I can’t remember the first time I had bangers and mash, but if I had to guess it would be at Lily Flanagan’s, an Irish pub in Islip on Long Island, back in the early 1990s. I just remember it as generic “sausage,” with nice mashed potatoes and peas.
Later, in 1995 on a 36-hour layover in London, I had the real deal. Still pretty generic, but definitely better: It was a softish link, with warm spices and an interesting bind that made it comforting to eat.
I later learned that the unusual mouthfeel of bangers is caused by the inclusion of some sort of grain product in the link, whether crushed rusks, oats, barley or breadcrumbs. I’ve heard various theories on why British charcuterie does this — virtually no other sausage-making nation does, with the exception of the famous potato sausage — ranging from scarcity during the World Wars to, well, it just tastes good. I used to think it was some sort of scandalous cheapening of a good sausage, but I’ve come around recently.
The addition of a grain in the mix can and does add something positive. Texture, sure, but also flavor. I am partial to barley or oats coarsely ground in a coffee grinder.
Now before you Brits cross the Atlantic on some fool’s errand again (lest we forget 1776 and 1812) know that I am well aware that there is no One True Banger, just as there is no one recipe for Italian sausage or Polish kielbasa. (Although if I had to give the title of One True Banger it’d probably go to Mick Jagger…)
My version of bangers is derived from a recipe for a Gloucester-style sausage I found in a charming little book called British Charcuterie. I wish this book were more comprehensive, and if any of you know of any other British sausage-making books out there, I am all ears.
Being fresh out of pork, I used some blacktail deer I got from a hunt this past September; I’d helped my friend Ian haul his dad’s deer up 600 yards of hillside, and his dad gave me a quarter of the deer in gratitude.
We’d noticed that this deer had grown fat from eating black oak acorns, so I added that to the sausage mix. Deer fat, by the way, can be awfully good in moderation. (More on that here.)
Everything went well. The bind of the bangers was perfect — tight, almost emulsified — and had that snap when you bite into them. The filling was moist, meaty, venison-y and laced with all those warm spices. A damn good banger, if I do say so.
British Bangers Sausages
Ingredients
- 4 pounds venison, pork or other meat cut into chunks
- Either 1 pound pork fat (or 1/2 pound pork fat and 1/2 pound venison fat), cut into chunks
- 36 grams kosher salt, about 2 tablespoons plus a teaspoon
- 2 teaspoons dried thyme
- 2 teaspoons white pepper
- 1 teaspoon minced sage
- 1 teaspoon porcini powder (optional)
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/2 teaspoon mace
- 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1 cup coarsely ground oats, barley, or, alternately breadcrumbs
- 3/4 cup malty beer
- Hog casings
Instructions
- Get out about 15 to 20 feet of hog casings and soak them in warm water. If you don't trust your source, run water through them to check for punctures or weak spots.
- Make sure all your equipment is cold, as in freeze the grinding plate and blades, and the bowl you will put the meat into for 30 minutes to an hour. Do the same for the meat and fat. When everything's nice and cold, mix the meat and fat with all the spices (leave out the oats and beer for the moment).
- Grind it all through a coarse plate; I use a 10 mm plate. Test the temperature of the mixture, and if it's 35°F or colder, go ahead and grind it all again through a fine die, like a 4.5 mm or somesuch. If it's warmer than 35°F, put the mix back in the freezer to chill. This miht take an hour or so if you've let the meat warm up too much.
- Once the sausage has been ground twice, test the temperature again to make sure it's 35°F or colder. I prefer to chill the mix down to 28°F to 32°F for this next stage. Chill the mix and when it's cold enough, take it out and add the oats and beer. Now, mix and knead this all up in a big bin or bowl with your (very clean) hands for a solid 2 minutes -- your hands will ache with cold, which is good. You want everything to almost emulsify.
