The craft of smoking meats and sausage has evolved from the need to preserve, to the want of imparting smoky flavors and color. There is a lot more to this art than just hanging your kielbasa over a smoke filled fire pit though.

Visual Signs of Smoking
Sausage that has been smoked has a very distinct color. This color is the result of carbon compounds that combine with the natural pigments in the meat. The cures used also help to add to the color by making the meat the familiar rosey color. It is possible to also create the wrong color by using woods inconclusive to smoking. The wrong woods contain high amounts of tar compounds that will give the sausage a black sooty appearance and impart an unpalatable bitter taste.

Why we smoke...Flavor
Few can resist the wonderful flavor created by smoking meats and sausage. One could argue it is the most important reason why we smoke our sausage. The wood we use is the ultimate deciding factor in the final flavor or our smoked sausage. Very hard woods like hickory and mesquite contain aromatic flavors that are absorbed during smoking. Fruitwoods are another popular type of wood to use for smoking. However care must be taken when using them because some fruitwoods contain the tar compounds that can ruin a days smoking effort.

Smoking: Not just Flavor and Color
Even though we smoke for aesthetic and taste reasons in these modern times the scientific reasons for smoking still hold true. Smoking preserves the meat through acids clinging to the surface preventing the growth of mold and bacteria. For some types of sausage e.g. frankfurters the smoke causes coagulation of the outer skin allowing for the temporary casing to be removed. While coagulation occurs for all smoked sausage frankfurters make particular use of this process to allow for "skinless" sausages.

The Process of Smoking
The process of smoking sausage requires a reliable smoking cabinet capable of maintaining temperatures in the approximate range of 135° F to 165° F or more. The first step in smoking any sausage is drying the casing to form the pellicle. This allows the smoke to adhere and penetrate the meat for flavor and color. This drying can be achieved by hanging the sausage during the stuffing process or by placing in the pre-heated smoker with dampers wide open to allow the moisture to escape. Do not rush this step by increasing the temperature because it will cause the sausage to perspire and melt the fat causing all sorts of unwanted issues and ruining the process. The sausage is dried enough when it is tacky to the touch.