English Recipe

SPECIAL FERRARESE DRESSED PORK
(Salama da Sugo)

The salama is first placed in lukewarm water and left over night as this will soften the outer encrustations which are then to be lightly brushed off.
It is then placed in a pot of water, better still if wrapped in a piece of thin cloth. The salama should not touch the bottom of the pot; therefore suspend it with a string from a piece of wood resting across the rim of the pot.
The water in the pot is left to boil over a low flame for over four hours.
Add water from time to time but without ever stopping the boiling.
The skin must absolutely not be broken or the juices inside would be irreparably lost.
Some prefer to cook the "salama" in a double boiler although in this case the cooking times must be lengthened.
Today special plastic bags for cooking exist which are quite good.
Once cooked the string is removed and the top of the "salama' is cut leaving an opening from which to scoop out the meat with a spoon.
It is not advisable to cut into wedges unless it is being served cold.
The ideal is to present it steaming hot with a side of pureed potatoes.
It is best served with full bodied red 'Bosco' wine or some other full flavored red wine.

History of Black sausage

The earliest known reference to this delicacy of Ferrara dates to the fifteenth century.
In a letter dated 15 February 1481, Lorenzo the Magnificent thanks Duke Ercole I d'Este for having sent a black sausage: "I thank your excellency for the sausage, which you were so kind as to send me, and which I highly appreciate". In his work Memoria per la storia di Ferrara, Antonio Frizzi asserts that the first ones to produce black sausage were the mountain dwellers, already experts in the art of sausage making, who descended into the Po valley during the winter from as far away as Trento, Morbegno and Bormio. Frizzi also dedicates to the "salamina" "little sausage", as it is affectionately called by the locals, a poem, Salamoide, published in Venice in 1772.
In his Dizionario moderno delle parole che non si trovano nei dizionari comuni, Alfredo Panzini defines black sausage as follows: "Made with select meats and Marsala and herbs. It must be cooked with great care. The older it gets, the more valued it is".
Panzini's three sentences sum up the distinguishing characteristics of the sausage: the care in choice and dosage of the ingredients, the attention to its aging and cooking.
Only a single sausage may be obtained from each pig, since the casing used to contain the mixture is the bladder.
The pork liver and tongue make up the central core, to which is added the meat of the neck and throat.
It is all minced with great care, moistened with Bosco or Barbittone red wine (some add a little Marsala as well), cloves, pepper and cinnamon.
After it is well blended, this mixture is stuffed into the bladder casing, which is tied with string to form the classical and elegant shape that dates back to the Renaissance: a sphere with grooves showing the segments.