Steffes Family Sausage Recipe
Food has a powerful way of connecting us to our heritage. Certain dishes can transport us back to childhood memories, filled with the warmth of family and the comfort of tradition. In my family, that special dish is our homemade rope sausage, a recipe passed down through generations and shrouded in a delightful secrecy.
For as long as I can remember, my dad has regaled us with stories of this unique sausage. "It wasn't your average store-bought sausage," he'd say, his eyes twinkling with nostalgia. "This was a German recipe, bursting with flavor and made with love by my dad and his siblings."
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He described a three-foot long link of pork, basil, and garlic, lovingly crafted by hand and served as a special treat, especially on Christmas mornings. They'd either fry the entire coil or cut it into smaller links, each bursting with a crispy, charred perfection on the open ends during cooking.
My mom's memories of the sausage were equally cherished. "I remember cooking it at our house," she reminisced. "We'd open the jar, and dump the sausage and fat into a cast iron skillet. We watched the fat melt and crisp up the casing on the sausage, then crisp up those ends where the sausage leaked from the casing. Those crispy bits were so delicious. Our house smelled wonderful and always reminded us of Christmas morning. The family would send us home with a jar or two of sausage every now and again. We never asked for it, just waited for it to be gifted to us. Such good eating!"
The recipe itself, however, remained a mystery. It was a verbal tradition, passed down from generation to generation without ever being written down. Determined to recreate this culinary treasure, I decided to call upon my dad's cousin, the current keeper of the recipe and one of the few remaining family members who still made it.
Our conversation was a delightful dance of memory and inquiry. My dad’s cousin shared the recipe piece by piece, some details crystal clear in her mind, others requiring her husband to jog her memory. The core ingredients were simple: pork, basil, and garlic, but the magic, I realized, resided in the love and tradition woven into every step.
Fueled by my dad's vivid memories and my dad’s cousin patient guidance, the dream of recreating the sausage recipe started to take shape. The turning point came when my parents gifted us a meat grinder. This tangible tool transformed our ambition into an achievable goal.
We embarked on our sausage-making adventure with a trip to our local butcher, Gene's. There, we procured the pork shoulder and other ingredients, meticulously following the scaled-down recipe (originally meant to feed three families, not just our little one of three).
Here's the recipe we used, with some adaptations to make it easier for home cooks:
Ingredients:
32 lbs pork shoulder (or roast)
1 and 1/3 cup fresh basil (chopped)
1/2 cup salt (scant)
1/2 cup pepper (scant)
1 jar minced garlic (or 3 jars liquid garlic, if you want to make it like my Grandpa Giles)
Sausage casings
Note: We used 4 lbs pork shoulder and adjusted the rest of the ingredients accordingly.
Instructions:
Chop the pork into small pieces.
Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.
Grind the mixture using a meat grinder.
Fry a small patty to test the seasoning and adjust as needed.
Stuff into casings
Traditionally, the sausage is smoked with hickory wood. Since we lacked a smoker, we simply fried the sausage links until cooked through.
The verdict? It was the best sausage we'd ever had! The flavors were perfectly balanced, the texture delightful, and the char on the open ends brought back all the wonderful memories my dad described. We even tried it on a bun with mustard, and it was pure bliss.
This experience was more than just about making sausage. It was about connecting with my family's history, honoring tradition, and creating new memories. It was a testament to the enduring power of food to bring us together and remind us of who we are.
So, the next time you're looking for a unique and flavorful dish to share with your loved ones, give this recipe a try. And as you savor each bite, remember that it's not just a sausage; it's a legacy.
