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Country Sausages with Fried Apples
Peel and core three medium, sound apples, then cut them into four even slices each, dip them in milk, then lightly roll them in flour. Heat two tablespoons lard in a frying pan, add the apples one beside another and nicely fry them for two minutes on each side. Remove, arrange around a hot dish and keep hot. Prickle twelve country sausages with a needle, arrange them on a double broiler, and broil for four minutes on each side, remove, dress them in the centre of the apples and serve.
A quick supper dish that depends entirely on the sausages being cooked through, since the original timing assumes thin links over live coals.
- Sausage donenessFour minutes a side suits slim breakfast links but will leave a thicker country sausage raw at the centre. Cook fresh pork sausage to an internal 160F, whatever the clock says.
- "Double broiler"Not a double boiler. This is a hinged wire grill basket that clamps the sausages between two grids so the whole batch can be turned at once. A rack over a sheet pan under a modern overhead broiler does the same job, or use a heavy skillet.
- Pricking"Prickle twelve country sausages with a needle" means piercing the casings so they do not burst. Modern practice usually leaves them whole to keep the juices in; if you prick, keep the pricks few and shallow.
- Country sausageIn this period the term means fresh, unsmoked pork sausage seasoned with sage and black pepper, sold in links or in bulk. Any fresh breakfast-style link works; smoked or fully cooked sausage changes the timing entirely.
- ApplesChoose a firm tart variety that holds its shape in fat -- Granny Smith, Braeburn, Northern Spy. Softer dessert apples will collapse in the two minutes a side given here.
- The milk-and-flour coatingDip, then roll lightly and shake off the excess. A heavy flour jacket will absorb the lard and go pasty rather than crisping.
- FatTwo tablespoons of lard is right for the flavour; butter browns too fast at the heat needed, and a neutral oil gives up the pork note the dish is built on. Rendered sausage fat is a fair substitute.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield. Twelve links and twelve apple slices would stretch to three or four portions at breakfast or supper.
Pork and apples are a long-standing pairing in Northern European cooking, and for practical reasons: hogs were slaughtered in autumn and early winter, when the apple crop was also in, and the fruit's acidity cuts the fat of fresh sausage meat. "Country sausage" in American cookbooks of the early twentieth century generally meant the plain sage-and-pepper fresh pork sausage made on farms after the hog killing, as distinct from the smoked and spiced links sold by many city butchers. The dressing of the plate, with the fried slices ringed around the edge and the meat piled in the centre, follows an arrangement common in period restaurant service.