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Aberdeen Sausage

A Scottish sausage roll made with minced steak, sausage meat, bread, bacon, egg, and seasonings, boiled and served hot or cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and thyme are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,585 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Aberdeen Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mince the steak and bacon.

  2. Soak the bread in cold water, then squeeze it dry in a cloth.

Shape and cook

  1. Mix all ingredients well together and bind with the beaten egg.

  2. Shape the mixture into a roll and tie it in a floured cloth.

  3. Boil for two hours.

Serve

  1. Turn out and sprinkle with brown breadcrumbs.

  2. Serve hot or cold.

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. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Meat + thymetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,008 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Steak
Provides the main meaty body and substance of the sausage.
Bread
Soaked and squeezed, it adds moisture and a soft texture to the mixture.
Sausage meat
Adds richness and savoury flavour to the mixture.
Egg
Binds the mixture together so it holds its shape when boiled.
Fat bacon
Adds fat, which keeps the meat mixture moist and flavourful during cooking.

The step that matters

Tying the roll in the floured cloth. If the cloth is too loose or the roll is not packed firmly, the sausage can fall apart or take on water during the long boil. A firm, well-tied roll holds its shape and cooks evenly.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, meat, pepper, egg):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Thymethe original
  4. Marjoramfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, meat, pepper, egg. 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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