Tulsa Company Keeps Oktoberfest Stocked With Bratwurst

By Rick Wells, The News On 6

TULSA, OK -- What's Oktoberfest without having at least one bratwurst? This year, The News On 6 took that love for sausages a brave step further by going to Siegi's Sausage Factory to watch bratwurst being made.

For most folks Oktoberfest means the Chicken Dance, beer, and bratwurst. And since I never met a bratwurst I didn't like I was curious how they make them.

Despite the fact that there's an old saying about sausage being one of those things, in life, you really never want to see being made I forged ahead.

Siegi's Sausage Factory is in south Tulsa. They've been making and selling sausage here for about 25 years. The meat is chopped and mixed with seasonings then it gets dumped into a machine which stuffs and twists the casings into hundreds of coarsely chopped bratwursts.

"That's what they're making here," said Jeffrey Yates, "In fact some of this may end up at Oktoberfest."

The brats go into a smoker for smoking, for steaming for a couple of hours then head into the cooler for packaging - bratwurst, knackwurst, all kinds of sausage

"We don't just make German sausage," Yates said, "some American style, European style and Italian sausage."

They supply a huge market in the Dallas area, but have customers in all 50 states.

They even made some good sized dog bones - big enough for mastiffs and Great Danes.

Siegi's also processes wild game for hunters. There are boxes are full of venison sausage ready to be picked up by the hunters who brought the animals in.

But it's mostly sausages, like these, thousands of pounds of it every day, including bratwurst.

Siegi's will send a ton and a half of bratwurst, knackwurst, and spicy chicken brats to Oktoberfest this year.  Siegi's is building a much larger place at 81st and Sheridan - more room for sausage making and sausage eating. It should be open early next year.