- Stuff the sausage into hog casings rather loosely. I like bangers to be about 6 to 8 inches long, but it's your choice. To twist them into links, tie off one end of the coil you just made. Pinch off links with your two hands and roll the link between them forward a couple times. Move down the coil and repeat, only this time roll backwards a few times. Repeat until you do the whole coil. Now look at the links, which will probably have air pockets in them. Use a sterile needle or sausage pricker (set it aglow in your stovetop flame) to puncture the casing over all the air pockets. Gently compress the links together to squeeze out the air pockets and rotate the links a bit more to tighten; this takes practice.
- Hang your links for at least 1 hour if your room is warm, and up to overnight if you can hang them in a place that's 40°F or cooler. Don't let them freeze yet. If you are not hanging overnight, let the sausages continue to dry uncovered in the fridge overnight before you seal them up and freeze. Bangers will keep a week in the fridge and a year in the freezer, if you've vacuum sealed them.
Just finished up a batch and of course we had to sample our work. Very good. The oatmeal does give them a distinctive texture. Reminded me of what we ate every morning while in Ireland a couple years ago.
I’ve been looking for a good banger recipe using deer and this is it. Thanks they turned out great!
The Icelandic make a banger-like thing called Lifrarpylsa, one recipe I saw contained: lamb liver, sheep suet, rye flour, oatmeal, onion, herbs, salt and milk. They’re simmered in water for around 2 hours. Similar to ‘white pudding’ or ‘mealy pudding’ or even haggis. Grain and offal puddings are traditional in the North and West of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland ( i.e. all of the poorer areas).
Hank,
Nice post. I love bangers. The Portuguese, frugal folk who are rather famous for recycling stale bread in creative ways, also make sausages with the addition of bread crumbs, for example alheira and farinheira.
I worked making sausages and Hulani is right. Rusk is the secret to making a traditional Banger Irish or English any way!
Scott: Not entirely true. As you may suspect, different sausage makers in different parts of the United Kingdom use different ingredients. Sure, rusk is absolutely common, but I have seen plenty of bangers recipes that use oats or barley, which is what I use. Mostly from Scotland.
Thanks again. The 1960s in Hong Kong BCC (british crowned colony) introduced me to variations of Brit Bangers & Mash compared to my heritage Socttish Bangers (oft Venison,lamb and meat combos). one thing the brit verisons all had in common was Rusk. Yes the Scots may use Oats, Barley noone uses breadcrumbs per se for the simple reason (they claim) theyre not dry enough.
LOL. Rusk is almost made exclusively for Banger recipes! The idea is they all say that Rusk or barley or oats will hold the fat or flavour. I now make Bangers without any filler, oh blasphemy!
Local Banger varieties around the Isles have differing herbs with an “h” Lol…enjoy! I recommend Scott Rea on you tube for best Rusk, perhaps discussions of Scottish V Brit V Irish V welsh bangers.
Hey Hank,
Came across a bangers recipe where they boil the sausages for 20 mins before cooking them. I tried it out and it was successful. my question is can I freeze the boiled sausages after?
Tarek: Yes, you sure can.
I have just completed a batch of Banger Sausages using your recipe.
My question to you is this; in the ingredients list, did you mean 8 ounces of ground oats, as in one cup, or 8 ounces as in half a pound?
At first I ground a cup’s worth (8 ounces) of oats….then it struck me that you must mean by weight, and so that is what I ended-up putting into the mix.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think I made the wrong choice.
These are incredibly bready sausages.
Have I screwed these up badly, or is this really your interpretation of Banger Sausages?
Doug: It is a cup. Sorry about that!
Great flavor and texture borderline to saltybut just enough salt to make the flavors pop. Very good with hash and eggs haven’t tried mash and peas.
Hi Hank,
I’m new to sausage making. I took a local sausage making class and now have some elk sausages – 50% elk, 50% pork plus various spices (chorizo, Italian and bratwurst). I was wondering if I can cook them in my smoker. It’s a stove top smoker from Nordicware (new product). I don’t know how long I should leave them in the smoker. Any suggestions on temperature and time, dry or wet smoking?
