It’s UK Sausage Week this week so don’t waste your time with inferior bangers. We tried two delicious and different sausages that deserve special love.
Marmite Sandwich Sausage
Do you like Marmite? It is of course a textbook example of great advertising. Don’t try and pretend you’re what you’re not, tell the truth and get loved for it. Imagine what the client at Marmite must have said, probably unprintable, when it was proposed to do an ad campaign that majored on the fact that a large number of people can’t stand the stuff?
Well I love it, I’ve been spreading it inch thick on my toast since before I had teeth. So the idea of Marmite in a sausage was very appealing.
Halls of Hazlemere, note the spelling this is not Haslemere in Surrey, are a very fine butchers which has been a family concern since 1966. They make all their sausages fresh in the premises and have a wide selection of flavours, but Marmite? Well that’s unusual.
The Marmite Sandwich Sausage scored a Gold Medal at Q Guild Butcher‘s annual Smithfield Awards 2017 out of a very large competition.
It’s easy to see why, cooked as suggested in the oven and not in the frying pan, it comes out a gorgeous russet brown with not a drop of fat or water to be seen in the tin. Clearly it’s packed full of prime pork and the Marmite is subtle, an umami hint that brings out the superb sweetness of the sausage still further,
Big sausages these, two will do for most normal people as these sausages don’t shrink when cooked as lesser bangers might do. We had them with mash and broccoli for tea, Lovely
Would they work in a sandwich, cooked and sliced lengthways first and with lots of butter? Oh yes, they would be perfect.
Chicken & Apple Sausage
This I suppose could in itself be called a Marmite sausage in that some people think chicken has no place in a sausage. I tend to agree, sausages should be pork and sometimes beef. The trouble with chicken is the sausages can end up far too solid and dense as the fat content often isn’t high enough.
These boys come from Lidgates however, a very old and established butcher in one of the priciest parts of London. Many top chefs will source their meat from Lidgates and nowhere else.
They say these Chicken & Apple sausages are favourites with kids and I can see why. They are easy on the tastebuds, and kids do like chicken. The apple makes them moister than they might otherwise be so that after cooking they are still soft and succulent. The apple also adds a sweetness that kids, and I must admit I, rather like. Again these are Gold Medal winners.
Hungry for more? Here are some more unusual links from Q Guild Butchers
1. Pork, Plum and Mulled Wine Sausage from Williams and Son Butchers, Cornwall
2. Marmite Sandwich Sausage from Halls of Hazlemere, Hazlemere
3. Chicken & Apple Sausage from Lidgate Butchers, London
4. Oriental Duck Sausage from Owtons Butchers, Southampton
5. Pork & Marmite Sausage from Tilehurst Village Butchers, Reading
6. Pork, Cranberry and Orange Sausage from Williams and Son Butchers, Cornwall
7. Pork, Orange and Chocolate Sausage from Aubrey Allen, Leamington Spa
8. Breakfast Marmalade Beef Sausage from John Lawson, Uphall
9. Pork & Mango Sausage from Turnbulls of Alnwick, Alnwick
10. Curried Lamb Sausage from Owtons at Country Market, Bordon