The word
cervelat is a designation for a whole family of
sausages, uncooked but
smoked and either semi-dried or very well dried. Cervelat is also known in the
New World as "
summer sausage".
Although there are an absolute multitude of different cervelat sausage, the main varieties are:
- farmer cervelat: made of equal parts coarse-chopped pork and beef which is cured, dried and gently seasoned, notably without garlic.
- goettinger cervelat: a higher quality dry, hard sausage containing pork and beef.
- goteborg (Gothenberg) cervelat: made of coarse-chopped pork and beef which is heavily smoked and salty and somewhat sweet from the addition of cardamon.
- gothaer cervelat: contains very lean and finely-chopped pork, this German variety is well-cured.
- holsteiner cervelat: similar to farmer cervelat (above), but is packed in a ring, rather than a straight sausage.
- landjaeger cervelat: containing beef and pork, hailing from Switzerland, is heavily smoked and is sold semi-dry and is black and wrinkled in appearance (it is sold as flat-pressed links).
- thuringer cervelat: contains beef and ham or pork fat, it is distinctively tangy and mildly spiced.
Cervelat sausage is often cut and used as an ingredient in soups and goulashes in Europe.
NBItaly's awesome Mortadella sausage is technically a cervelat, although due to it's great fame and position in the history of sausages, appears in it's own node.
research sources include the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council and other sites sourced on the web via Google