Meat: Cured Sausages

 

Hello, everyone! 

My name is Colin, and this year I took the plunge and started a semester abroad in Volda, Norway. As a media student, I deal with the sender, the medium and the receiver and have to learn about many different media. This blog shows you how to use my recipes (sender) and your stove (medium) to make food that will make your taste buds (receiver) explode. 

This semester, I am currently taking the module ‘Norwegian Food Culture’, in which I am gaining practical experience in Norwegian cuisine. In the second practical exercise, we dealt with meat and how to preserve it.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 20% of food is thrown away every year because it spoils. (Brown, 2019, p. 540) You and I are going to combat this today by showing you how to preserve meat by turning them into cured sausages. Let's get started! 

Cured Sausages

Cured Sausages
Photo: Kuki

Ingredients (for 4 sausages): 

400g Minced Meat (1/2 pork, 1/2 beef) 

1 Onion

1 tsp Salt 

1 tsp pepper

1,5 tsp allspice

1 tsp dried ginger 

Sausage casing, approx. 2-3m 

Directions

1. Wash/rinse the casings in cold water. If necessary leave them in water for an hour or more before use. 

2. Cut the onion and grind. 

3. Mix the meat and onion together and grind it once again. 

4. Roll the sausage casing on the meat grinder and start filling the sausages. By twisting the filled sausage you can control how the long the sausages are gonna be 

5. Hang to 2-3 days before freezing them.

Colin's fun fact: 

The word "sausage" comes from the Latin word salsus, meaning "salted". Once, meat was cured by saturating it with salt. Today, the term cure is used to mean the addition of synthetic preservatives. Nevertheless, salt remains one of the major flavoring ingredients of cured meat. Today, there are thousands of varieties, like Germany's over 1,500 types, and the food is a global staple. (Brown, 2019, p. 149)

In Germany, we say ‘Mahlzeit’ and ‘Bis bald!’ (Enjoy your meal and see you soon!)

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Sources: 

C. Brown, A. (2019). Food Preservation. In Understanding Food: Principles and Preparation (6th ed.). Cengage.