Standard Ingredients For Pork Sausage

[Bob]

You mentioned several recipes in past posts but I cannot find them. The Search facility on this bulletin board really sucks.

Pork and Garlic Sausage Recipe
http://forum.sausagemaking.org/viewtopic.php?t=347

I have that recipe - it's the one I used to make Garlic Pork Bangers which we liked so much. I even bought Savory for that recipe even though I never use it.

I was referring to these regional recipes you had mentioned in another thead a while ago:

Cumberland Sausage
Lincolnshire Sausage
Manchester Sausage
Epping Sausage
Cambridge Sausage
Oxford Sausage
Yorkshire Sausage

Please post or email. Thanks.

[Parson Snows]

Bob

You wrote

I am hoping to reduce the fat to 30% by adding breadcrumbs

I include excerpts from the following document
Solving the problems of texture and flavour in low fat meat products
P. Allen, N. Dreeling, E. Desmond, E. Hughes, A.M. Mullen and D.J.Troy
Teagasc National Food Centre, Dunsinea, Castleknock, Dublin 15, Ireland

Water is the cheapest substitute for fat, though without the use of binders, the practical limit for added water in a low fat (8 %) formulation is around 8 % due to excessive cooking losses.

Flavour volatiles are released more rapidly from low fat formulations, which may explain much of the difference in flavour acceptability between low fat and standard fat products

Oat fibre seems to be able to trap the flavour volatiles and delay their release, thus overcoming the problem referred to above. (My note: rusk has displayed the same properties)

You wrote (referring to the Pork and Garlic Sausage Recipe)

I even bought Savory for that recipe even though I never use it

Summer savory has a strong, hot and slightly bitter flavor reminiscent of thyme and pepper. As you�ve bought it why not use it.

You wrote

I was referring to these regional recipes you had mentioned in another thead a while ago:

Oxford Sausage
http://forum.sausagemaking.org/viewtopic.php?t=304

Hope that this is of some use to you

Kind regards

Parson Snows

[Bob]

(My note: rusk has displayed the same properties)

That is my observation too, although I am still experimenting with the exact amount. I believe I will settle on 2 T. breadcrumbs + 2 T. water per 1 lb. pork.

You wrote (referring to the Pork and Garlic Sausage Recipe)

I even bought Savory for that recipe even though I never use it

Summer savory has a strong, hot and slightly bitter flavor reminiscent of thyme and pepper. As you�ve bought it why not use it.

I am using it on the Garlic Pork Bangers. But other than that recipe I have never run into anything that uses Savory.

You wrote

I was referring to these regional recipes you had mentioned in another thead a while ago:

Oxford Sausage
http://forum.sausagemaking.org/viewtopic.php?t=304

Thanks. I see that recipe has Savory too.

How about the rest:

Cumberland Sausage
Lincolnshire Sausage
Manchester Sausage
Epping Sausage
Cambridge Sausage
Yorkshire Sausage

[Parson Snows]

Bob
We�re not quite there yet

You wrote

I do not understand that. If 80% VL pork shoulder has 20% fat, how can it have 28% fat?

Approximately 8 % of the fat is not visible to the naked eye, the 80 % VL is �visual� lean. We don�t need to get into that at the moment. A considerable amount of work has been done on by such people as Moulton, and the FSA/EU. All studies obviously vary as they are dealing with living animals. I tend to use the FSA/EU (UK Government) figures.


the above table is taken from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

I wrote

The recommended/typical fat content for hard pork fat back is 78.6 %.

You commented

Actually it varies all over the place depending on the butcher. That's why I trim out all the lean which add to the lean meat weight. However, of late it has been 100% fat so I have not had to trim it.

As you can see from the table above, all of the �fat� isn�t fat. (taken from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations)
As I mentioned above, all studies vary, though I use the FSA/EU (UK Government) figures.

Hope that this clears it up a bit.

Kind regards

Parson Snows

[Bob]

Bob
We�re not quite there yet

[snip for economy of real estate.]

You are approaching this as a nutritionist. That's all well and good - and quite interesting.

I am approaching it as a home butcher who sees two kinds of pork: lean and fat. Lean is red stuff and fat is white stuff.

My objective when making the pork mix is to take a given weight of red stuff and a given weight of white stuff and blend to a consistent ratio - one that I can use to calibrate the mix for repeat use.

I take the externally-trimmed pork shoulder at 80% red stuff because that's what I got when I dissected a piece. The pork scraps I get contain varying amounts of red stuff which I have to account for when I make the mix.

So my mix contains approximately 3 parts red stuff and 2 parts white stuff in the form of red/white pork shoulder and red/white pork scraps.

Although the number I get is a contrivance by nutritionist standards, the way I go about deriving it is more accurate than looking it up in tables, because I am actually measuring the amounts for my given sample.

Therefore I hope to be more consistent over a wider variety of different samples even if the figure I use has nothing to do with nutritional composition.

[boslow]

After suitable aging, I believe you poach it. I poach sausage in other products like Italian pasta sauce or sauerkraut but in this case I would use plain water. I keep the water temperature around 160F so the poaching process does not split the casings.

I poach to an internal temperature of 155F, which takes about 20 minutes. Normally I just let the sausage sit in the hot water for 1/2 hour and not bother with the internal temperature measurement.

Then I believe you pan fry the sausage in butter on a low heat until the casing takes on a golden brown coloration.

Comments, please.

Trying to keep up here, sorry if someone has already posted a reply to this. but being a "banger" lover I would not touch "poached" english sausage. and I suspect this is more the reason for dry sausage than fat content. the way we cook them in the old country is to take the fresh uncooked sausage and place into a warm frypan with a little butter or oil and fry gently for 20 -25 minutes until golden brown. eat between two slices of good bread with HP sauce. I dont think we should get into if you should prick the sausage during cooking and just accept that some do and some don't.