Christine
Christine: not sure. I have never used a stove top smoker.
Ok that should be Bloody Mary, but the computer knows better than me.
This is my basic recipe:
2500g Pork
250g oats (blitzed) 10% of meat
50g Salt 2% of meat
10g White pepper (cook off a sample and taste with half this amount first)0.4%
5g Black pepper0.2%
1g Mace0.04%
2g Dried Sage 0.08%
250G liquid 10% (water, Beer could be apple juice (but might burn when cooking))
I always dice the meat ready for mincing then add the seasoning before mincing, allow to rest in the fridge for an hour or more. Mince through a coarse plate then a fine plate
Add Chile flakes, fennel seeds and Garlic to the above (before mincing, only a coarse then medium plate) and halve the grain/bread for a good sausage to cut up and throw in a pastsa sauce
Hi,
the filler of cereal, I use regular oatmeal blitzed in a processor to a fine, consistency otherwise I use breadcrumbs from the odd ends of my homemade bread, could be a sourdough, plain white or a rye blend.
Point is (and made earlier by others) the cereal will hold on to the juice and fat in the sausage; guess where the flavor is.
I add simple water for the liquid content but if to want to add beer, give Newcastle Brown a chance. I would do a half and half batch and add Newcastle Brown to half my mix and plain water to the other. Yo can then decide if it would be better to drink the beer when eating the sausage!
Also go find real Mace, it its so different from its sibling nutmeg.
I am based in Worcestershire as in the sauce for you bloody martini, make lots of sausage, salami and whole muscle cures, using local produce, Gloucester old spot.
My top tips:
get the best meat you can afford
use fresh herbs and spices, blitz them as late in the process you can then add to the cut (1″ pieces, include all the soft fat you have) meat, ready for mincing. Chill for two hours then mince trough a coarse plate (6 mm 1/4″) Add cereal and liquid of your choice then mix well, like kneading dough Or very slow in a machine until the mix comes together like dough almost. Cover and leave to rest for an hour or so, take a sample to cook and check the seasonig
Getting ready to try recipe, but one question. Are the oats rolled oats or steel cut oats? I used to work in a British Pub, and loved the bangers and mash, but they had the bangers made for them by a local butcher. Can’t wait to try this recipe
Douglas: Either work, but I use steel cut, and grind them to a flour/powder.
These taste great, I made a batch yesterday. How do I stop them from bursting and the filling pouring out? Did I overstuff them?
James: Yes, you overstuffed them.
That’s why they are called bangers, they go BANG and explode!
Hank what would be a good beer to use in this recipe?
Both Brit & American?
John: Something malty, like a Scottish ale, a brown ale or even a porter or stout.
Hi, yes it does my bad.
You said you ere all ears about other books on the subject well this is a good one.
http://www.amazon.com/Manual-Traditional-Bacon-Maynard-Davies/dp/1906122083/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_y
Also this guys butchery videos are quite entertaining.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFhSH18MVOo
Hi you say that British sausages get their texture from grain products but that’s not correct they get it because they use Pinhead Rusk instead of breadcrumbs, but to be fair pinhead rusk does look like grain. I will paste in a description of what it is from a suppliers website.
Yeastless Rusk is simply unleavened bread that has been baked and dried before being ground into a fine crumb. You can also use regular breadcrumbs but using Rusk gives a good and consistent texture to the sausage, it also retains the moisture within the sausage better than breadcrumbs giving you a more succulent sausage, and finally because it is yeastless it gives the sausage a longer shelf-life.
John: What I mean by grain products include breadcrumbs, oatmeal, etc. Pinhead rusk counts in my definition. But I do thank you for the detail on an exact product. Interesting that it’s breadcrumbs from unleavened bread…
hi. great recipe. but on the subect of other grain sausage traditionals: blood sausage, kishka, which is heavy on barley.
