Saucisse:

[Gluestick]

Anyone on here make their own sausages?

I have just discovered a recipe for Cambridge Sausages.

A couple of thousand apparently sank with the Titanic as they were then the favourite British breakfast banger.

[Patf]

Here's a recipe I saw elsewhere:

500 grams of good quality minced pork

200 grams of smoked bacon

3 spring onions

2 flat tablespoons cranberry jelly

1 cup of fine breadcrumbs

3 shakes of nutmeg (about half a teaspoonful)

1 teaspoon paprika

3 large-ish fresh sage leaves chopped very finely

It doesn't tell you how to get the skins and actually make the sausages though. I think you need some kind of machine?

[idun]

I have made them over the years. I love a little mace in mine, macis in french. Gives the taste of sausage I am so fond of.

I don't really use a recipe these days, as I rather go by eye and eventual taste. What I found was that sausages need pork fat otherwise they are very dry and I do not like them 'dry'.

I use some bread crumbs, not too much though, and a good mix of lean and fat meat, shake of mace, salt, pepper and then maybe  a little thyme or sage and sometimes a little grated lemon rind.

Hardest thing I find to get hold of, is the skins. And getting the mix in the skins is great 'fun'!

Also, once made, I used to like drying them a little, hanging them for a few hours before using or freezing them.

[Gluestick]

[quote user="Patf"]

It doesn't tell you how to get the skins and actually make the sausages though. I think you need some kind of machine?

[/quote]

Don't know where one might buy the skins in France: I order them online, in UK. Only use sheep's natural skins. They come packed in brine and last quite well in the fridge.

Hate the nasty collagen skins! Might as well use clingfilm!

[:-))]

You can use a reasonable mincer; most these days come with a sausage stuffing attachment. 

See here:

DO NOT buy a cheap Mincer/Stuffer! Waste of money.

Our first mincer/ stuffer was a gift from our son. Lovely kind idea. However, made in China (what isn't these days?) and the gears are plastic and it is pretty damned useless.

Soon to sport out on a proper jobbie; steel gears. When the first one went duff, with a batch of filling waiting, patiently, we filled the skins by hand, using the funnel thing from the duff mincer. Not a job I would recommend...

[Gluestick]

[quote user="idun"]I have made them over the years. I love a little mace in mine, macis in french. Gives the taste of sausage I am so fond of.

I use some bread crumbs, not too much though, and a good mix of lean and fat meat, shake of mace, salt, pepper and then maybe  a little thyme or sage and sometimes a little grated lemon rind. [/quote]

Never use breadcrumbs, apparently. They soak up too little moisture and swell up dreadfully. I use rusk which I make, Easy; simply bread flour, a little bicarb as a mild leven and water. Bake in a shallow tray until browning and then turn over. Leave for a day or so; break up like slab toffee or peanut brittle then stick the bits in the liquidiser until nice and crumby. (This is identical to ship's biscuits - Hard Tack. Still used in lifeboat rations today apparently.)

[quote]Also, once made, I used to like drying them a little, hanging them for a few hours before using or freezing them. [/quote]

Hanging is apparently, essential, Idun; allows  certain essential micro biological processes to create the proper "sausage" flavour.

Excellent site here where I found the Cambridge banger.

See here:

[idun]

I usually use bread crumbs made from bread I have made, and as I only use a little have had no problems. A butcher in England told me to use rusk, and I probably would give that a go if I had had any problems.

The cambridge banger recette looks like something my family would love, but not me. I am 'funny' about sausages and prefer them simpler. But as someone who likes to try new things and make those I feed happy, I may give them a try.

[Gluestick]

I'm a funny old cove, I suppose, Idun.

Very much accord to W Somerset-Maugham's suggestion, that:

"To eat well in England, eat breakfast three times a day!"

The last decent breakfast I enjoyed, was staying at the Old Bell Hotel, in Malmesbury, Wilts, overnight, for a business meeting in circa 1986.

Breakfast was an utter delight! Porridge made with Wiltshire milk and I guess a dollop of cream; divine. Well cooked Wilts back bacon; local breakfast banger; mushrooms; two wondrous fried eggs; grilled tomatoes; well-filled toast rack; Wiltshire butter. Bottomless silver service coffee pot and more toast and excellent marmalade; and a morning complimentary newspaper.

I have searched for a proper English breakfast banger ever since and finally decided, well the only way is clearly to make 'em ourselves. Same with our bread; Mrs G and I make all of it.

