Wild Boar Sausages
Wild boar sausages are a classic food. Given that the pork we eat today is a direct descendant of wild boar, why not try the wilder flavored and original sausage?
These wild boar sausages are easy to make, combine multiple flavors, and are a healthier alternative to pork sausage.
Ingredients for Wild Boar Sausage
The two main ingredients for wild boar sausage are lean wild boar meat and some form of fat. Then there are the spices that make up the flavor of the sausage.
Finally, there is a skin if you want links, or alternatively, you can leave the sausage loose.
Meat and Fat
You can use either beef fat or pork fat, I much prefer pork fat, it’s easier to source and blends better with wild boar.
I also like to add just a little pork meat, this is because the pork fat I use is either fatty pork belly or fatty pork shoulder.
I do however also use pure pork fat.
If using pure pork fat, you can reduce the amount needed. For this recipe, I have 1.5 lbs of fatty pork and 1/4 lb of pork fat.
If you are using only pure pork fat you can use 1-1.5 lbs of pure pork fat, depending on how fatty you want your hog sausage.
Spices
No two wild hog sausages are the same, and there are a huge variety of seasonings to choose from.
Seasoning plays a huge part in making wild boar sausage and can transform the sausage one way or the other.
You can have a sweet sausage, a savory sausage, or a spicy wild boar sausage.
For this recipe, I tried to do them all. This wasn’t an overnight thought and comes from years of experience in making wild boar sausages.
The way I built this recipe allows for a savory sausage with a very fine hint of spice. Then the sweetness is optional and comes from the very ingredient that wild boars feed on – juniper berries.
The likelihood is that the wild boar meat could already be flavored with juniper berries if it was feeding on them.
I like to add these in as they are a subtle sweetness and compliment the savoriness of the sausage.
There are only a few ingredients to the spice list:
- salt
- wild garlic
- fennel
- Paprika
- Thyme
- Black pepper
- Juniper berries (optional, highly recommended)
Combining these few ingredients makes a simple yet savory wild boar sausage, with most of the ingredients similar to the flavor of the meat thus complimenting it.
Making Wild Boar Sausage
Making hog sausages is as simple as grinding the meat and fat together, adding in the spices, and piping the sausage.
However, there are a few tips for ensuring the quality of the sausage.
When grinding the meat and fat make sure they are really cold, stiff to the touch is perfectly fine.
This prevents the fat from breaking, which would make a dry crumbly sausage.
The meat must be kept cold through the whole process, this is why it’s also better to use a sausage stuffer rather than a grinder attachment.
- Soak sausage skins in cold water
- Cut the meat and fat into cubes and place them in the freezer
- Set up your meat grinder
- Grind your spices with a pestle and mortar
- Grind the meat and fat evenly
- Mix in the spices and return to the freezer
- Set up your sausage stuffer
- Pipe the sausage mix into the skins
- Link and hang
Hanging the sausage allows for them to dry and the mix to bind together. Alterinitavly you can leave the sausage loose but I prefer making wild boar breakfast sausage for loose sausage.
Cooking Wild Boar Sausage
There are numerous ways of cooking wild boar sausage as well as combining them into other recipes like pizza, or pasta dishes.
One of my favorite ways of cooking these sausages is on the grill, I like both grilling them and smoking them.
If grilling the sausage you should grill them over high heat, preferably using charcoal to enhance the flavor.
You can also grill and smoke them simultaneously. For smoking you could opt for a strong flavor like hickory or mesquite, both work well with wild boar.
Another option is to choose a sweet flavor like apple or cherry.
These sausages are also great for both pan frying and oven roasting.
I’ve cooked the ones in this recipe in the air fryer and they turned out fantastic.
Normally for wild boar, you would cook the meat until the internal temperature reaches 145F, but since this is ground meat there is no harm in cooking until 160F.
Wild Boar Sausages
Ingredients
- 5 lbs wild boar meat
- 1.5 lbs pork shoulder/belly
- 1/4 lb pork fat
- 2 tbsp kosher salt
- 2 tbsp wild garlic
- 1 tbsp fennel seed
- 1 tbsp sweet paprika
- 1 tbsp thyme
- 1.5 tsp black pepper whole
- 1 tbsp juniper berries optional
- sausage skins
Instructions
- Cut the wild hog meat, pork, and fat into cubes. Place in freezer while you make the seasoning
- If using juniper berries add them to a mortar and crush, add the fennel and crush, add pepper and crush, add the remaining ingredients and blend them all together
- Set up your grinder with a medium plate and begin grind the hog, pork and fat evenly
- Once the meat is ground mix in the spices with your hands. Set in the fridge to cool again
- Place the skins on your sausage stuffer and fill with the loose sausage meat. Pipe the wild boar sausage ino the skins
- Hang in your refrigerator or cool room for a day
