It was sausages galore at last weeks 25th annual Great New Zealand Sausage Competition awards night and amongst the 530 entries was a winning entry from the Ravenswood New World butchery department.
Senior butcher Lindsay Dawkins says it was a great honour for the team to win on their first attempt.
He says it took the team weeks of trail and error before they finally formulated the correct proportions of taste, texture and ingredients for their gold medal winning Lamb, Pumpkin and Feta sausage.
The category the team had entered in at the nation-wide competition, was the flexitarian or meat-free category.
The goal was to create a sausage with little or no meat in it.
The veteran butcher said over a period of about five weeks, each member of the team had a crack at producing a sausage mixture and then they all reviewed their offerings.
‘‘We picked the best idea and then went about trying to get the proportions and the taste right.’’
He gave thanks to a supplier who managed to find the right seasoning for them and then they tried many different cheese varieties before eventually settling on goats milk Feta, ‘‘because it had the right amount of taste and texture,’’ he said.
‘‘It made it taste just right as the other varieties were either too strong or didn’t have enough flavour.’’ The tasty bangers have become a popular attraction at the store. Mr Dawkins says customers are phoning them daily asking when the next batch is due. ‘‘It’s been a good experience for all the team here and we are already thinking about what we can make for next years competition,’’ he says. Store owner /operator Justin Blackler says it is a great honour for the team at the one-year-old store. ‘‘It was great how each butcher came up with a concept, and then they picked the best and all worked as a team to improve and help fine tune it. ‘‘It was great recognition for the hard work they all put into it,’’ he says.
