Did you know our calendar is packed full of Food Holidays just waiting to be celebrated? Yep it sure is! And "Bangers & Mash" is found on many-ah-table during National Sausage Month, (October). "Bangers & Mash" is always found at the family table during cold winter months when a hot filling meal is welcomed. If you don't feel like cooking, then find yourself a local Pub because "Bangers & Mash" is known as Pub food too. Everybody loves sausage ;)
What is Bangers & Mash?
"Bangers and mash, also known as sausages and mash, is an English/Irish dish made of mashed potatoes and sausages, the latter of which may be one of a variety of flavoured sausage made of pork or beef or a Cumberland sausage.
"The dish is usually served with a rich onion gravy. Although sometimes stated that the term "bangers" has its origins in World War II, the term was actually in use at least as far back as 1919."
Pub Grub:
"This dish may, even when cooked at home, be thought of as an example of pub grub - relatively quick and easy to make in large quantities as well as being tasty and satisfying. More up-market varieties, with exotic sausages and mashes, are sold in gastropubs, as well as less exotic alternatives being available in regular public houses."
Along with jellied eels and pie and mash the dish has particular iconic significance as traditional London and Dublin working-class dishes.
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Bangers & Mash Recipe:
"You can fry or grill sausages quickly, but in this recipe we cook them slowly (as recommended by Nigel Slater, no less) so as to really bring out the flavour."
"Some people like baked beans with their sausage+mash, some people like gravy, some people don't need either...
Ingredients
- 2 or 3 good British butcher's sausages per person
- Potatoes - 2 medium-to-large potatoes per person
Bangers
Note: you do not need to prick the sausages, that only lets tasty juices escape! Similarly you don't necessarily need to separate them one from another until after they've cooked.
"Put a large heavy frying pan on a hob, on a medium heat, put a little veg oil in (if desired) and let it warm up. Then place the sausages in a single layer in the frying pan. Let them fry a minute or so, then turn them over, fry another minute, turn them around again, to try and get a bit of colour all over."
"Once they've been in the hot pan for 5 minutes or so, turn the heat right down and let them fry very gently for the next 25 minutes, turning them over every 5 or 10 minutes so they get cooked evenly."
"You can cook them for longer than this (up to about an hour even! on a reeeeaaallly low heat). Always make sure the sausages are cooked all the way through (no pinkness should remain)."
Mash
"Peel the potatoes and chop them roughly into pieces around 1 or 2 cm thick. Add them to a large pan of boiling water and boil vigorously for 15 minutes."
"When they're done (they'll be soft enough that you can easily put a knife/fork into one of the pieces), drain them in a colander and return them to the big pan (not on the heat any more). Add a generous knob of butter and a splash of milk, and mash them all up with a potato masher.
Other Sausage Favorites:
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Resources:
Pictured: Bangers & Mash, also known as
Sausage & Mash Photo by:avlxyz
"A sausage is a prepared food, usually made from ground meat, animal fat, salt, and spices (sometimes with other ingredients such as herbs), typically packed in a casing. Sausage making is a traditional food preservation technique."
