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Get your free copy08 November 2016, 05:12 AM
- One of Britain's best-known butchers, David Lishman, walks us through the steps to making a brilliant banger
● Use good meat: We try to source pork from gilts (young female pigs). Boar pigs, once they start ‘chasing the ladies,’ can give an unpleasant smell in their meat known as boar taint. It’s a testosterone/teenage thing which may be familiar to people with growing-up sons. It’s not always possible to procure just gilts, but sourcing from a good producer is key.
● Lean to fat ratio needs to be around 75:25: Fat gives succulence and flavour. Too lean and the sausage will be dry, too fat and the pan will fill with drip. A combination of shoulder and belly works very well.
● Seasonings and spices: Use the freshest ones, not those you’ve had stored in the ingredients cupboard for a year or more. There are spice blenders who will make up your recipe for you, rather than you blending them yourself. This means that you are drawing from the freshest ingredients all the time.
● Production: The mincing and mixing of the meat with the ingredients is paramount to how the sausage binds, and how well it cooks and tastes.
● Keep learning: There is a skill and an art to making consistently good sausage, which only comes with experience and knowledge. We are all still learning.
Read the entire interview with David in the latest issue of Speciality Food, which is available to download for free here.
