I am making my first batch of sausages tomorrow. What are your favourite flavours?

[javotte]

We have bought 10lbs of pork shoulder. We are trying to make enough sausages for our summer barbecues.
So far we are making sausages with :

• herbes de provence and a little garlic
• harissa (to make some sort of pork merguez, IYSWIM)
• paprika, cumin and fresh coriander

I would like to add a couple more sorts. Any ideas? Would sausages with curry powder taste good? My kitchen is well stocked so all suggestions are welcome.

Wow they all sound so nice. I don't have any really helpful suggestions. I love sage with pork personally. Are you going to do any plain ones for those that are weird like my son and don't like any extra flavours?

My butcher sells pork, sage and Stilton sausages and they are delicious

Our local butcher does pork and black pudding. Delicious.

Pork and Apple

Pork and Haggis!

Pork and apple or pork sage and Stilton

Pork works very well with sweeter flavours as well as savoury

How are you storing /curing then as the apple maybe impossible

Pork & tomato - yum!

I like pork and apple, and our local butchers do pork and plum which is fab.
When my dad used to make his own sausages, the best were the honey ones as the honey makes the outside all caramelized and lush

I made sausages with a friend recently, and one thing that shocked us both was the amount of salt we used. We thought we'd put in a generous quantity, but when we tasted the finished product they still needed more.

Your ideas and the suggestions above sound lovely.

FWIW our flavours were:

• lemon zest + wild garlic (bit late for that now, but you could maybe use wet garlic?), and
• toasted and ground fennel, cumin and coriander seeds + black pepper, with lots of paprika and chilli flakes. We were aiming for a merguez-type sausage too, and though they weren't particularly authentic (merguez are supposed to be lamb or beef, I think?) they were still delicious!

Might be worth seeing if your local library has a copy of The Sausage Book, some good ideas in there.
Next time we thought we might try a Chinese style one, with star anise or five spice, soy, garlic and ginger. Also pork, leek and prune. I bet a smoky/spicy one with chipotle paste or smoked paprika would work well too, particularly for the BBQ. Most popular one at a trade food show we went to recently was flavoured with marmalade, which had that caramelised effect CMOT mentions.
Anyway, have fun!
PS we found natural casings to be more fiddly but a lot nicer than the silicone ones

Thank you!
DH is not keen on sweet flavours, so in the end we made an extra batch with sage.
Our sausages are now in the freezer, waiting for warmer weekends.

Hi. How did you make the sausages ie what equipment did you need? And where can I get silicon casings? I need halal casing if I used natural ones and they're difficult to source. Thanks!