Pigs Cheek Sausage Rolls & my Dream Pub Food

This is a more fuss free version of the Piggy Cheeky Wellingtons I made.

Cook your pigs cheeks the same way by gently cooking overnight in a low oven. Let them cool then trim them lengthways so they are thinner and more suitable for sausage rolls.

Give them a little smear of mustard and then wrap them in puff pastry. Bake for 15 minutes until the pastry is browned and serve with some mustard and a pint of beer.

The meat melted and the pastry crunched. They are cheap. Delicious. Easy. And divine. Without question, these are the best sausage rolls ever – Ginger Pig included.

Just thinking about pig cheek sausage rolls has made me want to own a pub specialising in serving imaginative bar snacks that use cheap bits of meat. We’d have Scotch eggs on a par with the Harwood Arms, pork pies that make Helen’s look average and pigs cheek sausage rolls that make you wonder why you ever visited the Ginger Pig. And all for a couple of quid.

We’d also make biltong from ox cheek and serve chitterlings to unsuspecting drinkers. Imagine how tasty chicken oysters would be encased in a thin dumpling? And the bliss of tucking into a platter of bourbon glazed short ribs. Ramekins of hare pate would be a doddle. Pork belly confit would be a favourite. Just thinking about deep fried skate knobs makes me feel weak at the knees, ankles and toes.

And what’s wrong with doing a range of larger more tapasy type dishes of pigs cheeks in cider and cream? Or slices of slow cooked ox cheek with smoky mash?

If you’ve got any ideas for imaginative pub bar snacks let me know and we’ll start a pub together!

Mince Pie and Brandy Butter Sausages

Bonkers. But delicious. The suet from the mincemeat, along with the butterfat make these sausages very moist, whilst the fruit and the brandy give them a sophistication that helps to elevate them out of the novelty category. Given that Santa and his band of merry reindeer have buggered off for the rest of the year, they also make a great way of using up any leftover mincemeat.

Start with a 60/40 mixture of minced belly and shoulder. Add two big spoonfuls of mincemeat and a spoon of brandy butter. Then add a glug of brandy. Mix together with some salt, pepper and breadcrumbs until the consistency feel sausagey.

Then pump into some natural casings and leave to rest overnight. Create mini links and serve to unsuspecting friends as mini mince pie sausages on the end of cocktail sticks.

We ate these after a long walk in the frosty Somerset countryside with a cup of tea. To my delight the idea turned out to be far less hair-brained than I had feared. The sausages were moist, sticky, full of festive flavour and universally approved of. The stewed fruit led Cowie to think they tasted like Devils on Horseback. So if you’re keen to use up your mince meat the last dregs of brandy butter, spare them the pastry treatment and ram them inside some pigs intestine.

Gareth from Bibendum suggests quaffing some rich Alsatian Pinot Gri with these, whereas Fiona thought they’d go down a storm with Tawny Port or off-dry Amontillado.

Top photo is from kyz on Flickr via creative commons.

This is part of a series of posts about experimental sausages and a potential sausage-fest

Apple and Bourbon Sausages

Ever since I cooked bourbon glazed pigs cheeks I’ve been gagging to explore the unchartered waters of cooking with bourbon. It seems swine and bourbon have a natural affinity. So much so that a bar called PDT in New York even make a cocktail with bacon and bourbon!

This sausage recipe is very simple. Take your 60/40 mixture of minced belly pork and shoulder and add some salt and a few turns of freshly ground pepper. Then add a finely chopped apple such as a Cox. Then add a double measure of bourbon. I used Maker’s Mark, but you could use Jim Beam. Given that I work with the nice folk at Beam Global, there’s normally a drop or two floating around in the office. To finish the mix add a handful of breadcrumbs and a dollop of mustard. Since making these Londoneating has made the inspired suggestion of adding a touch of maple syrup. It seems a dose of sugar is quite a common technique in sausage making. Apparently it helps the sausages to caramelise.

Then set the gears in motion and fill your casings. Leave them to rest overnight in the fridge. These sausages are wonderfully comforting. They are great cooked in a glaze made from soy, mustard, honey and bourbon and served with a giant pillow of celeriac mash, some buttered spinach and lashing of left over marinade-cum-gravy. Just like the pigs cheeks below.

Or if you are feeling more patriotic, do something more British, such as a toad in the hole with a bourbon based gravy. Cowie’s Mum, who is an expert at making all things battery and British, whipped this up without a recipe. But if you need one, why not sneak a peak at Delia. The key thing is to get your dripping nice and hot before hand and get ready to eat it as soon as it comes out of the oven, otherwise it might flop.

Grog-wise, Gareth from Bibendum suggests slucing these down with a bottle of New World chardonnay whereas Fiona thinks a medium cider would do the job as it links back to the apples.

This is part of a series of posts about experimental sausages and a potential sausage-fest

Homemade Chorizo Sausages

I adore chorizo. I even thought about writing a blog dedicated to the joys of eating it. I don’t know what I see in its smoky, spicy, sweet, fatty, salty flavour profile that makes it impossible for me to resist.

My version of chorizo is a very homemade version. I thought long and hard about whether to even call it chorizo given that it is pretty ersatz. Whilst Brindisa shouldn’t be shaking in their boots, it still tastes pretty good!