Thus, as with my copious researches into bread and flour, I researched sausage making.

The very best reference is an English Butcher's Bible and I am trying to source a copy; published in the late 1940s.

Luckily, in France, we can buy wonderful pork cuts, shoulder, belly etc, at far better prices than UK and all perfect for bangers, at our local Carrefour; seems the meat section is a franchise and local abattoirs supply much of the meat.

[idun]

 You sound like my husband Gluestick. He will research and try out all sorts of recipes. I think I learned my lesson with gratin dauphinois years ago, none of the recipes I had were right and I felt like the recipes I had were cons. So now I tend to look at recipes etc rather half heartedly just taking into account what a few of them say.

The best sausages I have ever had from a butchers were pork and beef, absolutely perfect as far as I am concerned. That was on a visit back to England when we lived in France and on the next visit, the butcher had sold up. I was so disappointed.

Bread, well, as I have said on numerous occasions on here, I use cheap and cheerful white flour. These days usually with about a third to a half wholemeal. Although sometimes I make just white, and teacakes and brioche and pizza base.

I know all about the properties of other flours and have actually done tests, made breads with the different flours and got friends and neighbours in France to blind taste them. For the difference in taste compared to price, not worth my forking out a lot for dearer flour.

I do bake lovely bread, even if I say so myself, and that is not just me who thinks that. [:)]

[Gluestick]

My bread research commenced, after far too many years of suffering what was - wrongly! - diagnosed as IBS...

Baker's bread in the UK - and I mean "proper" bread caused me to bloat every time I ate it.

French bead didn't: problem is a love bread. Which, after all was called "The Staff of Life" and a main dietary component of the average person's daily food intake at all meals. Strange, I thought, farmworkers, factory workers and the rest were not collapsing all over the place with Celiac Disease! Ergo: something or things had changed........... what was it/were they?

There were mainly three:

1.    Instead of Stone Mill Grinding, flour was milled using high speed steel rollers which heated the grain/flour and changes the enzyme structure:

2.    Modern wheat had undergone crossing, to produce higher crop yields; greater resistance to plant disease; and increased self-fertilisation. The pea plant is self-fertilising for example and creates its own nitrogen:

3.    Modern agriculture, drenches plants with a cocktail of chemical nasties.

To add to this (as it were not enough already!) the Chorleywood Baking Process, introduced 1961 on, changed "Bread" as we knew it; rendering a tasteless unwholesome end product.

Finally, large millers, (RHM et al), add various "improving" chemicals to bread "flour", exacerbating all the above.

We only use stone ground organic flour. Our most usual daily loaf is a mix of wholemeal bread flour; plain flour (to lighten the dough and bread), plus Rye and sometimes, Spelt.

Great tasting; good for digestion and bowels!

Bake three or four and into freezer.

[Patf]

I make all our bread too (Idun and I have had a few discussions on the subject).

I use Dove Farm organic wholemeal mostly - some in the oven at the moment. But also, confess to using Francine brioche flour for white bread, which has numerous additives, but produces another type of bread that we like.

Otherwise, I've given up on french flour, tried various versions, but all seem to be lacking the quality of giving stretch in the dough. And "keeping" quality very poor. I even had a phase of trying french flour with added gluten from the health food shop. I've tried Idun's cheap and cheerful flour which turned out OK but soon dried out. Something different about french wheat?

A lot of the arguments are probably about personal taste.

[Gluestick]

Interestingly, Pat, a few years ago, a group of dedicated bakers banded together and persuaded the French Institute who maintain a collection of old food plant varieties, to supply them some ancient French wheat seeds.. strange thing about wheat. It can germinate after many a long year. I

remember reading somewhere about ancient Egyptian or Roman (can't remember) which germinated.

Anyway, these people planted this wheat and grew it wholly organically. as it was harvested, each season, they saved the grains and continued until they had enough for milling and baking.

Even those diagnosed as Celiacs could eat it with no problem; which surely makes one think?

Here is an excellent analysis:

Here:

The second reference concerns the French Paysan Boulangers.

[Pierre ZFP]

Getting back to the original thread, can someone be so kind as to explain the difference between 'natural hog casings' and 'Collagen Sausage Casing Skins' ?  I'm thinking that the latter are the artificial 'cling film' like casings?

[Patf]

Thanks for the link, Gluestick.

I'll have to put a bit of time aside to absorb it!

[Gluestick]

[quote user="Pierre ZFP"]Getting back to the original thread, can someone be so kind as to explain the difference between 'natural hog casings' and 'Collagen Sausage Casing Skins' ?  I'm thinking that the latter are the artificial 'cling film' like casings?

