I think sausage is one of my favorite foods, probably pretty close to tacos. This greek sausage I have been in love with ever since I first tried it at Taverna Agora in Winston Salem years ago. Since I luckily received a meat grinding attachment for my trusty stand mixer, sausage making has become a great deal less labor intensive, and therefore a more frequent occurrence for me. I based this sausage off of this recipe, that site is a good sausage making resource btw, but I used red onion instead of green since that’s the way I had it at Agora and liked it so much, and fennel instead of anise seed because I simply do not like anise. Casing this sausage is optional since it fries up nice in a patty. I served it with spinach pie and some tzatziki (the tzatziki is not optional).

1 approximately 7 lb pork shoulder, cut into cubes (Do Not Trim The Fat!)

1 small red onion, diced

Approx 1lb Feta cheese

2 Tbsp Salt

3 Cloves Garlic, minced

Zest of 1 1/2 oranges

1Tbsp Oregano

1Tbsp Fennel seeds

1Tbsp Coriander seeds

1Tbsp Black Pepper

Hog Casings (optional)

Immediately after cutting up the pork shoulder, put the pieces in some freezer bags and put it back in the freezer for a few hours, this is also a good time to put your feta in the freezer. The meat grinds MUCH easier if it is partially frozen, the feta stays in nice chunks, and the finished sausage has a better texture overall.

While the meat and cheese are chilling in the freezer, clean your workspace well and set up your mixer with the meat grinding attachment and the largest bowl that you have, ground meat has way more volume than you would expect. Start soaking your hog casings at this point too if you are using them.

With the mixer on medium, feed the partially frozen pork through, slowly pressing down on any pieces that need a little encouragement to go through the hopper. If you put more than one bag in the freezer, try to take out just one at a time so the rest of the meat stays cold.

At this point you have a lot of ground pork and could make just about any sausage that your heart desires, but for our purposes, mix in the spices and the chopped onion, then after thats well incorporated gently mix in chunks of the feta cheese. DO NOT OVERWORK THE GROUND MEAT WHILE MIXING. This is how you wind up with tough meatloaf or sausage. A little gentle tossing is all you need.

I don’t have any pictures of the sausage stuffing process, since that’s something that requires both hands. Since I wanted chunks of onion and feta present in the finished sausage, I removed the die and the spinning cutter from the meat grinder when I put on the sausage stuffing funnel. Experiment with this to get the texture that you desire out of your finished sausage. Greasing the outside of the funnel with lard before you feed the casing on helps to move things along much smoother. Don’t turn the mixer speed up too high, or try to feed too much sausage through at once, and DO NOT overstuff the casing, it should have a little give to the touch, you don’t want it tight, or your sausage will burst when you are trying to twist it off. I didn’t pay as much attention to this advice as I should have, and had several blow outs in the twisting process. Learn from my mistakes.

After twisting the sausage into approximately 6 in lengths, divide it up and freeze what you aren’t going to immediately grill. This keeps pretty well in the freezer, but after people discover that you have it, it won’t last long. Serve with some tzatziki and spinach pie or spanakopita.