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Bologna Sausages

A cured sausage made from chopped beef and pork seasoned with salt, pepper, cayenne, cloves, and garlic, stuffed into beef skins, brined, smoked, and stored.

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 fine 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 daily.

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

  4. Before storing, rub the sausages 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 meaty structure and binds the sausage when chopped fine.
Pork
Adds fat, which carries flavor and keeps the sausage moist and tender.
Salt
Seasons the meat and draws out moisture, helping preserve the sausage during curing.
Black pepper
Adds sharp aromatic flavor that balances the richness of the meat and fat.
Garlic
Contributes pungent aroma and savory depth to the seasoned meat.

The step that matters

Submerge the sausages in the brine for three weeks, turning daily.. The brine must be strong enough to float an egg, or salt will not penetrate evenly. Turning daily keeps every side in contact with the brine so the cure reaches the whole sausage and preserves the meat.

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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