Don's Sausage Awards 2015

Don’s Sausage Awards 2015

As we near the end of the year, I contemplate the snarlers I have munched on during the year. I write a review shortly after consumption of a sausage, in the idiosyncratic (my wife says obsessive) way my minds works, I sometimes come back to a sausage after a week or two and in my mind desire to consume this variety again. The sausages to be awarded as my snarlers of the year are those that made me want more, the ones that I thought about after some time had elapsed since eating them.

This year I am giving three awards.

These go to Italian Banderia and the Blue Cheese, Walnut and Pear from Westmere Butchery in Auckland. Also in the mix is Kazanka Domowa, a Polish Black Pudding from Park Avenue Quality Meats. All these sausage reviews can be read by clicking on the link.

In a hard decision my sausage of the year is awarded to the Italian Banderia. You will be delighted with this sausage if you try it.

In the almost made the podium category I considered Heritage Meat Company’s Mexician Chorizo and The Sausage Sheds, Polish Garlic Smoked Sausage. These are also very highly recommended by this writer.

Tomorrow I will make my own sausages for the Christmas barbecue season. I’m making an Italian sausage along with my own version of a blue cheese, pear and walnut snarler. We are going to a Christmas Eve dinner / barbecue with friends, and then a Christmas Day barbie with whanau. There will be around about 26 present this year on Christmas Day. The sausages will be made with care and consumed with gusto by the hungry guests. Watch out for the next post about how it all goes.

It must be true love

It must be true love

My wife had to go to Auckland for a day’s work. I received a call late in the day saying she was outside Westmere Butchery and what kind of sausages would I like purchased. From our visit to Auckland in January the two sausages that stuck in my memory were the pork, blue cheese, walnut and pear; and Italian Banderia. Both varieties were available and purchased.

After a quick flight to Wellington these were consumed by an appreciative whanau. The sausages were as good as I remembered them. The blue cheese, walnut and pear is an outstanding snarler for those who enjoy the tanginess of blue cheese with the texture of roughly ground walnuts on the palate. We even had some left over to share with friends when had them round for coffee and hot cross buns at Easter.

Buying sausages for your husband during a quick trip to Auckland, it must be true love.

Yachting and Sausages

Yachting and Sausages

We are up in the Bay of Islands staying with friends. The weather is warm, many degrees hotter than Wellington, which is very enjoyable.

 

 

I went sailing with my mate who owns the Undine, the original cream boat operated by Fullers that collected milk and cream from farms on the coast and up the rivers and inlets of the Bay Islands. The Undine is a Northland cargo cutter. Hundreds of these boats were built in the nineteenth century but sadly the Undine is the last surviving cargo cutter. She was built in 1887 and today is owned by an ardent sailor who hopes she will see in the twenty-second century.

 

 

 

It was very pleasant out on the water, a little gusty so we sailed with the mainsail and gib. It was a relaxing way to spend the afternoon.

When we got back to the house we cooked up some dinner. Good simple fare for a late summer evening’s dinner.

 

 

We cooked up Westmere Butchery’s pork sausages with blue cheese, walnut and pear, along with spicy chicken and coriander sausages. Also served were new potatoes and a green salad.

The spicy chicken and coriander are a medium to fine grind sausage. This sausage is gluten, soy and dairy free and suited the exacting dietary requirements of my mate’s partner and their son perfectly. She had phoned the butchery earlier in the day and they were very helpful in working through the exact ingredients in the sausages – better service would be hard to come by for those who need to be sure of just what they are eating. The coriander is the dominant flavour and there is a significant taste of chilli too. Flakes of the red chilli can be seen in the sausage. The chilli kicks in to a greater degree as an aftertaste. The spices dominate the chicken taste. While the sausage is able to be identified as a chicken sausage in my opinion the flavours are too strong and detract from making this sausage a great chicken sausage. The others at the table agreed with my sentiments. I would not purchase these sausages again but our hostess felt differently. Westmere Butchery made a wide range of quality sausages, everyone has different preferences and when I go back there are lots of flavours that I would prefer to sample. Cost per kilo: $17.95.

 

 

The pork, blue cheese, walnut and pear sausages were well received. These have a pork flavour with the dominant secondary flavour being blue cheese. Our whanau like blue cheese, and appreciated this flavoursome sausage. The flavours of the walnut are easy to distinguish and have a lower intensity than the blue cheese. The walnuts are lumpy and add a pleasant textual component to the snarler. The sweetness of the pear is present in small amounts and this sweetness is fleeting on the palate. These sausages are very nice and went down well, I would purchase these again. Cost per kilo: $16.95.
 

I must admit that I felt a bit intimidated by my mate’s partner - as I took pictures of the dinner she remarked that one of her photos of the Boatshed café in Rawene was in Cuisine magazine, the latest edition with a focus on wine, Cuisine Wine Country 2015. Obviously I need to discuss with her how to improve on my food photographs.