Recipe: Peconic Prime Meats Holiday Breakfast Sausage

Ferociously protective of his recipes, Mr. Colabella reluctantly agreed to walk through the creation of a new holiday breakfast sausage recipe he’s featuring this holiday season.

“To make any sausage, the first thing is to decide what species you’re going to use. This one we’re going to be making into a new holiday breakfast pork sausage.

“Salt and pepper is my base for every sausage because I’m not using nitrates. This one includes dry rub sage, brown sugar, a mix of nutmeg and brown cinnamon, a little bit of chili and coffee, with parsley and red pepper flakes for color.”

Mr. Colabella uses about a cup of seasonings per 10 pounds of sausage, and recommends mixing it by hand.

“You don’t want to overmix, you want to hand-mix it. If you put it in a paddle mixer, you’re going to get more of a hot dog texture than a sausage texture.

“After you’ve gotten your mix pretty even, you should be able to see a piece of parsley or a red pepper flake all the way through.” Then it’s time to put it through a sausage press into the casing, or just shape it into patties, cook and enjoy.

“The good thing about breakfast sausage is you don’t have to put it in a casing, you can serve it as patties.” That makes it a less daunting project for the home cook. And while he grinds the meat himself, home cooks can start with a good quality store-bought ground pork.

Peconic Prime Meats Holiday Breakfast Sausage(Per 10 pounds of ground pork)2 ounces salt

1/2 ounce black pepper

1/2 ounce sage

1/2 ounce parsley

1/2 ounce light brown sugar

1/3 ounce nutmeg

1/6 ounce cinnamon

1/6 ounce coffee

1/6 ounce chili powder

A pinch of chili flakes for color