So when you’re making sausage, presumably you add certain spices to the pork or beef or whatever to make it taste sausage like. I was thinking that in certain food emergencies, these would be useful to have around, since I always have ground beef somewhere, but don’t always have sausage.
So what do I need?
This won’t tell you what’s actually in the spices, but if you want to make sausage, you can order various spice mixtures here. Some supermarkets and butcher’s shops sell this sort of thing too.
For breakfast sausage you might try sage or poultry seasoning (which contains sage). Use it sparingly, though, it can get overpowering. Use black pepper or cayenne for hotness.
For Italian-type sausage, try oregano and fennel. Same as above for hotness.
Here is a very good page on sausage-making, featuring a breakfast sausage recipe. You can substitute ground beef for ground pork in most cases:
Yep; apart from the meat (which is sometimes considered optional in supermarket sausages), the key flavours (as far as I can perceive them) are: salt, pepper, sage, nutmeg, thyme. Really not sure about the ginger Q.E.D..
I have a recipe for spaghetti pie that uses hamburger but you add a little fennel seed to it. Tastes a lot more sausagey
Sage
Rosemary <---- Makes it extra good !
salt
pepper
whenever i taste fennel i automatically think “Sausage!”
Don’t look at me, it’s not my recipe. Personally, I do think the ginger would add a nice flavor. I might give it a go one of these days.
Add anise to the list. Though that may be more of an Italian sausage thing.
Yep, sage and fennel are the signature sausage flavors.
Back in the days when I worked making sausage, the predominant spice was marjorum and sage.
I noticed that my Mc Donalds hamburger, the parts that where not covered by the bun, looked and seemed to taste like their sausage biscuits… This was less than a month ago. Just thought that it pertained here.
Is fennel the little ellipsoid-shaped seed-looking thingies that always show up in pizza sausage? I always think of sausage when I eat those things.
Yup, that’s fennel. Well, technically it’s fennel seed. Fennel itself is like a big, sweet onion with celery-like stalks.
semi-hijack:
What spices make bratwurst bratwurst instead of Polish/Italian/Summer/Breakfast sausage?
Brian
Fennel seed is a prime ingredient in sweet Italian sausage. The more the merrier, sez me. Marjoram is used heavily in traditional Polish sausage.
Most of the stuff you buy off the shelf is very heavily salted. The best sausage is found at an independent butcher, or ordered from an online deli. If you’re interested in making your own, take a look at “Great Sausage Recipes and Meat Curing” by Rytek Kutas.