[Bob]

Trying to keep up here, sorry if someone has already posted a reply to this. but being a "banger" lover I would not touch "poached" english sausage. and I suspect this is more the reason for dry sausage than fat content. The way we cook them in the old country is to take the fresh uncooked sausage and place into a warm frypan with a little butter or oil and fry gently for 20 -25 minutes until golden brown. eat between two slices of good bread with HP sauce. I don't think we should get into if you should prick the sausage during cooking and just accept that some do and some don't.

When I used the term "poaching" above, I meant cooking the sausages in a frying pan with a little water rather than fats or oils. The purpose is to render the fat in the sausage. When the water dries up you have enough rendered fat to continue the cooking - or you can add some oil.

However, based on your comments I think I will bypass the "poaching" step and go directly to butter and oil for cooking. As far as pricking sausage, I sometimes make several slanted slice marks on the skin along the length of the sausage to facilitate rendering of the fat. But, if I am able to make a less fatty sausage now that I am using breadcrumbs, I may bypass that step altogether.

Thanks for the heads up. BTW, what is HP sauce?

[boslow]

slitting the sausage will dry out the final product, I try to cook them so they don't split or loose any of the fat giving a nice juicy finish to the product.
HP sauce is a British thing

http://www.hpfoods.com/brands/hpsauce/

[sausagemaker]

Hi Bob

Follow the link below for HP sauce.
http://www.hpfoods.com/brands/hpsauce/

Regards
sausagemaker

[sausagemaker]

Hi

Sorry but I have been away for a while (Big Flood in Carlisle near where I live),so had the read the full thread to catch up.

With the taking apart of my last post I thought I should reply
If the 2003 sausage survey is to be believed then 40% fat is high by any standard & please remember that it's because of commercial sausage making that we all make our own.

Sausages would be in casings

The four sausages talked about by parson (Cornish, Epping, Glamorgan & Lorne) One the Glamorgan is made of cheese & not Salted meats so I discount this one as much as I would Lynda McCartney�s.
The Cornish & Epping are skinless sausages but they are made by stuffing into a cellulose casing, blanching in hot water & stripping the casings off (So they still went into a casing).
The Lorne sausage I have already mentioned.

Cumberland is coiled & not linked

I am not going into the argument again over this one but I will say that you would be hard pushed to find a Cumbrian butcher that links his Cumberland sausage It would be about the same amount of Scottish butchers putting there Lorne sausage in a casing.

Some recipes go down to 50% meat

I was talking about the old style of measuring the meats as this is a more suitable method for the home producer.
If we were commercial the amounts are as low as 26% if using avian or rabbits or combinations of the two
However this is lean meat only it does not allow any one to reduce the meats from the 50% minimum stated by law.
Reference to this can be found in "Labelling & Composition of Meat Products 2004"
Section 8 Have the requirements of the reserved description changed

It states clearly in the first paragraph that "it is not the intention that the revised reserved descriptions should significantly alter the composition of meat products"
i.e. old rules still apply, however only a judge can determine this situation (a line once given to me by a TSO).

As far as the book of sausages by Hippisley Cox goes I cannot help it if they do not give the credit were it is due I can only report where I got my information

Regards

Sausagemaker

[Bob]

Hi Bob

Follow the link below for HP sauce.
http://www.hpfoods.com/brands/hpsauce/

Regards
sausagemaker

Thanks for the reference. I wonder if HP Sauce is similar to A-1 Steak Sauce in the US? The bottle shape is the same. If so I can imagine it with fried sausage. However, I am prejudiced to my homemade Kansas City Sauce I talked about earlier - the one with molasses.

BTW, they mention a "hot bacon sandwich" along with their sauce. Have you tried the American favorite, nicknamed the BLT for bacon, lettuce and tomato, made with toasted sliced bread and mayonnaise.

[Twoscoops]

i thinik they are the same. Here is a recipe.

http://www.netcooks.com/recipes/Sauces/ ... Sauce.html

[Parson Snows]

Bob

You wrote

I wonder if HP Sauce is similar to A-1 Steak Sauce in the US? The bottle shape is the same

Yes the bottle shape is similar though not quite the same, the HP sauce bottle has characterisic vertical chamferred corners. By the way the "HP" stands for Houses of Parliament, the distinctive picture on the front of the label. The colour is similar to A1 and that's where the similarities end. Having lived in the US and Canada I am familar with A1 sauce. I grew up in pubs in the UK (London) so I'm certainly familar with HP sauce. If you shook a bottle of A1 sauce and then took the lid off and turned it upside down I think that you'll agree with me that it comes out of the bottle rather quickly. This is not the case with HP sauce, it has more of a thick Ketchup like consistency. The ingredients are also different, though they are both steak style sauces. Numerous companies such as Daddies sauce etc have tried to capture/reproduce the distinctive flavour. None have succeeded, or at least in my opinion.

kind regards

Parson Snows

[Bob]

Bob

Numerous companies such as Daddies sauce etc have tried to capture/reproduce the distinctive flavour. None have succeeded, or at least in my opinion.

How close does that recipe someone posted come to tasting like HP?

[Parson Snows]

Bob

I'll post my version tomorrow - I'll have to dig it out first. I make it here because HP sauce is so expensive (relatively), almost 80 % of a minimum day's wage. It won't be exactly the same as HP, though it's resembly close, and at least somewhere for you to start experimenting from. If I could make HP sauce I wouldn't be working for a living.

kind regards

Parson Snows