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Posted: **Sun Jan 27, 2008 9:44 pm**

johnfb was asking for a Cumberland recipe, although I have made a few, none stood out, so I determined to develop one myself, staying within the guidelines in the APPLICATION TO REGISTER: ‘TRADITIONAL CUMBERLAND SAUSAGE’

The guidelines state that the Cumberland sausage should

The recipe below meets all these requirements. besides all that it tastes quite nice as well.

Please follow the recipe the first time you make them. If you do make them, some feedback would also be nice.

Polly Perkins Cumberland Style Sausage.

80.79 % Meat Content.

78.4 % Pork Shoulder
21.6 % Fat Bellys

Of Meat
10 % Iced Water
10 % Breadcrumb
0.8 % Phosphate
2.9 % Seasoning

Seasoning
52.6773 % Salt
5.2581 % Black Pepper
5.2581 % White Pepper
0.7236 % Cayenne
5.9817 % Dextrose
5.3546 % Ground Coriander
5.3546 % Nutmeg
2.7014 % Mace
7.9112 % Sage
4.3898 % Thyme
4.3898 % Parsley

Method
Mince cold meats through 8 mm plate into a bowl, add iced water & mix, add phosphate & Seasoning & mix, add Breadcrumb & mix. Allow to stand to re-hydrate Breadcrumb before filling - about 5 - 10 minutes. Stuff more fully that you would normally and coil instead of link.

Posted: **Mon Jan 28, 2008 7:50 am**

Thanks Oddly, this has become like a search for the Holy grail...only a lot more difficult :lol:

Ok...here come the questions

1) What is phosphate (to a lay man like me) and where can I get it
2) Can it be left out
3) Can I substitue something else
4) Having made this would you say it stands up to the generic blend of Cumberlands available to you

Thanks for you help in advance
John

Posted: **Mon Jan 28, 2008 11:23 am**

Phosphate is used to improve retention of fluid, and improve texture, flavour and colour. Commercially you will find it as Superphos available in the shop here and elsewhere. So you can leave it out , but you will get a different product. Some consider it an "additive" :evil:

that should be avoided at all costs, others that it is an ingredient just like rusk, but that's a debate for another thread.

Dave

Posted: **Mon Jan 28, 2008 11:45 am**

Hi johnfb,

I think Dave has covered Phosphate quite well. The reason I included it was because you are looking for a commercial mix and most of those contain Phosphate. I left it as a separate component and not part of the seasoning so you or anybody else can leave it out easily. If you do leave it out it won't be the same sausage.

The last time I had a shop bought Cumberland was when we had run out of home made. My wife trooped in with some Tesco's finest Cumberland, my family tasted them and they were immediately thrown in the bin, we went without sausages till I made some more.

Posted: **Mon Jan 28, 2008 11:45 am**

Agreed on the debate issue, Dave.
Thanks for the info.

Oddley
Thanks for that ...yes my family only eat mine now too. RESULT!
I really think I might just stay with the bought blend rather than driving myself crazy trying to match it.

John

Posted: **Sat Feb 02, 2008 11:40 am**

John have you tried Oddley's Cumberland recipe yet?
I just made a small batch 2 days ago and I think its great, in fact its the best Cumberland I have made up to now.
I had also made some Weschenfelder Cumberland and Tradional so I done a test with my mates there is 5 of them.
4 thought Oddley's was the best the 5th picked Weschenfelder Cumberland.

I stuck to Oddley' recipe using Scobies Superphos and Dextrose.

Wallie

Posted: **Sat Feb 02, 2008 1:15 pm**

No Wallie, I haven't made it yet, but this sounds promising.
Maybe a breakthrough.

I will have to get some superphos.

Thanks for that
john

Posted: **Sun Feb 03, 2008 9:43 am**

Hi John
I think if you are trying to match a commercial sausage mix such as Weschenfelder's you have to use phosphate and dextrose because as Dave refers to phosphate: it creates a different product.

Phosphate is used to improve retention of fluid, and improve texture, flavour and colour. Commercially you will find it as Superphos available in the shop here and elsewhere. So you can leave it out , but you will get a different product. Some consider it an "additive" that should be avoided at all costs, others that it is an ingredient just like rusk, but that's a debate for another thread.

Also you can bet your bottom dollar that these commercial mixes contain them.

Scobies reference to dextrose:
An essential ingredient for sausage and salami making. Helps fermentation and acts as a browning agent in fresh sausages

[/quote]

wallie

Posted: **Sun Feb 03, 2008 10:33 am**

I also forgot to say to match Wesch's Cumberland using Oddley's recipe use the Wesch instructions and mince pork twice.

wallie

Posted: **Sun Feb 03, 2008 12:14 pm**

Cheers, Wallie.
Thanks for the imput

Posted: **Mon Feb 04, 2008 12:07 am**

Hi Oddley

I shall be getting my half pig in about a week's time, so I thought this was the moment to have a bash at your recipe.

But then I came across these quantities, and the thought of trying to weigh 0.7237g of cayenne slightly blew my mind, but didn't want to make up enough seasoning mix to season up 40 kg of meat or so!!!!

Oddley wrote:Seasoning
52.6773 % Salt
5.2581 % Black Pepper
5.2581 % White Pepper
0.7236 % Cayenne
5.9817 % Dextrose
5.3546 % Ground Coriander
5.3546 % Nutmeg
2.7014 % Mace
7.9112 % Sage
4.3898 % Thyme
4.3898 % Parsley

So, hoping that you won't be upset I calculated the standard spoon equivalents of most of these seasonings from a list of equivalents that I happen to have lying about my computer.

