A Lot of Sausages

Fifty-five pounds of ground pork shoulder. Dozens of feet of pig intestines. Herbs, spices, 2 bottles of wine, a bag of Doritos. My brother Ross, some old friends and I made sausages last night. Ross, Roger and Henry have been doing it together for years (Roger learned as a child from his dad) and they kindly let me in on what Henry called their "man fun." (I try not to see the world in gendered terms, but as I was up to my elbows in ground pork, I thought, yes, my gal friends and I get together to make chocolates...)

A lot of thought goes into their sausage flavourings. Ross used special treats from Australia--Aussie native spices such as bush tomato and native pepper berries; Roger went for the traditional (garlic); Henry went wild with fig sauce, maple syrup and, in a last-minute creative spark, ground-up Doritos (which did indeed add flavour along with crunch).

I, too, went a bit wild with my five pounds of pork, dividing it into half for just garlic and pepper, and the other half for sausages that paid tribute to my first drink of alcohol as a teenager: apricot brandy. I flavoured my sausages with chopped-up dried apricots, a couple ounces of Remy Martin and roasted fennel seeds.

I'm hooked and already scheming flavour combos for the next batch in a couple of months: dried pear and pine nuts; cranberry and hazelnut.