Bloody Germans

2. The German Bratwurst Sausage

I do not like German sausages!

There, now I’ve said it  --

And there are ‘millions’ of them out here in Germany.

They come in all various shapes, sizes and flavours and there are thousands upon thousands of sausage stalls wherever I go, some permanent, others temporary. Whatever the Germans do -- they must have a sausage in their hand to do it. Sometimes, I even imagine a funeral congregation would be eating sausages as they lower the coffin into the ground.

When mothers are out shopping with their young, some food store cold counters will; now and again, have special baby wiener sausages within easy reach for the assistants to hand out free to young toddlers in their prams. I guess they must do this to get them hooked onto the things at a very early age. I’ve heard of a drug dealers plaguing the young like this -- but out here, they’ve practically got the same thing operating by organised ‘Sausage Barons’.

 

Once, when the temperature in Hamburg dropped to minus twenty three, the large city lake; known as The Alster, froze solid. A good majority of the population ran home to collect their ice skates and toboggan’s to frolic on the ice -- while another segment hurriedly set up their sausage stalls, allowing them less space to do so.

It is most definitely ‘sausages’ from the cradle to the grave in Germany, so it’s no wonder I find it so difficult to pronounce the German words as I think I should first need to fill my mouth with heaps of sausage. When the Germans do partake in their sausage -- they cake it with half a ton of mustard and mayonnaise.  Many times, I have even seen them spurting on a total of three substances together; mustard, mayonnaise and ketchup -- all dolloped around one big curled up sausage. I just cannot figure out why they always have to put on so much either, because the majority of it becomes discarded along with the paper sausage tray after the sausage has been gnawed away.

At the end of some special fete or outdoor occasion within the city limits, the waste bins at all the sausage stalls -- or Imbiss’s ; as they are more commonly known, turn the whole area into something that resembles an illegal dumping ground for toxic waste!

Sometimes when I go into the city, I see hundreds upon thousands of stalls all surrounding the large lake. Music is playing and I can hardly squeeze my way through the crowds of people to get to the stalls.

The area is just bustling with excitement.

I say to myself --

“What’s going on?”

Then I move from stall to stall to find out what is on display.

Apart from a few stalls that sell cheeses, handicraft, knickknacks -- whatever; it can vary from event to event, the vast majority of these stalls sell only one thing..,

Yes, you’ve guessed it!

Bloody Sausages!!!

Germany celebrates -- (don’t they just..,) around 15,00 species of sausage. Frankfurters, Leberwurst, Bratwurst, Knackwurst, Münchner Weisswurt, Wieners, Wurst, and Nürnberger Bratwurst, are all different types of sausage immensely popular throughout Germany. They are the world’s leaders in sausage eating consumption and each year, an average German; if there is such a thing, will shove down their necks at least thirty two kilograms of the things.

For them, the sausage is a glorious part of their nationality -- a heritage in which they will proudly transmit by shipping-off many of their young offspring to special ‘sausage-making’ schools.  There, they can all surrender to the skills that have been handed down for hundreds of years and thus, keep the country's sausage tradition stringing out by the wagon loads for many thousands of years to come.

The basic ingredients of a Bratwurst sausage emanates from ground pork and veal that is seasoned with a variety of spices, including ginger, nutmeg, coriander or caraway. Though often, I do sometimes wonder what other ingredients they are clandestinely submerging into their large historic sausage pots.  I have heard tell that they hurl in just about everything that grows out of an animal, including its ears and tail -- nothing they say is ever wasted.

Which.., if I dwell my thoughts on for too long, it can amplify into something quite hair-raising!

The cooking process is done by either boiling them for around ten or so minutes, or grilling them on racks over large charcoal fires. The exhausted product is then blanketed with an armful of curry powder or mustard -- in a bid; one can imagine, to exterminate its real taste. Then the finished object, which can arrive either short, long, curly horseshoe shaped, or as straight as a ruler -- or; and if one so desires, can be chopped up into medium sized chunks and is either served as it is, or accompanied by a small portion of bread. Other recipe serving delights suggest -- eaten with dollops of cold; mayonnaise’d to the hills, potato salad or served with Pomme-frites. Which is Germany’s answer to skinny French-fry chips. It is then covered in seeps and oozes of hot curry sauce and the whole thing is eaten whilst tremendously -- and I mean tremendously,  hot.

That my friends, is your German Bratwurst Sausage!

It is still being contested today over who invented the ‘Hot-dog’.  The people in Frankfurtum in Main USA, claim it was they who first dreamt them up. But the local dwellers of Frankfurt Germany, say they are the one’s who are responsible even though, at the time -- they were only following orders. They go on to declare that the Hot-dog; as we so affectionately acknowledge them today, descended from their famous Frankfurter brand. But one thing is for sure -- the ‘Hamburger’ definitely sprang up from Hamburg, where they first baptised it as the ‘Hamburg Steak’. When the blueprint journeyed over to America, they elected to re-christen it ‘Hamburger’, as it is acceptably admitted around the world today.

Of late, the German sausage industry took a bit of a whack with the not-so-long-ago scare from Europe’s ‘Mad Cow Disease’. At first, they all thought it was a problem confined only to the United Kingdom and felt safe with just banning all beef products from there. Then without warning, reports of ‘Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy’; BSE or ‘Mad Cow Disease’, suddenly sprung up in cattle around Spain, France and even more distressing, within Germany.

Despite the fact that a good many from their medley of sausages are made from pork; it is the most popular meat in Germany next to beef and veal, a vast number also contained a beef filler, that hailed from the dreaded backbone of a cow. Three other well know persuasions of sausage, like the ‘Bavarian Brain Sausage’ and two other breeds from the Hanover region and Saxony-Anhalt, spawned further trouble simply by having the word ‘brain’ included as part of it’s name.

But none of these sausages have been produced using brain for the past twenty odd years -- only the wording in the name has survived the long tradition. However, be that as it may -- brain is still an ingredient in German sausage assembling that continues within the industry today.

All these consequences, plus many other worrying reports, sent icy shivers down the spines of the nations sausages and sales began to droop. At Christmas Eve -- when for most, German sausages play a weighty role in their annual feast -- due to heightened public anxiety, sausages were being propelled out into the cold and fish and goose were now being wielded out onto the festive plates.

To me, the very idea of Germans not eating their sausages is unimaginable, to say the least.  If they were to stop gnawing on their yearly mountains of 1500 varieties of sausages, what other use could they possibly have for them?

I read a few stories that claimed their sausages were now being painted and decorated for use in Nativity plays, and some Germans even commenced to hang them up on their Christmas trees. Other reports suggest that a skinhead fraternity inside the old eastern side of Germany, were utilising them as a handy cosh to bash folk over the head.

Though the questions concerning BSE still go on today -- from what I can see around and about me everywhere I go -- the Germans still love their sausages and nothing but nothing will ever separate the two. I don’t think for one moment that Germany’s Bratwurst sausage is heading towards extinction -- or destined to the dark and lonely tombs within city museums.

 

The German sausage may have been traumatised, wounded, basted, battered and scarred, but I sincerely believe that it is still a long way yet from ever lying down and going off into that big yonder sleep.