Stadtwurst – A delicious Franconian classic

In this post I show you how you can make Stadtwurst yourself. The Stadwurst or in dialect “Schdaddworschd” comes from Franconia. It is a popular sausage that is often offered in different variants. 

Variants include…

1. “Normal” Stadtwurst: Lightly smoked, fine sausage meat contains beef and pork. 
2. Hausmacher Stadtwurst: Lightly smoked, fine sausage meat is made from pork only.
3. White Stadtwurst: Unsmoked, made with normal salt, no cure.
4. Black-smoked Stadtwurst: As the name suggests, smoked very long until almost black.

I make the “Normal” Stadtwurst in this post. But have also included the other variations. 

You can eat the Stadtwurst finely sliced on a Franconian country bread, as a sausage salad or “with music”. “With music” means vinegar, oil and some onions.

Here you can find the complete Stadtwurst recipe as a video or to read through.

Have fun and good luck making it!

Stadtwurst – What do you need to make it?

Ingredients for your Stadtwurst

Basic sausage meat (60% of the final mass):

• 25 % lean pork (250 g)
• 17.5 % pork back fat (175 g)
• 10 % lean beef e.g. shoulder (100 g)
• 7.5 % crushed ice / ice water (75 g)

Filling (40 % of the final mass):

• 20 % lean pork (200 g)
• 20 % pork belly (200 g)

Spices per 1000 g of meat

• 15.5 g salt
• 2.5 g Cure #1
• 3 g Cutter Phosphate (e.g BRIFISOL 414, PhosThis!, Ames Phos) 
• 2 g black pepper
• 2.5 g marjoram
• 1 g coriander
• 0.5 g mace
• 0.25 g ginger

Variant #2: White Stadtwurst

The white city sausage works almost identically to the normal one. The only difference is that you use regular salt without any cure and you omit the smoking process and just poach the sausage. 

Variant #3: Hausmacher Stadtwurst

For the Hausmacher, the procedure is identical to the standard recipe. The only difference is that you do not use beef in the sausage meat. You replace this with more lean pork.

The equipment to make Stadtwurst

Meat Grinder  

You need a meat grinder to “grind” the meat. The grinder chops the meat into small chunks which then can then be mixed.

Food processor / Thermomix or cutter

In your food processor, the ingredients are blended and processed into a mass. This way you can make the meat sausage yourself without a cutter. If you have a Thermomix, you can also use it for this.

Spice grinder / mortar

To grind your spices, it is best to use a spice grinder. Alternatively, a mortar is also suitable. Or you can use already ground spices. I recommend grinding them yourself.

Natural casing

The city sausage is filled in natural casings. I recommend you pork casing caliber 36/38. 

Smoker

You need a smoker to smoke your sausage. 

Make Stadtwurst – Step-By-Step Instructions

1. Cut the meat and fat into pieces suitable for grinding. You can adjust the size depending on how big your meat grinder is. Make sure you keep the meat & fat pieces for ground meat and chuck separate from each other. 

2. Let the meat freeze in the freezer for about 1 hour. The freezing makes it easier for you to grind the meat later.

3. Grind the spices to a fine powder. If you want to see the marjoram distributed in the sausage later, you should not grind it. 

4. Now grind the meat and fat.

For the base sausage meat, I grind the fat and meat once separately through the finest perforated disc (3 mm).

I use the medium perforated wheel (4.5 mm) for the “filling” and run the pieces through once. 

5. Now put the lean meat of the base sausage meat into a food processor or your cutter and let it start. 

6. Add the salt, Cure #1, Cutter Phosphate and spices. Then turn the machine back on and gradually add the bulk/ice water.

7. Now gradually add the fat to the mixer and mix until a good binding is obtained. Important: The mass should not exceed 12 degrees Celsius (53,6 °F).

8. Now mix the fine ground sausage meat together with the ground up “filling”.

9. Fill the sausage meat into pork casings caliber 36/38. 

10. Now you can tie the sausage into rings. It is up to you how big the rings will be.

11. After that you can smoke the sausage at 65 C° (149 °F) for about 45 – 60 minutes. 

12. After smoking, the Stadtwurst must be scalded at 75 C° (167 °F) for 35 minutes. 

13. Ready is your Stadtwurst😄.   I hope you have fun making them. Enjoy it!

How long is the shelf life of the stadtwurst?

 The Stadtwurst can be kept in the refrigerator for approx. 4 – 5 days when cut. In one piece it can be kept refrigerated for about 10 days.