Mingle your 60/40 pork belly and shoulder mince in a bowl and season heavily with salt. Then in a frying pan sauté a finely diced onion until it softens. Then add 3 cloves of garlic and 2 dessert spoons of the best picante smoked paprika you can get your hands on. The onions and garlic will instantly turn red and the air will transform into a hellish cacophony of chilli fumes with a hint of tapas bar. One the powder has been assimilated into the onions tip it out into the pork mixture. Then pour a small glass of wine into the pan and deglaze. Add this to the pork.

Next, finely chop as many chillies as you’d like and add them to the mixture. I then added a handful of finely chopped Pepperdew peppers, but this is optional. They add a lovely red colour that lingers throughout cooking as well as a sweet note to combat the abrasive spice.

Add a handful of breadcrumbs and then “sausagify” them. Leave to rest overnight.

Then serve for breakfast with spicy scrambled eggs as a take on huevos rancheros. You’ll love the way the spicy red oil mingles with the eggs. It’s one of the best ways to start the day I’ve ever come across.

Alternatively, they would also be great in a classic butter bean, charred pepper, chorizo and passata stew, with some crusty bread and a bottle of Malbec or Rioja as suggested by both Gareth and Fiona. Although maybe not for breakfast!

You can see from our cat’s reaction that these are special sausages!

This is part of a series of posts about experimental sausages and a potential sausage-fest

Fennel, chilli and chocolate sausages

Chocolate sausages?! Has Browners gone completely mad?

Pork goes well with chilli…

Pork also goes well with fennel…

Pork and chocolate is a combination that you’ll stumble across throughout Latin and South America…

So why not combine it all together?

The warmth of the chilli, the aniseed flavour of the fennel and all round depth from the chocolate build up to create a sausage that’s up there with my favourites.

Make your sausage meat using the 60/40 belly to shoulder ratios as I’ve mentioned elsewhere. Season liberally with salt. Then grate a generous amount of Willy’s Wonky Cacao into the mince. Then sprinkle with chilli seeds and finely ground fennel seeds. If you’ve got some fresh chillies to hand then finely slice them and add to the mix.

To continue the South American theme, Ancho chillies would work well, but if you wanted a smokier flavour then why not experiment with Chipotle chillies which are hard to get your hands on, but well worth the effort.

Mix it all together with some breadcrumbs and then extrude into some natural casings. Leave to rest in the fridge overnight and then serve for lunch along with some buttery mashed potato, iron rich greens and fennel gratin. The chocolate helps to give them depth, whilst the main sensation comes from the fennel and chilli, both of which are very grown up flavours.

As an adventurous alternative make a Mexican mole and serve with the sausages with some rice.

Gareth from Bibendum recommends drinking a bottle of Primitivo with these bangers, whereas Fiona the Winematcher suggests wolfing them down with some New Wave Tuscan red.

This is part of a series of posts about experimental sausages and a potential sausage-fest

Sichuan Sausages

Earlier in the year I had an inspirational meal at Chilli Cool. Having never had Sichuan food before, I was oblivious to the narcoleptic charms of Sichuan peppercorns which not only set your mouth on fire but numb it at the same time. I left feeling invigorated and keen to dabble with Sichuan pepper.

So I invented my own Sichuan sausage recipe. And would you believe it, the sausages are amazing. Here’s how you make them.

Mince a 60/40 mix of pork belly and pork shoulder. For 6 sausages throw in a handful of breadcrumbs. Then, in a pestle and mortar, grind 3 dessert spoons of Sichuan peppercorns to a fine dust. Add them to the pork. Then slice up a spring onion and add it to the party. Grate a whole thumb of ginger into the pork along with a a couple of cloves of minced garlic. Then sprinkle in a generous amount of chilli seeds and then as much Chinese 5 spice as you think seems right. Season with salt, or for added authenticity some MSG.

Mix the pork and spices together and then feed into sausage casings. Allow the sausage to rest for a few hours before cooking as this will allow the meat to settle and relax after the trauma of the sausage making process.

Amazingly a few wires got tangled up in the Brown kitchen and we landed up serving them with Brussels’ sprouts and carrots! The winter vegetables admirably stuck to their task. It prompted one of the funnier moments over Christmas when my Grandfather, who isn’t a fan of spice, said, “I don’t mind about the chilli because my mouth has gone numb”. There was something deeply surreal about the whole experience. And this odd situation allowed us to concentrate on the flavour of the sausages which whilst taking no prisoners, were a spectacular success.

My plan had been to take inspiration from “Dan Dan Noodles” (see photo above courtesy of scaredy_kat on Flickr via creative commons ) and cook them in a liquor of soy sauce, chillies and stock and then serve them with noodles and pak choi. They would also be great without their casings as meat balls in a Chinese broth. If you’ve got any suggestions about what to serve them with, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

And if you are thinking what wines would go well with a Sichuan sausage, then Gareth from Bibendum suggests drinking Argentine Bonarda and Fiona the Winematcher suggests a New Zealand Pinot Noir.

This is part of a series of posts about experimental sausages and a potential sausage-fest