[/quote]

Correct, Pierre. We use natural sheep intestine; one can use hog and others.

Today, they even make glue from collagen and other nasty products of the rendering plants, used to stick bits and pieces of odd meat together! Then sold as steaks and even joints. Giveaway is the regular shape, all the way along.

[Pierre ZFP]

Thanks for the clarification to my last question (I don't know what wrong with the formatting in my last post !?!?)

Anyway, a secondary question please.  What type of mincer/stuffer do you use?  I've seen manual and electric ones.  I think I even have an attachment for a Kenwood Chef but goodness knows where it might be, not having been used since we got the mixer over 30 years ago!

[Gluestick]

[quote user="Pierre ZFP"]

Anyway, a secondary question please.  What type of mincer/stuffer do you use?  I've seen manual and electric ones.  I think I even have an attachment for a Kenwood Chef but goodness knows where it might be, not having been used since we got the mixer over 30 years ago!

[/quote]

At the moment, Pierre, none! [:'(]

The mincer/sausage stuffer our son gave as a present, died rather quickly. Plastic gears and gearbox. Having looked at quite a few, it seems they are all made in China. Motor power is always quoted as stall speed; i.e. the damned things seized up, making a violent 50 cycle hum and ready to burn out the windings!

I am probably going to buy this one:  Here:

Grunt? 0.938715 HP. Enough. Steel gears. Might even invest rather more. No substitute for grunt!

Kenwood should do. Kenwood still supply most parts. British company, you know. Which these days is a rare beast....

BTW: Carrefour in your and my canton town has excellent porc often on promo and far better flavour and taste; plus all necessary cuts including leg, shoulder and belly.

[idun]

We have two, an old fashioned hand turned one with different size blades bought from a quincaillierie in France, and attaches to the end of the table.

The other is an electric Kenwood mincer, rather than an attachment.

Both work perfectly well, depends on the quantities we are working with.

[Pierre ZFP]

Well Gluestick, that's a fine looking machine but a bit overkill for my use of few Sos now and then.

I think I'll try and find the Kenwood mixer attachment or hunt out a hand turned one like Idun (Although I suspect I might need more than just 2 hands!)

[cajal]

'or hunt out a hand turned one like Idun.

Plenty of choice here for 'Le hachoir à viande manuel'

regards

cajal

[Gluestick]

[quote user="idun"]We have two, an old fashioned hand turned one with different size blades bought from a quincaillierie in France, and attaches to the end of the table.

The other is an electric Kenwood mincer, rather than an attachment.

Both work perfectly well, depends on the quantities we are working with.

[/quote]

Meant to and forgot to ask, Idun.

How do you actually "stuff" the casings?

[idun]

With a great deal of laughter, sometimes until I can hardly draw breath.

Does that help[Www]

[Gluestick]

Same with us at  the last attempt when we were endeavouring to make our third batch: more sausage meat than before...

The wretched new toy failed; dismally, as the plastic gears were slipping.

Therefore, I gather together various funnel shaped implements and finished up stuffing the casings with a plastic sausage stuffing end from the new machine and a large wooden lemon juicer. Took hours and was not a happy bunny...

[:@]

[idun]

[:D]I am never unhappy when I have done this. Ever!

Need a sit down and a cuppa though to calm down........ from the big thick'uns that are bursting at the seams, to the hardly filled, pathetic specimens and just the feel of doing the job in hand, amuses me on such a juvenile level.

Now what I have found, and I have used a hand cranked machine and the electric one, is to roll the skin onto the tube as evenly as I can, taking my time and then I still expect the first one to be a bit of disaster and then hopefully just let the hole process slide gently across one's hands and into the awaiting dish. Certainly a two person job.

And sometimes, I end up with a proper looking sausages, and sometimes, they are an odd looking lot, but what the heck.

Any sausage meat the we haven't got skins for ends up being bagged and frozen in small amounts and I use that meat in other ways, life for sausage rolls, or in a pie, or make sausage meat balls. All gets used.

[Gluestick]

What I much like with the new one I have targeted, is it has a dedicated sausage stuffing blade, which clearly facilitates the transit of the already ground mix into the skin.

Whereas with most of the lower end jobbies, one simply uses the larger grinder blade: therein lies one of the main problems.

Of course, one can take this to excess and allow it to become a fetish.....

See here:

See here:

 No wonder Americans are so damned obese...