Leipoldt's Boerewors page: to learn how to make boerewors, go to the recipe or go to braai menu for other dishes or the home page.

Boerewors

An excerpt from the chapter Sausage in Culinary Treasures (1942-1947) by C. Louis Leipoldt (Leipoldt is South Africa's culinary equivalent of Brillant-Savarin)

Translated from the original Afrikaans Polfyntjies vir die proe by Dr. W.L. Liebenberg.

Every country, and just about every district, in Europe has its unique kind of sausage. Some are world famous. The tiny pork sausages of Vienna, which we now import in tins from Argentina (not nearly as nice as those in Austria) have become truly cosmopolitan. The same holds for different kinds of salami, which should really be made with horsemeat. The salami we buy in shops has a bit of sugar added to imitate the taste of horsemeat, which is slightly sweet. There are all sorts of recipes for preparing sausage, and of such a variety that could write a voluminous book about it all.

For us, however, there is but one kind of sausage that stands out from the rest. This is our traditional boerewors, which is alas seldom found in its genuine, noble, unmatched, inimitable form. What passes under that name is usually a mill-ground meat of the toughest kind, mixed with far too many breadcrumbs, and some coriander, salt and pepper. I am in complete agreement with my old aunt who was given some the other day at a braaivleis and pushed it aside in disgust, saying: ‘Dis mos nie wors nie, dis sommer gemors’’ (‘This is not boerewors; it is just rubbish!’) You see, she herself is a first-class sausage-maker. When I have sausage at her place, I refrain from food altogether the day before, in the knowledge that I will be indulging in the priceless dish she will serve me, along with homemade white bread (in her house you will never find government bread, only the genuine white farm-bread, crumbly, soft and easily digestible) or a portion of mushy rice.

‘You know, my child,’ she says ‘boerewors must be made with mincemeat, very, very finely minced, except for the bacon. The bacon should be diced and added to the mince. Then, my child, when it is braaied on the plate, the fat will melt out and keep the sausage nice and moist. Yes, my child, it should be moist but crispy, so crispy that the outside cracks as you eat it.’

Exactly! And that goes not only for the finely minced meat. My old aunt always adds a bit of pork and mutton, although the basis of her boerewors is beef. And no leftover meat either! No – only selected thick, soft, round sirloin, and first-class pork. The meat is finely minced, then well ground, sometimes even pounded with a mortar. The pork is diced and frayed, then mixed with the rest of the meat. The mixture then gets its opskiksels: a glass of wine, a glass of vinegar, a tablespoon of brandy, and salt to taste. (Always a bit more than is really necessary, in my opinion, since too much salt influences the taste of the herbs, but on this point Tannie simply will not listen to me. When I quote from my cookbooks, she simply says: ‘My child I keep to the commandment of Moses, who says: “You should not go with the majority in things that are wrong.” What can one say? And then coriander (clean, new seed, without the slightest trace of weevils), pepper, a pinch of ground ginger, a leaf of sage rubbed to pieces, bruised rosemary, and – be careful with this one – a suspicion of garlic. Everything is well stirred, so that it all clings together –something that is not easy, and requires a strong arm. Then it is stuffed into the well-cleaned intestines, with the help of Tannie’s old fashioned little copper sausage-stuffer, and hung up in a cool room until it is used.

This kind of sausage is a pleasure to eat. It is the apotheosis of sausage when it is braaied on a grill over a rhinoceros bush fire in the open air. Or even in an iron pan on a common Swedish stove, or an Aga if you are a millionaire. I can also recommend it strongly when wind-dried while hunting. No biltong tastes better, and I know of very few dried sausage abroad that can compete with it.

But the stuff that now passes for boerewors! Ichabod – three times Ichabod!

This above article excerpt is available, along with a collection of other culinary articles, in the book Leipoldt's Food and Wine.

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make boerewors, go to the recipe.
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