Thank you so much for the clarification. We have a fridge full of promising bangers for Saint Patrick’s Day.
I don’t get it…You go to all that trouble to make sure your meat etc. is 28 degrees or so and then after you stuff your sausage you hang it at room temp. I live in Southern California. It was 94 degrees today. Isn’t that dangerous?
Kristine: No. First, presumably your house is not 94 degrees, it’s closer to 75. Second, The cold is partially for food safety, but it’s mostly to ensure a proper bind and mixing of the meat and fat. Once the sausages are made, there is enough salt in the links to handle being left out even in a warm room for an hour or two. When I make sausages in summer (I’m in NorCal), I will hang at room temp 1 hour, then move to the fridge to continue drying.
Exactly like that. I guess that would make it something like chili in a tube or a burrito filling sausage?
While eating some chili today, I was struck by a thought – these bangers have ground oats or barley, Haggis has oatmeal, and Boudin has rice – but are there any sausages that contain beans?
More to the point, would a sausage with pork, mashed beans, and chili spices work?
Chanman: It might. Like refried beans? Never tried it.
Michelle in VA: If you have a whole foods near you they will sell you packages of the homepack hog casings. Pretty cheap, 5 bucks for 50 ft.
Just made a ten lb. batch of these and they came out great. Good flavor and they hold their moisture well when cooked. Awesome recipe!
Looks divine! I love bangers! Got antelope and local pork fat in the freezer. Thanks for posting sausage recipes lately!
So where might you suggest I look for hog or sheep casings? I want SNAP. Pretty sure I haven’t seen them at Harris Teeter 🙂 Standalone butcher shop? Mail order?
Michelle in VA: Any supermarket that makes their own sausage will sell you some. Any butcher shop will have them, too. Or you can buy them online here.
Hi Hank, love your work! As far as grain in sausages, I have recently been introduced to creole Boudin, which has rice in the sausage. (The French version apparently has bread or panade). I may have to do more with what I used to consider “filler” ingredients…thanks for sharing this!
Hugh Fearlesslyeatsitall’s Meat book has a chapter that includes many british charcuterie recipes like potted hough, faggots and raised pork pie, and he has a discussion of sausage making in one of his earlier books.
Elizabeth David also has a few papges on English charcuterie in her ‘Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen.’
There’s also a new book, Curing & Smoking: River Cottage Handbook No.13, but I haven’t read it yet.
paul peacock’s sausage book has some British sausage recipes. It a bit basic but has recipes for Gloucestershire, Leicestershire, Somerset etc. Not sure if it’s available in the states. Try making a large Yorkshire pudding fill it with mash and a coil of Cumberland sausage, and top with gravy. Good cold wet Sunday food.
Tell me about the ceramic stone in the oven? Do you use it for better conduction when you pull the pan from the stove?
Yep. It makes the oven hold heat more evenly and you can also cook breads right on it.
Good to see an American appreciating the concept of a great British sausage, although typically the ‘best of the best’ British sausages are between 85%-97% meat and usually either pork or beef.
The best pork for sausage is indeed Gloucester old spot, originating in Gloucestershire, England, incidentally where I am from! 🙂
Also, you should look up ‘Cumberland Sausage’. If you love a good banger then you have to have a go at these babies!
Will do! And my sausage is probably about 90 percent meat by weight.
I fell in love with bangers at the Big Bang in Oxford a half dozen years ago (which I just found out coincidentally went out of business this summer).
I have some caribou in the freezer with “Banger” written all over it. Thanks for the recipe Hank!
At least once per week I have sausages made from Gloucester Old Spot pork, a traditional fat breed, with apple and cider included in the mix. Bliss!
This takes me to my Happy Place!
Brit sausages remind me of tubular meatloaf with a very fine grind.
Hank, I have some lovely venison in my freezer, but no fat. I do, however, have both unrendered and rendered lard. Should I use the unrendered pork fat for this?
Absolutely. Use the unrendered pork fat.