venison before grinding. Click here to see the recipe I am canning. Remember to to avoid using sage (it may cause an off tasting or bitter flavor).

All photos ©Stephanie Dayle 2013

• Shape the ground meat into patties (my preferred method) or balls or if you use links, cut them into 3- to 4-inch links.

• Cook until lightly browned. Ground meat may be sauteed without shaping.
• Remove excess fat. Fill jars with meat. We found that four patties perfectly fit into a half-pint jar, which is a perfect portion for two people.

All photos ©Stephanie Dayle 2013

• Add boiling meat broth (you can also use tomato juice, or water), leaving one inch of headspace. Two teaspoons of salt per quart to the jars, can also be added if desired, we found this was not needed.

• Process jars in a pressure canner for 75 minutes for half pint and pints (90 minutes for quart jars) at 10lbs of pressure, if your location is over 1000 feet in elevation, process the jars at 15lbs of pressure.

Finished Product Ready for Storage