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Bologna Sausages

A smoked sausage made from a mixture of beef, ham, pork, and bacon fat, seasoned with mace, white pepper, sea salt, garlic, and bay leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

Bologna Sausages

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Cut the beef, ham, pork, and bacon fat into small pieces.

  2. Beat the meat together in a mortar until it forms a fine paste.

  3. Add the mace, white pepper, coarse sea salt, garlic, and bay leaves. Blend well.

Fill and tie

  1. Fill large sausage skins with the mixture.

  2. Press the mixture down tightly.

  3. Tie the skins securely.

  4. Prick the skins with a pin to prevent bursting.

Boil, cool and smoke

  1. Boil the sausages gently for three hours.

  2. Cool the sausages on a cloth. Turn them occasionally to prevent moisture settling.

  3. Hang them in a chimney.

  4. Smoke for one week using oak dust.

  5. Store in a dry room.

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. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  2. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Ham + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,638 recipes

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

  4. Pork + garlictop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  5. Beef + garlictop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean beef
Provides the main protein structure that binds into a firm, sliceable sausage.
Pork
Adds fat and moisture so the sausage stays tender rather than dry.
Bacon fat
Carries flavor and moisture, keeping the mixture juicy during cooking and curing.
Ham
Contributes cured, savory meat flavor to the paste.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma and savory depth that mellows during long cooking.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and draws out moisture, helping preserve the sausage.

The step that matters

Prick the skins with a pin. Trapped steam expands as the sausages heat, so without pricking the skins can burst during boiling. Pricking lets steam escape while the filling stays intact.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, ham, pork, mace, garlic. 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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