Guinness sausages

[oldspots]

Hi

I want to make sausages with our Old Spot pork for our business using Guiness - anyone have a good recipe please? Also for Christmas we want to use cranberries so a recipe for that would be wonderful. Thanks.

[aris]

Not tried it, but I suspect that a sausage with game meat and cranberries would be superb.

[Paul Kribs]

oldspots

I have made sausages using Guinness and prune. I used Franco's traditional sausage mix @ 50 grms per kilo of meat/fat. I used a pint of Guinness and boiled it down to a reduction of about 1/5th pint. The prunes were the semi dried ones finely chopped. I would say that the prune was the predominant flavour and I could barely taste the stout. A nice taste nonetheless.
If I were to make them again I would reduce 2 pints for a kilo. It would work out quite an expensive sausage though.
I did a similar one using cider and apple juice reduced down, and added semi dried chopped apricot. Quite a sweet sausage.

Regards, Paul Kribs

[welsh wizard]

Hi Oldspots

Like Paul I have used different beers in the process but I too have found little discernable taste difference. I recently made a game and cranberry sausage which was yummy, I just soaked dried cranberries in port to plump up and then used them in the mix whole. It gave a good flavour but I cant remember what the quantities were, just like a lot of my cookery I tend to go by eye.

I would think using the cranberries with a basic sausage mix with pork would be good, or try Franos game mix for a little bit of a different taste.

Cheers wW

[oldspots]

Thanks everyone - will try these

[Oddley]

Hi oldspots

I might as well put my twopenny worth in, I have first to say, I have never made Guinness sausages. But if I were to experiment with them , taking into account that Guinness does not come through as a strong flavor, I think I might add Guinness then try to intensify the flavor with a yeast extract like marmite.

As long as it has Guinness in it you can advertise it as a Guinness sausage. I personally would use one of my own spice mixes as a base but you could also use a commercial mix as has been suggested. I would also counter the bitter flavour of Guinness and marmite with some dextrose.

[aris]

Yeah, or Bovril - which is yeast extract with some beef extract mixed in for good measure.

[sausagemaker]

A few years ago now I developed a range called boozy bangers for a well know national food distributor, I replaced 14% of the water used with a good ale or cider.
The flavour was well developed but you need to be careful as the shelf life will be limited even if it is frozen


Hope this helps
Regards
Sausagemaker

[Oddley]

Hi sausagemaker

I have a couple of questions. I'm assuming that the reduced shelf life is due to the ethyl alcohol content. Do you know how this substance interacts with the meat and or fat. What is the result of the interaction?

As ethyl alcohol boils at 78.5oC would boiling off the alcohol reinstate the keeping qualities of the sausage. I really see no use for the alcohol, it's only the flavour of the liquer, that I would be after.

[sausagemaker]

Hi Oddley

It's the yeast that is still active in the beer that turns the meat sour, however if you boil the beer to kill the yeast this should overcome the problem.

Hope this helps

Regards
Sausagemaker

[Oddley]

Thanks sausagemaker.

That is interesting! As an ex amateur beer maker, I know trying to get a starter culture from most commercial beers is almost impossible. (They are very heavily filtered) Guinness being one of the exceptions. So would it be true to say you can use most commercial beers, without boiling. Draught bitter for instance from one of the large breweries.

A lateral thought, being if you add wine to salami with out sterilizing the yeast, will it have the same effect by souring the meat?

Another thought what is the effect of souring, is it the production of lactic acid, or some other substance?

[oldspots]

Hi Guys

Many thanks for these tips -I will boil the guiness first as its not the alcohol content we need just the flavour, although my husbands disappointed he says he needs the alcolhol!

[Spuddy]

Yeast won't sour the meat in as far as it won't lower the pH by any great amount but can produce undesirable slimy yeast growth and flavours which are not very palatable.
The desirable souring in a dry sausage is the result of a lactobacillus which produces lactic acid which DOES lower the pH and produces no unpalatable flavours just a sharp tang.
I think the term "sour" as used by Sausagemaker is more a generic term to indicate the presence of "Off" flavours.

[Oddley]

Thanks Spuddy

Why then, if you use wine (which does have a residue of yeast) in dried sausage, don't you have the same problems. The drying is not that quick as to inhibit the yeast growth. Also the salt is not much more than in fresh sausage. I can't see the ph being a contributing factor, as some people don't use a lactobacillus starter.

I don't think we can rule out completely the possibility of a lactobacillus bacteria being introduced with a yeast. There seems to be a symbiotic link. This is especially so in sour dough bread. What do you think?

[sausagemaker]

Yes I think Spuddy could be right in the fact that the term sour could be used as a generic term for off flavours.
However in my experience the meat did turn sour even after freezing & one can only go by the adage if something tastes sour then it's sour, either way it's inedible.

Regards
Sausagemaker