Cumberland Sausage
Sausage in a continuous spiral, never divided at the stuffing, which can reach fifty centimetres in length. Protected by a PGI since 2011. The mincing is coarse, the peppering generous.
| Lean pork shoulder | 850 g |
| Fatback | 150 g |
| Fine salt | 18 g |
| Crushed black pepper | 5 g |
| Ground white pepper | 2 g |
| Grated nutmeg | 2 g |
| Ground mace | 1 g |
| Dried sage | 2 g |
| Dried thyme | 1 g |
| Dry breadcrumb | 30 g |
| Iced water | 60 ml |
| Hog casing (Ø 32–36 mm) | — |
- Preparation: A minimum of 80 per cent pork. Cut into cubes and chill.
- Mincing: Mince coarsely through the 10 to 12 mm plate. The coarse mincing is characteristic and obligatory under the PGI.
- Seasoning: The pepper should be abundant. Mix the moistened breadcrumbs with the spices and the meats. Knead without crushing the pieces.
- Stuffing: Stuff into the casing, forming one long continuous sausage, not divided into portions. Coil it into the characteristic flat spiral.
- Cooking: Grill or pan-fry the whole spiral, or cut it up after cooking. Cook for 20–25 minutes. Serve with mash and onions.
The Cumberland sausage is known above all by its shape: a continuous spiral, without subdivision into portions, which can reach 50 centimetres in length. The presentation is not decorative: it follows directly from the traditional Cumberland stuffing technique, in which the sausage is shaped into a single long ribbon, coiled on itself, then held by a wooden skewer before cooking in the pan or on the grill. The spiral allows even cooking without repeated turning and is today one of the criteria for the PGI: a Cumberland sausage presented in individual portions is, technically, a Cumberland-style sausage, not a Cumberland sausage.
The PGI obtained in 2011 imposes a strict specification: obligatory manufacture in Cumbria, a minimum of 80 per cent pork, coarse mincing (the forcemeat must not be emulsified), spiral presentation, and no colourings or preservatives. Coarsely crushed black pepper is its aromatic signature, a generosity of pepper that stands out against the customary restraint of British sausages.
This abundance of spice has a plausible historical explanation. Whitehaven, a port on the west coast of Cumbria, was in the eighteenth century one of the busiest merchant ports of Great Britain, the third port of the kingdom after London and Bristol at its height. It was a hub of transatlantic trade: Virginia tobacco, West Indian sugar and, above all, spices (pepper, nutmeg, allspice) arriving directly from the colonies. The Cumberland sausage-makers thus had access to spices at prices and in quantities their inland counterparts could not have contemplated. The aromatic profile of the Cumberland sausage, peppery, lively, faintly exotic for a British sausage, perhaps carries the memory of that maritime trade.
The rivalry between Cumberland and Lincolnshire sausages is one of the United Kingdom’s most persistent culinary quarrels. The first stakes its claim on pepper and spices; the second on fresh sage. Both claim to be the best English breakfast sausage. The annual competitions, the Great Sausage Competition and its regional variants, bring together hundreds of participants from both styles before specialist juries. These events are followed by the regional press with a seriousness that reflects the sausage’s place in the identity of the English counties.
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