Here it is - rounded up and down with intelligence, I hope. I've done it for a 200gm batch of seasoning which would be enough for just under 7 kilos of sausage. I've assumed the parsley would be fresh and left it as weight - mainly because I don't HAVE an equivalent and don't have enough parsley to chop and weigh!!! :oops:

----200 gms Seasoning----
105 g Salt
2 teaspoon dextrose
4 teaspoon ground black pepper
4 teaspoon ground white pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
5 teaspoon ground coriander
4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 teaspoon ground mace
4 tablespoon rubbed sage
1 1/2 tablespoon dried thyme
9 gms parsley; finely chopped

Obviously if I've gone wrong, or you're livid, please accept my embarrassed grovels.

Posted: **Mon Feb 04, 2008 12:55 am**

Hi Ianinfrance

Please excuse my notation, I do it that way for selfish reasons. If I develop a good recipe, I like to be able to recreate it exactly. I develop them with drug dealers scales, 0.01 g that I bought for the specific purpose of mixing small quantities of spices and cures.

Good or bad, I would value your opinion on this sausage, as I do all opinions from members of the forum.

I used dried parsley so I think probably using twice as much fresh might be about right. I also used dried sage I believe rubbed sage is different, here is the difference in weight from sausagemaker per teaspoon 0.6g-Ground Sage, 0.9g-Rubbed Sage. To be honest, I don't know if just dried sage, is the same as ground sage, or rubbed sage.

Posted: **Mon Feb 04, 2008 3:53 pm**

Hi again Oddley

Oddley wrote:
Please excuse my notation, I do it that way for selfish reasons.

No excuses necessary. I understand exactly why you did it, and when you've got scales as accurate as that, it makes as much sense as any other way.

Oddley wrote:
If I develop a good recipe, I like to be able to recreate it exactly.

Of course you do!! I do exactly the same when developing/adapting recipes for anything. I'm meticulous in measuring jusr exactly how much I use of everything, so that I can put my mind in neutral next time!!!

In fact today I noticed that the recipe I used for making Palestine (jerusalem artichoke) soup didn't have any quantities for salt & pepper. So when I was seasoning it up, I measured the salt very precisely with measuring spoons and counted the number of grinds of black pepper. So I can say that a batch, sufficient to fill 8 1 litre jars, needs 3 teaspoons salt and 80 grinds of pepper. (The recipe calls for bacon, which also provides salt, which I why I don't use much). All that to say that I think you're absolutely right to be precise.

Oddley wrote:
Good or bad, I would value your opinion on this sausage, as I do all opinions from members of the forum.

You'll have it. I've made up the batch of 190 gms of seasoning (200 less the parsley), and ground it all together. We were going to have sausages anyway this evening, so I thought that as I had to go out to a big store to get the makings for a foie gras terrine, and a couple of other goodies, I'd buy enough pork to make a kilo of your sausages and see how it all worked out. In fact I'll be making them as patties as I don't want to fiddle about with my stuffer and get some casings just for a kilo.

Now then!!! I'm afraid I've had to make a couple of modifications. Don't have dextrose, or phosphate, so I subbed sugar for one and left the other out. BUT, because the phosphate tends to hold water, I thought it would be a good idea to reduce that. And because I tend to use rusk, I substituted that for the breadcrumbs.

This section edited for clarity
So this is the mix that I'll be using as soon as I've finished writing here.

705gms pork shoulder
195 gms fat pork belly
45 gms rusk
45 gms water
28 gms spice mix (made without parsley)
1ï¿½ gms chopped fresh parsley (= 1ï¿½ tsp)
end of edited section

I'll report back later thes evening what we thought of them

Oddley wrote:
I used dried parsley so I think probably using twice as much fresh might be about right. I also used dried sage I believe rubbed sage is different, here is the difference in weight from sausagemaker per teaspoon 0.6g-Ground Sage, 0.9g-Rubbed Sage. To be honest, I don't know if just dried sage, is the same as ground sage, or rubbed sage.

Yes I noticed the difference, but as I just bought "Sauge" in the local supermarket, I've no idea which it would count as, and therefore calculated on the basis of 1.3 gms per tsp Between you and me, I think the big difference is bizarre especially as I'd normally expect a ground herb to be denser than a rubbed one! As for the parsley I agree, though generally I work on the ration of 3:1 fresh to dry for most herbs.

Posted: **Mon Feb 04, 2008 8:26 pm**

Hi again.

As promised, I'm reporting back after having tried Oddley's PP sausagemeat as patties.

Having weighed out the meat and cut it into smallish cubes, I stuffed them into the freezer compartment of my fridge with a freezer block on top, for about 20 minutes while getting everything together. When I took them out they were perfectly par-frozen for mincing.

I don't have an 8mm plate so minced at 6mm, straight into the s/s bowl of my big kenwood chef Major. Added the water and mixed at speed 4 for about a minute. Added the spices and gave a further 30 secs or so. Finally added the rusk and gave another minute. The meat was very sticky at this stage so the emulsion had obviously taken well. Left 10 mins to rest and hydrate in the fridge.

We then shaped them into 100 g patties - as explained earlier. These were cooked on a griddle. for about 8 mins a side, quite gently.

Taste. Smashing. perfectly salted, good pepperiness, but not too much so. The other spices rounded out the flavour and the generous amount of sage gave them a very "english" flavour. Superb. Texture wise, the patties were quite tight, without any tendency either to shrink or to fall to bits. I liked them very much, and am delighted we've got about 7 more in the freezer now! I will certainly be making a batch with "my" pork, and stuffing them into rings this time.

Thanks very much Oddley. A resounding success, significantly better than my previous attempts using mixes.

Posted: **Mon Feb 04, 2008 8:57 pm**

I'm glad you enjoyed them...

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