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Bologna Sausages

A sausage made from equal parts pork, ham, beef, or veal, seasoned with salt, cloves, pepper, and allspice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Bologna Sausages

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Run the meat through a meat grinder.

  2. Season the meat with coarse sea salt, cloves, black pepper, and allspice.

  3. Test the seasoning before filling the casings.

Cure and cook

  1. Soak the casings in brine for 9 to 10 days.

  2. Smoke the sausages or boil them until tender.

  3. Dry the sausages before serving.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Pork + clovetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,515 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pork, ham, beef, or veal
Forms the body of the sausage, giving it structure and meaty texture when ground and cooked.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and helps draw out moisture and bind the ground mixture.
Cloves
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour that defines the sausage's character.
Black pepper
Contributes sharp, aromatic heat that balances the rich meat.
Allspice
Adds a blend of warm, sweet aromatic notes to the seasoning.

The step that matters

Test the seasoning before filling the casings. Salt and spices are hard to correct once the meat is stuffed into casings. Tasting a small cooked sample shows whether the seasoning is balanced, since raw meat does not reveal its final flavour and salt strength well.

“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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