Sausage Patties

Here is a photo of the progression of my sausage today. I started with boneless pork ribs, ground them up in my Kitchen Aid meat grinder, formed them into patties, cooked them, then placed them on a metal tray, covered them with wax paper & a kitchen towel & put them outside in the snow to cool.  The temp outside is 27 degrees F.

Someone may be wondering why I put my food in the snow.  Well, my wonderful new cookbook says to cool your food before putting in the fridge or freezer to make sure the fridge & freezer don't have to work as hard to cool the food. 

Because our back porch is above ground 1 story without stairs, I don't have to worry about people or animals getting up on the porch & snatching food.  Plus, when it is below freezing outside, I am being green, using nature to help cool the food.  Very soon, my patties will be frozen and then I can bring them back inside, layer them between some wax or parchment paper & pop them in the freezer in a freezer zip lock bag.  How cool is that!

Here is a photo of the wonderful tools I used today.  I ground the pork in my Kitchen Aid meat grinder, then put it all in the bowl, added the spices and the paddle & mixed it up.  I have a small container of round cookie / biscuit cutters, so used the smaller size in the photo to make breakfast sausage size patties, then used the larger one to make hamburger sized patties.