Toulouse sausage!

An early start was on the cards and after I had taken Abigail to catch the school bus, I hopped in the car and drove the 2km to the local farm to help my friends with the perparation of a pig purchased from the local butcher into sausages and pate.

On arrival work was already well underway. The kitchen was a hive of activity and the sheep intestine was being rinsed and soaked in eau de vie and lemon slices to neutralise the natural aromas. The meat was being prepared into mincing sized pieces to go through the industrial machine and the wild boar was being de-boned.

The first thing that struck me was that the pork being used was prime cuts including the loin and the only things added to the mixture was herbs and spices and deffinitely no bread.

I minced 25kg of pork into a large pot and 5kg of Wild boar in another pot for sausages and rabbit in a third with some pork and some liver that was minced finer for the pate.

The sausage meat was placed a handful at a time through another mincer and pushed through a small tube into the sausage skin that had been tied at one end with string. I was told in order to make the best sausage and not to split the skin, 1kg of mince should be used to 1m of skin.

Toulouse sausage is traditionally produced as a length rather than individual sausages. Some of the sausages were prepared to be used from fresh or frozen and others we prepared to dry over the next few weeks.

The different pate meats were prepared by adding eggs, salt, pepper, spices and milk and mixed together and placed in the pots for cooking.

The skin was stripped of its fat which was used for frittons and the skin itself was rolled and tied in to small bundles to be used in casseroles for flavouring.

I decided that it would be a good idea to introduce Pork Scratchings into the equasion and took home a large slice of skin to roast in a hot oven with salt and pepper. The result was well received and divided between all the helpers as a snack after lunch.

Everything was finished, and tidied away in the make shift meat factory/garage with the sausages to be dried hung on rails in the garage by 4pm and I was treated to a lovely slice of home made cake and a large glass of wine, perfect! Happy days in France.