I should start by mentioning that when I said I would post these "every other week," what I meant was that I will post them whenever I feel like it, which will hopefully be at least every other week... Anyway, thanks to the last Sommelier Smackdown, I was hell-bent on making Merguez sausage at home. The night of the Smackdown I ordered a book that had been on my wish list for a long time: Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn.
This book is awesome. There are so many things I want to make, but I had to start with Merguez. This looked problematic at first, as I couldn't find natural sausage casing locally (not to mention pork fatback) and didn't want to wait for mail order, but the always-brilliant (and always-correct) R pointed me to Blood Farm, and suddenly I was in business. Here's the casing, soaking in preparation for use.
The lovely "small" 3-pound hunk of fatback I picked up was pretty awesome. I diced the 1/2 pound I needed for the recipe, then diced the rest to vacuum-pack and freeze for future sausage-making adventures. (I think Chorizo is next...) That knife on the right is my very favorite knife on the planet, by the way... (Thanks, Stanley!)
Here we have the lamb, fatback, garlic, fresh oregano, spices, and chopped roasted red pepper,
which I then tossed together and allowed to marinate in the fridge for a few hours while taking care of some other cooking...
Then came the grinding with my handy-dandy KitchenAid meat grinding attachment... (Sorry the picture is a bit blurry. I was in the weeds...)
The red wine and ice water are then added, and the mixture is beaten for about a minute to combine.
I cooked up a test bite at this point, and it was awesome. All that was left to do now was toss it all in some casing, which was... easier said than done. I have the KitchenAid sausage stuffer attachment and, to put it kindly, that attachment is a jerk. Even following the book's instructions to grind into a bowl set over ice (as you can see I did in the grinding picture), it was impossible to get the meat cold enough to prevent the fat from gumming up the works. I could not for the life of me get any reasonable amount of meat out of the end of the damn tube. (I have no pictures of this, because my hands were covered in raw meat and I was filled with hostility...) I poked around on the interwebs and found that I was not alone in my suffering, and that several people suggested partially freezing your ground meat before using that blasted attachment... Sure enough, 30 minutes in the freezer (and working in batches while leaving the rest of the meat in the freezer) and the sausage stuffing attachment stopped being such an asshole. Behold, my (slightly ghetto) Merguez sausages:
I got better as I went, and I think they'll look even better next time. Also, I feel that nothing says "classy" like purple and yellow IKEA bag clips to seal the ends... The sausage went into the fridge to rest and chill while I recovered from the exertion of making it... A couple hours and a glass of wine later, it was time to start the risotto... Yes, there had to be risotto. I don't think I'd ever actually made risotto before... Never had the inclination... But there was risotto at the Smackdown (Brussels Sprout, Roasted Onion, and Lardon Risotto, to be exact), so there would be risotto on my table as well. I went with an Asparagus Risotto recipe out of The Cafe Cookbook as a template, but modified almost all of that recipe (except rice and liquid) to try to replicate the Smackdown risotto... I roasted sweet onions onions in a 300°F oven until soft and very tender, blanched some sliced Brussels sprouts in salted water, and crisped up a few strips of insanely good bacon that I'd picked up at Blood Farm. (Seriously: Best. Bacon. Ever.) After sautéing the roasted onions in some butter, it was time to add the Arborio rice and get going...
Adding warm chicken stock (sadly, not homemade for this adventure) one ladle at a time while stirring and stirring and stirring, I finally started to have something resembling risotto in my skillet... 
I dumped in the sprouts, bacon, and some awesome Parmesan, and it was good to go...
Meanwhile, I roasted off the Merguez in a 375°F oven until they reached an internal temperature of 150°F...
Then seared in a hot skillet to make them pretty:
Mmmm... Merguez... (Yes, I see that the ends came open a bit... Geez, man... It was my first time. Get off my back...) All in all, things came together beautifully:
(Not to mention deliciously...) The Merguez wasn't the same as we had at the Smackdown, so I think I'll keep playing with recipes until I find the perfect one, but my risotto was seriously delicious. Actually, so was the sausage. (Not the exact flavor I was going for doesn't actually mean less delicious in this case... just different.) My sausage was more bell-peppery than the ones at the Smackdown, and I think I'll do a recipe using harissa next time I attempt Merguez, but I honestly sort of loved that bell-peppery-ness, and would definitely make this again... 
For the record, I totally followed the recipe this time (for the sausage, at least... I couldn't find a recipe to follow for the risotto...) with the exception of the freezer trick that was necessary to get the job done. Can't wait to test out more of Mr. Ruhlman's totally awesome book... He is definitely one of my culinary heroes...
