Jump to content

Lorne sausage

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Slice (lower right) served with black pudding, baked beans, mushrooms and fried bread

The Lorne sausage, also known as square sausage, flat sausage or slice, is a traditional Scottish food item made from minced meat, rusk and spices.[1] Although termed a sausage, no casing is used to hold the meat in shape, hence it is usually served as square slices from a formed block. It is a common component of the traditional Scottish breakfast.

Name

[edit]

It is thought that the sausage is named after the region of Lorne in Argyll;[2] advertisements for 'Lorne Sausage' have been found in newspapers as early as 1892.[3][4][5] This was long before comedian Tommy Lorne, after whom the sausage has been said to be named, became well-known.[6]

History

[edit]

The exact origins of the Lorne sausage remain unclear. It is often eaten in the Scottish variant of the full breakfast or in a breakfast roll. The sausage is also an appropriate size to make a sandwich using a slice from a plain loaf of bread cut in half.[2]

Preparation

[edit]

Sausage meat (beef, pork or more usually a combination of the two) is minced with rusk and spices, packed into a rectangular tin with a cross-section of about ten centimetres (four inches) square, and sliced about one centimetre (one-half inch) thick before cooking.[7] Square sausage has no casing, unlike traditional sausages, and must be tightly packed into the mould to hold it together; slices are often not truly square.[2]

Occasionally, it has a length of caseless black pudding or haggis through the middle, in the style of a gala pie.

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "A history of the square sausage, including a recipe for making your own - Scotsman Food & Drink". Scotsman Food & Drink. 2016-03-10. Retrieved 2016-11-05.
  2. ^ a b c "Lorne Sausage, Argyll". Information Britain. Retrieved 14 December 2013.
  3. ^ "Grant's Store, Renton". British Newspaper Archive. Lennox Herald - Saturday 18 June 1892. Retrieved 26 June 2023.
  4. ^ "Scotslanguage.com - Lorne sausage n. square-shaped sausage meat".
  5. ^ "Results - Arbroath Herald and Advertiser For The Montrose Burghs" – via British Newspaper Archive.
  6. ^ "Lorne Sausage Scottish Square Slices Sausages". www.aboutaberdeen.com.
  7. ^ "Lorne Sausage". Dictionary of the Scots Language. Archived from the original on 14 December 2013. Retrieved 14 December 2013.