Pesto Sausage?

[onewheeler]

I was toying with the idea of a pesto flavoured pork sausage. Has anyone done anything similar? Quantities?

Martin/

[wheels]

That's an interesting one Martin. Over the years I've seen quite a few references to basil along the lines of:

This, and the wild Basil, belong to the Labiate order of plants. The leaves of the Sweet Basil, when slightly bruised, exhale a delightful odor; they gave the distinctive flavor to the original Fetter-Lane sausages.

But, I've never been able to find out anything more about 'Fetter Lane' sausages!

I think that I'd like a deconstructed pesto sausage better than one with fine ground ingredients. Chunks of pine nut and coarse chopped basil really appeals. How about adding some form of tomato too - maybe 'sun blushed'. Those with pork and Parmesan are already making my mouth water.

Phil

[onewheeler]

I think we're thinking along the same lines. Basil leaves (I have a lot having scored some reduced to clear plants at the supermarket) plus toasted pine nuts, parmesan and garlic. Of course in pesto the basil is a bit more than bruised and exudes its incomparable aroma freely. I'd not bother with the olive oil as it seems unnecessary.

As a starter, I'm thinking (per kg meat) about 30 g pine nuts (toasted, some chopped, some whole) a couple of cloves of garlic, a slack handful of fresh basil and about 30 g parmesan in shavings. Add the parmesan after the mixing to try to keep it fairly intact. Might be inclined to mince the basil with the meat to get it well-bruised! Salt in the usual quantities for sausage.

It also occurs to me that it might be nice with chicken or turkey.

One for the weekend...

Martin/

[wheels]

Sounds good to me.

I don't know why but if I was using chicken or turkey (both sound great ideas) I wouldn't mince the basil. I'd go gentle on the garlic too.

Phil

[gdkaufmann]

I have to admit this is a really making me hungry. I've recently moved to Ireland where sausage is a fairly bland affair. I'm considering just making my own.

Pesto is one of my favorite things.

I'd love to know what comes of this.

Thanks for posting.

[onewheeler]

We've just tried the Mk 1 pesto sausage recipe. Very nice, but the basil didn't come through as much as I'd hoped. The parmesan was detectable and the pine nuts added to the flavour. The herbs and spices did seem to enhance the pork flavour nicely however - a good recipe.

The next attempt will use more "proper" pesto sauce which should add basil flavour due to its being well processed.

Per kg pork shoulder:
Black pepper 1 g
Garlic powder 1 g
Salt 12.5 g
Fresh basil leaves 15 g added to the mincer with the meat
Fresh pesto sauce 3 g (because there was a bit left in the 'fridge!)
Pine nuts, whole, roasted 20 g
Parmesan 25 g (half grated, half in shavings)

Add the parmesan after getting the primary bind to try to keep the shavings as intact as possible. Stuff into hog casings.

Martin/

[Wunderdave]

This sounds great, I would perhaps double the fresh basil content. 15 grams isn't much!

You could rough it up in a mortar before adding to release more of the volatile flavor compounds, but I'd imagine that running it through a mincer would accomplish the same thing.

[cryan1980]

Glad I saw this post-- Gives me a place to start.

I was just saying to my wife that I want to use one of the basil plants in a sausage before they start to die off and figured I'd run a search here first!

[cryan1980]

Did a small batch (about 1kg)

Flavor was good... We used a higher amount of basil, garlic and red pepper. Issue. Col. Casings

I have never used before and while stuffing went smoothly they disinegrated while cooking (fring with a touch of oil to start)