This book is awesome. There are so many things I want to make, but I had to start with Merguez. This looked problematic at first, as I couldn't find natural sausage casing locally (not to mention pork fatback) and didn't want to wait for mail order, but the always-brilliant (and always-correct) R pointed me to Blood Farm, and suddenly I was in business. Here's the casing, soaking in preparation for use.
The lovely "small" 3-pound hunk of fatback I picked up was pretty awesome. I diced the 1/2 pound I needed for the recipe, then diced the rest to vacuum-pack and freeze for future sausage-making adventures. (I think Chorizo is next...) That knife on the right is my very favorite knife on the planet, by the way... (Thanks, Stanley!)
Here we have the lamb, fatback, garlic, fresh oregano, spices, and chopped roasted red pepper,
which I then tossed together and allowed to marinate in the fridge for a few hours while taking care of some other cooking...
Then came the grinding with my handy-dandy KitchenAid meat grinding attachment... (Sorry the picture is a bit blurry. I was in the weeds...)
The red wine and ice water are then added, and the mixture is beaten for about a minute to combine.
I cooked up a test bite at this point, and it was awesome. All that was left to do now was toss it all in some casing, which was... easier said than done. I have the KitchenAid sausage stuffer attachment and, to put it kindly, that attachment is a jerk. Even following the book's instructions to grind into a bowl set over ice (as you can see I did in the grinding picture), it was impossible to get the meat cold enough to prevent the fat from gumming up the works. I could not for the life of me get any reasonable amount of meat out of the end of the damn tube. (I have no pictures of this, because my hands were covered in raw meat and I was filled with hostility...) I poked around on the interwebs and found that I was not alone in my suffering, and that several people suggested partially freezing your ground meat before using that blasted attachment... Sure enough, 30 minutes in the freezer (and working in batches while leaving the rest of the meat in the freezer) and the sausage stuffing attachment stopped being such an asshole. Behold, my (slightly ghetto) Merguez sausages:
I got better as I went, and I think they'll look even better next time. Also, I feel that nothing says "classy" like purple and yellow IKEA bag clips to seal the ends... The sausage went into the fridge to rest and chill while I recovered from the exertion of making it... A couple hours and a glass of wine later, it was time to start the risotto... Yes, there had to be risotto. I don't think I'd ever actually made risotto before... Never had the inclination... But there was risotto at the Smackdown (Brussels Sprout, Roasted Onion, and Lardon Risotto, to be exact), so there would be risotto on my table as well. I went with an Asparagus Risotto recipe out of The Cafe Cookbook as a template, but modified almost all of that recipe (except rice and liquid) to try to replicate the Smackdown risotto... I roasted sweet onions onions in a 300°F oven until soft and very tender, blanched some sliced Brussels sprouts in salted water, and crisped up a few strips of insanely good bacon that I'd picked up at Blood Farm. (Seriously: Best. Bacon. Ever.) After sautéing the roasted onions in some butter, it was time to add the Arborio rice and get going...
Adding warm chicken stock (sadly, not homemade for this adventure) one ladle at a time while stirring and stirring and stirring, I finally started to have something resembling risotto in my skillet... 
I dumped in the sprouts, bacon, and some awesome Parmesan, and it was good to go...
Meanwhile, I roasted off the Merguez in a 375°F oven until they reached an internal temperature of 150°F...
Then seared in a hot skillet to make them pretty:
Mmmm... Merguez... (Yes, I see that the ends came open a bit... Geez, man... It was my first time. Get off my back...) All in all, things came together beautifully:
(Not to mention deliciously...) The Merguez wasn't the same as we had at the Smackdown, so I think I'll keep playing with recipes until I find the perfect one, but my risotto was seriously delicious. Actually, so was the sausage. (Not the exact flavor I was going for doesn't actually mean less delicious in this case... just different.) My sausage was more bell-peppery than the ones at the Smackdown, and I think I'll do a recipe using harissa next time I attempt Merguez, but I honestly sort of loved that bell-peppery-ness, and would definitely make this again... 
For the record, I totally followed the recipe this time (for the sausage, at least... I couldn't find a recipe to follow for the risotto...) with the exception of the freezer trick that was necessary to get the job done. Can't wait to test out more of Mr. Ruhlman's totally awesome book... He is definitely one of my culinary heroes...
3 comments:
I am excited about where your cooking is going with the new book. Mmmm... cured meats!
I am rather excited about it myself... =)
I'd sort of gotten out of the habit of trying to cook new things, and I forgot how much I enjoy it... I've got all kinds of stuff planned for the rest of this month, then after I recover from my surgery I'm going to get crazy with some curing...
I would be interested in eating your sausage. Please mail me some.
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