The Ultimate Guide For Buying Sausage

Sausages have a reputation for being an unhealthy food. Their notoriously high fat levels undoubtedly play a part in this. However, of greater concern is the association between sausages and cancer risk. According to a study published in the International Journal of Epidemiology, the regular ingestion of processed meat — a category which includes sausages – was found to have a positive association with certain cancers. After examining 474,996 participants, researchers found that eating 70 or more grams of red and processed meat per day led to a 32% greater risk of developing colorectal cancer and a 40% greater risk of developing colon cancer. The link between sausages and certain cancers is thought to be partly due to additives, specifically nitrites and nitrates.

Nitrites and nitrates are used to preserve sausages. They help prevent the spread of potentially harmful bacteria such as Clostridium botulinum and also ensure the sausage develops an appealing, bright color. Unfortunately, nitrites' use also results in the formation of N-nitroso compounds, which are known to be carcinogenic. When consumed alongside protein-rich foods, the nitrates found in sausages form nitrosamines, which are also associated with an elevated risk of developing certain cancers.

Those wishing to continue eating sausage regularly while also minimizing the effects of these additives can purchase nitrite- and nitrate-free sausages. Happily, products of this nature are widely available.

In the United States, pork, breakfast, and roasted sausage do not have a legal protein requirement. This means there is no minimum amount of meat they are required to contain in order to be labeled and marketed as sausage. Due to the lack of a legal protein requirement, the onus is on the general public to check the meat content of sausages before purchasing them.

Sausages with a high meat content, above 90%, are firm and often thought to be desirable. However, such high concentrations of meat do result in characteristics that aren't always popular. Simon Wood, who was the manager of a meat company, explained this to The Guardian: "When we started, we tried to convert people to eating firmer sausages with 95% to 98% meat that were just seasoned with salt and pepper, but it soon became clear that a lot of people preferred them with a softer texture and a bit more flavour."

As Wood hints, sausages with around 75% meat content are often deemed the best. This amount provides the sausage with plenty of flavor and body while still allowing ample space for the addition of fat, rusk, water, spices, and any other additional ingredients required for a high-quality eating experience.

Great sausages are found across the country in all types of stores. Despite this, we advise buying sausages from your local butcher when possible. This is for a few reasons. Firstly, purchasing sausages from local butchers gives customers the opportunity to inquire about the animals. Due to their close ties with suppliers, butchers will likely know where the animals were raised and under what conditions. Butchers can also give advice on how to best cook and serve different types of sausage, knowledge which is hard to come by in the nation's larger grocery stores.

Generally speaking, sausages that are purchased from local butchers also tend to be of a higher quality than the mass-produced products found in large grocery stores. This is because they are often freshly made, using locally reared animals. Cheap sausages produced and distributed on a mass scale rarely boast similar virtues.

The vast majority of pork sausages are made using the meat of commercially farmed pig breeds, predominantly the Yorkshire. These animals are known to produce lean carcasses that maximize yields and thus profit margins. However, some pig farmers and butchers prefer to use heirloom breeds to make sausages, such as the Berkshire and the Gloucestershire old spot (pictured). Chef Craig Deih explained why some producers turn to these animals to the Charleston City Paper: "The heritage breeds have more characteristics and flavorful fat. If you start with a better product, you'll end up with a better product."

Thanks to their unique genetic makeup, heirloom tomatoes offer a huge abundance and variety of flavor. Heirloom pigs are the same, boasting incredibly flavorful fat. The resulting sausages are far superior to anything else on the market.

The only drawback of heirloom sausages is their price. Heirloom breeds take longer to mature than commercial breeds and tend to have a much more varied, and therefore expensive, diet. Add to this the time- and space-consuming rearing practices that are often employed, and it's not difficult to see why sausages made from heirloom breeds can cost more than $20 per pound. Rest assured, however, that buying them is money well spent.

When most people buy sausages, they get links. This is the most common form of sausage, but it's far from the only. Another common style are sausage patties, made from sausage filling that's not contained by a casing. Instead, the meat forms a puck-like shape. Often fried up at breakfast, sausage patties offer some benefits that encased sausages do not. As chef Brian Doherty noted to St. Louis Magazine, "I like to get a good sear, which produces some serious char and texture. And I've always been a fan of a good breakfast sandwich, and patties work much better for that."

Another less utilized sausage form is the coil. These large sausages are often dismissed as being impractical to serve because, unlike links, they don't come in portioned sections. However, an advantage of coiled sausages is that they have a relatively small surface area to volume ratio. This minimizes moisture loss, ensuring that the finished, cooked sausage is much juicier than those cooked as links. So, if catering for a crowd, consider coiled sausages.

Competent sausage makers are able to stuff their products with next to no air entering the casing. They also make a habit of pricking the raw sausages to release any air that does make its way into the otherwise finished product. This is important, as trapped air bubbles detrimentally affect all types of sausages. One of the main ways air bubbles ruin an otherwise perfectly good sausage is causing it to cook unevenly; air is a poor conductor of heat, and those sections around the bubbles will cook much slower than those parts of the sausage in contact with the skillet.

The presence of air bubbles also increases the chance that the sausages will burst during cooking as the air inside the sausage expands. To minimize the chance of air-bubbled sausages bursting, customers can prick a hole in the sausage's casing while it cooks, allowing the air to escape. Unfortunately, this causes the sausage's juices to escape as well and can even lead to the entire sausage splitting.

Air pockets inside cured or already cooked sausages, such as salami, do not pose as much of a problem. However, they do mean that customers are getting less sausage for their money. For these reasons, all types of sausage that present air bubbles should be passed over if possible.

In the United States, the two most common meats used to make sausages are pork and beef. These classic choices are used to produce bratwurst and Italian sausages. Popular as these meats are, they are by no means the extent of sausage meat options, as the popularity of poultry sausages indicates.

Chicken sausages are undoubtedly the leader of the poultry sausage subcategory. The main appeal of chicken sausages — and those made from other forms of poultry — is that they are significantly lower in fat than those made with pork. Typical chicken sausages contain only around 10 grams of fat total per 100-gram serving. For pork sausages, this number sits at over 27 grams. As Karen Whitman, owner of Mama's Chicken food market in Los Angeles, explained to the LA Times, these credentials cause customers to switch from pork and beef sausages to chicken. "[In the late 1980s] beef had a bad rap, so folks gravitated toward chicken [sausages]. That's really how it became popular, because you were eating something that tasted great and was better for you."

As Whitman indicates, poultry sausages are also surprisingly flavorful. This is thanks to the widespread use of thigh meat, which has a perfect meat-to-fat ratio for sausages, and poultry's ability to take a whole host of seasonings.