Make your own gosh darn longanisa!

But that’s just the riff. Make your own jazz.
Seems somehow incomplete right? That’s the beauty of it. It’s the perfect chance to make it yours. Here are a few notes to help you along the way. 1/2 kg is about 1 lb (which makes 8-10 links). Salt peter is what turns the longanisa that familiar reddish color (it also does it for corned beef), it’s not absolutely necessary as not too much flavor is derived from the salt peter. But if a warmer tone to your sausage is what you desire, you can find salt peter branded as Morton’s Tender Quick in your local mega mart.

We like to grind our own pork shoulder for use with this recipe (and adding just a touch more pork fat couldn’t hurt, jowl, fat back, maybe a couple chunks of pork belly even) but some of your finest 80/20 ground pork will do in a pinch. We also use smoked paprika and Filipino Vinegar (palm vinegar) but equal parts of red wine vinegar and rice wine vinegar would do the trick. Mix the mixture together by hand (as opposed to an electric mixer) for superior texture.

Get some natural casings from a purveyor of fine meats (in the South Bay Area, Lunardi’s and Seafood City are my go-to’s). To stuff, get yourself one of those Kitchen Aid stand mixers, with the sausage stuffing attachment or a sausage stuffing tube from one of those fancy kitchen supply stores at the mall. Oh and before stuffing don’t forget to fry a little bit of your mixture up for a taste and re-season as needed. As for drying in the sun, we skipped that little bit of authenticity and everything turned out just fine. Now go and make some sweet fatty pork music! Mmmm jazz in tube form . . .

Leave a Comment