Good morning, campers! How to Eat (HTE) is back at the sizzling griddle of gastro pedantry, ready to take on one of the true big beasts, the sausage sandwich.
Of course, from knackwurst to merguez, ciabatta to Kaiser rolls, the sausage/bread combinations available internationally are almost endless. It is therefore impossible to discuss them all in detail here, despite the temptation to engage with this compelling meditation on “sandwich ontology” vis-a-vis the US hot dog. Nor do we have space to examine what south Australians call “sausage in bread”, the practice of wrapping a sausage in a single slice (prevalent at “sausage sizzles”). Except to say that, clearly, a lot of Australians still eat like students.
No, instead, HTE will (with all due respect to the morning rolls filled with Lorne sausage in Scotland), limit itself to considering the British sausage sandwich of pork bangers placed between two pieces of bread.
Sausage quality
As regular readers of HTE know, this series takes a flexible line on sourcing. Cheap does not necessarily mean nasty and, ultimately, it is all down to the cash in your pocket. When you are skint and hungry, most things taste incredible. Moreover, we are children of the processed food age. We all love stuff, from Babybel to Dairy Milk, at which militant foodies would gag. HTE is a safe space. No one is judging you.
But what HTE cannot do, in this case, is defend bad sausages. They might cost less (although, many “gourmet” sausages are awful, too), but they leave a trail of misery in their wake: miserable pigs, miserable sausages and, ultimately, miserable you. Buy the best sausages you can afford or, at least, swerve the supermarkets and find a local butcher making proper sausages – from preferably free-range British pigs. The effort is worth it.
In sausage ‘n’ mash, for instance, bargain-basement bangers are less of an issue. They are masked in mash and gravy. But here they are, literally and metaphorically, the real meat in the sandwich and any flaws – chewy, stringy cases; gristle; eerily dense, uniform meat; water-pumped sausages that lack lubricious fat; wild over-seasoning – can ruin a sausage sandwich both practically (you will be unable to cleanly take a bite of it) and qualitatively.
Sausage flavours
Given that the sausage sandwich is primarily a breakfast meal (see below), you want a relatively plain pork sausage – a hefty banger of 85 to 90% pork content (using fattier cuts such as belly and shoulder), seasoned with salt, pepper and perhaps a little Lincolnshire-style sage. That is it.
You want the savoury depth of the sausages, their lengthy pork flavour, the sweetness of their juices to shine through. You want to be gently ushered into the day by comforting, soul-stirring flavours, rather than the screeching alarm call of hot, coiled Cumberland sausages laced with white pepper and mace. At that time of day, chilli-spiked sausages would be equally discombobulating. As would any of those novelty bangers that are mined with everything from tomato and apple to blue cheese and smoked garlic.
Bread
As we have established, the sausages are the star of the show. The bread is there in a strictly supporting role. That is why all sorts of breads such as rustic granary and piquant sourdoughs are unsuitable for a sausage sandwich. They are too exuberant, too needy. They want to be the centre of attention. Instead, a discreet soft, white bread is correct, whether it is an artisan masterpiece or a Chorleywood bagged loaf. It must be a rectangular loaf, too, as circular baps, bagels and rolls are incredibly difficult to fill properly.
Bizarrely, Michael Winner used to insist on the bread on his sausage butty being toasted – a ludicrous affectation. The contrast between the soft, milky blandness of the bread and the solidity of a good, coarsely ground sausage is a key pleasure of the sausage sandwich. Baguettes are off the menu, too. They can often form a hostile, crusty barrier between you and the sausages. Tearing at a dense baguette, having to wrestle it with your mouth in a way that threatens to spill your sausages, is not enjoyable. This should not feel like going 10 rounds with Kendo Nagasaki.
Assembly
Take two, roughly 1cm-thick slices of bread. Aim for a ratio of around 50:50 bread-to-sausage, favouring the sausage if need be. Liberally butter the bread. You want that magnificent emollient to generously hot-soak into the slices. Margarine will not do. Depending on the size of your sausage (no giggling at the back), take three or four from the pan – you did fry them, right? – and split them lengthways. This will allow you to build a thorough, corrugated sausage coverage across your bread which, among other advantages (sausage in every bite!), will bring a welcome stability to your sandwich. That people still put whole, uncut sausages into huge, flappy slices of bread and then wonder why they spend half the sandwich trying to stop them falling out, is testament to man’s enduring stupidity. The only thing worse is using chipolatas.
After assembling your sandwich, gently press down on it with your palm to fuse it together. It may not look attractive, but it helps the sandwich retain its structural integrity.
Sides, sauces and condiments
Sausages! Sausages! Sausages! That is our focus here. If you want to sweeten their impact with a little tomato sauce, go ahead, but do so modestly. Likewise, any layer of caramelised or fried onion needs to be judicious. Beyond that, there is very little to recommend any potential additions. A fried egg is not unpleasant, but it is unnecessary. Cheese is better in theory than in practice (too heavy and greasy), as is bacon (too dry). Fundamentally, this is not a full breakfast. It does not require mushrooms and why would anyone put grilled tomatoes on anything?
At lunch, if you want to lighten your sandwich and give it a little spritz – a va-va-voom more suitable to that hour of the day – you may add a slaw that will bring a modicum of vegetal cleanliness to the sandwich. But this is no time for, say, hot ‘n’ sour Thai creations that would ride roughshod over those bangers.
Certainly at breakfast, as you emerge blinking into another grinding 24 hours of existence, you do not want anything confrontational on your sausage. Much as I respect Danny Baker, the admittance of brown sauce into his Sausage Sandwich Game is a clear category error. The only reason to eat something that spicy first thing is if you smoke 40 a day and have lost your sense of taste. The same applies to BBQ sauce, chilli condiments, Branston, Worcestershire sauce, mustards, lime pickle (!) or any of the other things that people misguidedly stick on their sausage sandwiches. Conversely, most chutneys are cloyingly sweet. This is not dessert.
When Danny Baker asks: “Is it red sauce? Brown sauce? Or no sauce at all?”, the most sensible response is probably “no sauce at all”. Why make a sausage sandwich if you don’t want to, you know, taste sausages? And butter.
When
Breakfast. Possibly lunch. When the sausage sandwich is served at lunch, the temptation is to bulk it out with sides from chips to salad, but those two items – sandwich and side – steadfastly refuse to come together to form a satisfactory, cohesive meal.
As for tea time, a sausage sandwich feels a bit too heavy for that time of night. It is a foodstuff that you need a few hours to work off. Plus, as a stand-alone sandwich, is it interesting enough to qualify as an evening meal? At 8am, the simplicity of a sausage sandwich is soothing. It is all you can cope with. By 8pm, you crave greater complexity.
Equipment
Plate. Maybe stick some kitchen towel on the table if you are entertaining.
Drink
A large mug of tea as rusty as the Bridgewater Canal, the internationally recognised colour comparison for all tea drinkers.
So, sausage sandwiches: how do you eat yours?
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