Liver sausage for gourmets

Ingredients for 8 servings:

• 500 g bacon, raw back bacon (green bacon) fat
• 500 g lean pork and half a pig’s head
• 500 g pork liver(s)
• 300 g onion(s)
• 1 garlic clove(s)
• 33 g salt
• 8 g marjoram
• 50 g butter
• 1 liter broth (kettle broth)
• 1 bunch of soup vegetables for the broth
• 3 bay leaves for the broth
• 5 grains of pepper for the broth
• Salt for the brew

Instructions

Working time approx. 2 hours; Total time approx. 2 hours

Ottla’s Franconian Liver Sausage

Place the stock ingredients (soup vegetables, bay leaves, peppercorns, and salt) in a large pot and fill with water (approx. 2.5 liters). Add the lean pork and half the head, and simmer gently for about 2-3 hours, until the meat separates from the head. In the meantime, fry the chopped onions and garlic cloves in the butter, set aside, and let cool. Now grind the green bacon twice through the fine disk of the meat grinder. If necessary, skin the liver by adding 1 liter of water, bringing it to a boil briefly, scalding the liver for 30 seconds, and then peeling off the skin; then grind it through the fine disk in the same way. When the lean pork is tender, grind it twice with the onions and garlic. If you want the liverwurst even finer, you can grind everything together again (i.e., three times in total). Now add the finely chopped liver, lean pork, green bacon, onion, and garlic to a bowl and mix well. Strain approximately 1 liter of broth from the pot through a fine sieve and add it to the meat. Be careful: the sausage mixture should have a consistency similar to baby food after mixing. You can also add the spices at this point. Don’t be surprised if it’s a bit overseasoned, but boiling or stuffing casings will mellow everything and create a more balanced flavor. Now you can fill the mixture into casings or jars and boil them at 85°C for approximately 120 minutes for jars or 90 minutes for sausages in casings. If the liverwurst is stuffed into pork casings, you can also hang it in cold smoke for 1-2 days after boiling. This intensifies the flavor and adds an extra kick to the smoke aroma. The remaining broth can be made into a sauce, served with sauerkraut, potatoes, and the head meat. Or you can take some of the liver sausages (if they’re still in the casing) after boiling them down and add them to the seasoned broth, along with potatoes and sauerkraut. If you’re watching your calories, you can let the broth cool overnight and skim off the fat the next morning!