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Natural sheep casing
Best and ambient
We are manufacturers and suppliers of Sheep natural casings. Sausage sheep casing, also known as sausage skin or simply casing, is a natural material that encloses the filling of a sausage. Natural casings come from animal intestines or skin; artificial casings, introduced in the early 20th century, are made of collagen and cellulose.
Sausage casings from natural origin have a better flavour and are made from the sub-mucosa of the small intestine, a layer wich is very thin of the intestine that consists mainly of naturally occurring collagen whcih differs from the artifical one. In European cuisine and Asian cuisine, most casings come from pigs, but elsewhere the intestines of sheep, goats, cattle and sometimes horses are also used.
In able to prepare the intestines to prepare them as casings, they are flushed, scraped and cleaned with water and salt by hand or with machinery; today they are primarily machine cleaned using water. The outer fat and the inner mucosa lining are removed during processing. They are salted to lower the water activity (which inhibits microbial growth and prolongs the shelf life) and preserve the casing from going bad.
Natural casings have been used in the production of meat specialties and sausages for centuries and have remained virtually unchanged in function, appearance, and composition and Culingo has tried to make it as more natural as possible as it was done centuries ago. UK, US and EU organic food regulations only allow natural casings, they can be derived from non organically raised animals as there are no large scale slaughter plants which handle and process only organic animals and sell their casings as certified organic casings.
As a result of this,all large scale natural casing corporations buy casings from around the globe and send them to their selection and working facilities to be graded and packaged. There are three primary animal species which are used to manufacture natural casings due to its properties and quality, although all animals wich are mammals could potentially be used to produce natural casing): pigs, hogs, lamb and sheep.
Packagings
Beef, sheep/lamb and hog/pork casings are available already tubed where each strand goes on a plastic tube makes it easier for the sausage producers to easily place the casing on the stuffing horn, and can gently add the casing around it and introduce the meat through the casing the tubes can open along a seam and the operator can pull it out at the back of the horn allowing greater efficiency and making it faster and are normally named "zip tubes" These tubed casings are then packed in plastic nets which later are placed in plastic drums with a big amount of salt so that the casings fon´t go bad. The amount of casings per drum will differ depending on the gauge and type of the casing. These casings are available in many diameters and in lengths and normally the ones in tube are long in order to make them more cost-effective.
SHEEP CASING
QUALITY:
AA quality - A quality- AB quality - B quality - BC quality
CALIBERS AVAILABLE:
18/20
20/22
22/24
24/26
26/28
PREPARATION:
Depending on the customers needs: Salted hanks- Brine- Net wrapping- Piped sausages (flexible or rigid pipe).
Appearance
Culingo´s Natural sheep casing sausages are unique from fake collagen or cellulose casings because of their irregularity, although this high quality sheep and lamb casings can be almost indistinguishable from a fake collagen casing as they have no visual imperfections. The main difference is the taste and the bite and the way they are twisted and linked which impacts the visual of the sheep casing and makes it easy to differentiate a sausage using sheep natural casing vs collagen sheep casing. The size and usage of natural sheep casings also are important depending on the animal they are came from, so Culingo Manufacturer makes sure that the origin and quality of the animal or optimum and that the sheep is in good healthy condition before it is slaughtered. The size range of the casing for for lamb is 18 mm to 28 mm in diameter, the size range for hog pork is 50 mm to 75 mm in diameter, the size range for sheep is 32 mm to 65 mm.
Process
All this starts at the slaughter plant where "green sheep " ungraded casings are removed from the animal after the slaughter process is completed and they are finely washed and cleaned, which takes a big effort to break the inner mucosa whcih is done normally with a machine made for cleaning casings and then this go on rollers which break break the inside of the mucosa so it can be easily flushed and cleaned out and easiealy removed. The cleaning was done by hand in the old times and still are done with more complicatd cassings but nowadays casings tend to be more machine cleaned.
During this process, a lot of water is used as there is alot of blood and mucosa in the casing, as if this blood is not removed from the casing it can red stain the casing and becomes pink. The cleaned casing is tied in bundles and packed in plastic drums and filled with a a big amount of salt in a brine for preservation and to improve the long shelf life. This bundles are then checked for quality and grade and later sond by the hank.
A hank consits of a number of strands (individual pieces of casing) which varies in length from 2 meters (which is the shortest length sold for commercial use) to as long as 28 meters.
Casings are graded by size and measured in millimeters and refers to the diameter of the casing, this is done exclusively by hand and at our Factory in Spain. Casing hanks ara available in a big number of formes and sizes which are later used in different applications.
Beef, Sheep/lamb and hog/pork are available in many packaging options in order to make the use of casings easier.
