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Braunschweiger Sausage

A cured sausage made from back fat, shoulder fat, ham trimmings, shoulder trimmings, lean beef chuck, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ham and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,729 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Braunschweiger Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut shoulder fat into 2-inch square strips and shave fine.

  2. Grind the lean beef through a 7/64th plate.

  3. In a large bowl, combine ground beef, shoulder fat, and seasoning.

Mix and cure

  1. Add ham and shoulder trimmings, then mix in back fat trimmings.

  2. Rock the mixture for about 30 minutes.

  3. Spread the mixture 10 inches thick on tables and refrigerate for 72 hours.

Stuff and dry

  1. Stuff the mixture into hog casings and hang to dry for 10 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Ham + beeftop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,729 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  2. Ham + white peppertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together535 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  3. Beef + white peppertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together616 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Lean beef chuck
Provides the lean meat that gives the sausage its body and firm bite.
Back fat trimmings
Adds fat that carries flavor and keeps the sausage moist and tender.
Shoulder fat
Supplies fat for juiciness and a smooth, spreadable texture.
Ham trimmings
Contributes cured meat flavor and a savory, ham-like character.
Shoulder trimmings
Adds meat and fat that help bind the emulsion and add richness.

The step that matters

Rock the mixture. Rocking, a gentle tumbling motion, keeps the meat and fat evenly blended without overworking them. Overmixing can make the texture greasy or sticky, while thorough blending keeps fat spread through the batter.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, beef):

  1. Pepperfits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, beef. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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