High time

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harryc
Posts: 1112
Joined: Thu Jan 23, 2014 6:09 pm
Location: Espoo-Helsinki

High time

Post by harryc » Fri Jun 06, 2014 7:42 pm

High time some interest here - other than Lenkkimakkara and ubiquitous "Grillimakkara"
(For the raw sausage now available it would be great if someone would cut off their garlic supply - why everything has to be so GARLICKED is beyond me)


NEWS
News 6.6.2014 7:00 | updated 6.6.2014 7:00
Do-it-yourself sausages a growing trend, butcher claims
The increasing interest in home cooking means customers are turning away from supermarket varieties, claims one Kotka-based sausage maker. The award-winning producer and his English partner have made it their mission to introduce Finland to the good old British banger, albeit one with toned-down flavours to suit the Finnish palate.


Kotkan Lihatukun lihamestari Anthony Watson esittelee omenamehulla maustettua makkaraa
Kotka-based sausage maker Anthony Watson displays his apple-juice-flavoured sausages Image: Petri Lassheikki / Yle
Kotkan Lihatukun lihamestari Anthony Watson esittelee omenamehulla maustettua makkaraa
Makkaranvalmistusta Kotkan Lihatukussa
For many Finns, the sausage is as essential a part of summertime as the sauna, forest and summer cottage.

But one butcher claims that increasing numbers of people are tiring of the off-the-shelf varieties on offer at the supermarket, and instead making their own.

Panu Eerola from wholesalers Kotkan Lihatukku says that home-made sausages are a growing trend among his customers, perhaps as a result of an increasing wider interest in cooking at home.

”We’re getting constant requests for recipes, and there are now some very popular sausage-making courses in this area,” Eerola says.

You get out what you put in

The basis of a good sausage is good-quality ingredients, Eerola says. Fresh meat must be kept refrigerated. Seasonings and other raw ingredients should be weighed precisely to ensure consistent results, he says.

Minced meat and seasoning are mixed together to make the filling, which is then pushed into a casing made from pig intestine. It’s worth experimenting with different filling combinations, but too many flavours at once can be overpowering, Eerola warns.

Battle of the bangers

Eerola recently put his sausages to the test by entering them into a competition in Nottingham, England. The result was a podium finish for the third year in the row.

His secret weapon? Master sausage-maker Anthony Watson, a Brit who has lived in the southeast Finland town of Kotka for six years.

”Sausage competitions in England are very traditional affairs,” Eerola says. ”You compete under different categories, such as for best taste or for the most traditional recipie. We’ve taken our Kotka sausages there and they seem to have gone down well,” Eerola says.

Eerola says that English sausages are very different from the Finnish version, of which the pre-cooked Frankfurter-style is by far the most widespread.

”The English use a lot more seasoning and herbs with stronger tastes, which Finns aren’t used to. We’ve had to tone down our English sausages to suit the Finnish palate, but we’ve kept the essence the same,” he insists.

Sausage-making the Kotka way:

Anthony Watson’s basic sausage

Two kilos of minced pork, with at least 25 percent fat. (Some of the pork can be substituted with, for instance, lamb or moose meat.)
25 grams of salt
5 grams of pepper
350 grams of water
12 grams of herbs
3 grams of ginger
3 grams of coriander
3 grams of nutmeg
Mix all the ingredients. The filling can be run through the mincer a second time before being stuffed into sausage skins.

Fry the sausages or cook in the oven for 25 minutes. Make sure they’re properly done on both sides before eating.



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