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Bologna Sausages

A cured sausage made from finely chopped beef and pork seasoned with salt, pepper, cayenne, cloves, garlic, and sweet oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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. Chop the beef and pork very finely and mix well.

  2. Season the mixture with salt, black pepper, cayenne, powdered cloves, and minced garlic.

  3. Wash the cleaned beef skins in salt and vinegar.

  4. Fill the skins with the meat mixture and tie the ends securely with twine.

Cure and store

  1. Make a brine strong enough to float an egg using salt and water.

  2. Submerge the sausages in the brine for three weeks, turning them daily.

  3. After three weeks, remove the sausages, wipe them dry, and hang them up to smoke.

  4. Before storing, rub the sausages all over with sweet oil and keep them in ashes.

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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + garlictop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Clove + garlictop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the main meat structure and rich flavour, with fat adding juiciness and tenderness.
Pork
Adds fat and moisture to the meat mixture, keeping the sausage tender and juicy.
Salt
Seasons the meat and draws out moisture, helping preserve the sausage during curing.

The step that matters

Submerging the sausages in the brine. The brine must be strong enough to float an egg so that enough salt penetrates and preserves the meat over the three weeks. Turning the sausages daily keeps every side evenly in contact with the brine.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Rosemaryfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pork, pepper, garlic, vinegar. 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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