What kinds of pâtés and terrines are there?
• En terrine – forcemeat (ie a mixture of ground up meat, fat and herbs) cooked in a terrine dish lined with bacon (or Parma ham), cooked in oven (either direct heat or a bain-marie), always served cold. Texture can be smooth or rustically rough and may be patterned with nuts, dried fruits. Strips of ham etc).
• En croute – forcemeat mixture, cooked in pastry, served hot or cold. Texture can be smooth or rough. You need to consume en croute fairly quickly as pastry doesn’t mature well (unlike en terrine which matures and flavours will integrate over 2-3 days)
• Pâté de maison/ Pâté de campagne – robust flavours and texture. Baked. Basically fancy meat loaf.
• Parfaits – Offal (usually liver) very finely puréed with eggs, butter and cream and then baked in a bain-marie. The result is very light in texture and rich in flavour.
• Puréed liver patés – made on stove top. Liver is cooked and puréed. The paté is bound with cream and/or butter. Doesn’t require long cooking process.

WHO SELLS LOVELY PATE IN GAUTENG?
• For Franco-phone pates - La Marina Foods: Longmeadow North Business Estate. 011 997 0500
• For German style pates – Alma Butcher – 21 Natalie Street, Murrayfield, PTA. 011 803 3335 NB. They also make fabulous german style fine textured sausages.

Foie Gras – the one that makes people cross
• Foie gras makes people very cross. And it is undoubtedly a nasty thing to do to a goose. But anyone who eats factory farmed meat needs to examine their meat choices before judging the foie gras eaters.
• Foie gras is the enlarged liver of a force fed goose or duck (goose foie gras tastes richer and more mellow than duck).
• It is a very ancient delicacy – In the Ancient Roman Empire geese were forcefed with figs to fatten their livers to 3x the original size. Modern foie gras are fattened on corn.
• One liver will weigh 700-900g for a goose and 300-400g for a duck.
• 700 calories per 100g.

WHO SELLS DELICIOUS FOIE GRAS IN GAUTENG?
• Auberge Michel, Sandton 011 883 7013- pan fried fillet of foie gras served on fig and beetroot marmalade.

Sausages
Definition: All sausages consist of a forcemeat stuffed inside a tube-like casing.

Casings
Historically, the casing was derived from sub mucosa portion of animal intestines (these are semi permeable so fat can run out when the sausages are cooked) but many modern casings are synthetically produced cellulose. Not nearly as nice. Find a butcher who uses real casings.

Categories of sausage
Sausages fall into 3 broad categories: fresh, smoked, cured:
• Fresh sausages - made from minced raw meat and spices. Must be cooked before eating. Because they are raw they should be refridgerated and eaten within 2 days. They must be thoroughly cooked to avoid Trichinosis infection.

WHERE TO GO FOR FAB FRESH SAUSAGES IN GAUTENG?
PJS foods (everything from classic Cumberland and chipolatas through to Tunisian lamb sausages) 011 615 4184 (www.pjsfoods.co.za)

Nussbaum’s Kosher sausages Louis Botha Avenue in Orange Grove 011 485 23 03 oldest surviving Kosher butchery in JHB. Fabulous sausages, Kosher boerewors from heaven.

Jong Hwa Meat, 16C Derrick Avenue, Cyrildene; 011 6161410 Lady butcher Jessica Shih speaks almost no English but her Laap ch’eung sausages hang in the window and are damn fine.

Smoked sausages – can be hot or cold smoked. Aromatic woods improve the flavour. Smoking retards spoilage both hot and cold smoked products will keep in a fridge for 2-3 weeks.

• Cold smoke means low heat for a long time (hours – days). Cold smoking dries the sausage but does not fully cook them (lots of German sausages are cold smoked) Hence cold smoked sausages must be cooked before eating.
• Hot smoked sausage (e.g. Italian Mortadella sausages are often hot smoked) smoked over a high heat for a short period and are ready to eat. There is no need for further cooking.

FOR FAB SMOKED SAUSAGES:
Super Sconto Louis Botha (mortadella from heaven) 011 728 7561
La Marina (see above)

• Cured sausage (e.g. salami) is firmer and keeps longer than fresh or smoked sausage. Fully cured sausages such as Salami are cured with salt and dried to prevent bacterial growth. Curing retards spoilage because it removes moisture. Will keep un-refridgerated for several months (but will gradually become hard). These sausages are eaten without further cooking.
Fama - Roberto Gimenez 011 618 3048 perfect delicious Spanish style sausage both fresh, smoked and cured

Ritrovo in Pretoria 012 460 5173 - a tiny deli section attached to the bistro section where they keep the finest of Italian cured sausages and the advice as to food and wine pairing is unsurpassed.

Cured pork - Hams and Bacon

How does ham differ from bacon?
Ham is the hind leg of a pig cured as a whole leg.

Bacon is other parts of the pig (ie not the hind leg) cured. Most bacon is made from trimmed pork bellies cured in brine and smoked until partially cooked.

What is proscuitto?
It just means ham in Italian. The key ones to look out for are
• Parma – In Parma the pigs are fed on chestnuts and the whey of Parmesan cheese. Hind legs dry cured and then air dried for 10 months.
• San Daniele – stronger, redder than parma as longer air dried. More intense flavour.
• Coppa – Corsican loin of pork salted, marinated in garlic and red wine, rolled oil and tied in a section of gut. Braised then dried and eaten before it hardens.
• Serrano – Spanish for mountain ham Similar to prosciutto it is a raw, air dried ham. Rich in flavour (it has been cured in wine and seasoned with olive oil and paprika) eaten alone as an appetiser.

What is pancetta?
It just means bacon made from pork belly in Italian. Pancetta is cured but not smoked so it is moister and mellower in flavour than bacon. If you have to substitute bacon for pancetta blanch it in boiling water to get the smoky taste out of the bacon.

If you are in the Cape do go to Bread and wine Neil Jewell 021 876 3055 makes the best hams, sausages, salamis in South Africa.