Boudin blanc de Liège

Appearance & taste

The sausage is cylindrical, closed at both ends, 15 to 40 cm long and at most 60 mm thick; for sale in slices or portions it may be longer. It is white to light grey; in the cut a distinct grain of meat and fragments of the marjoram leaves can be seen. The smell of marjoram is clearly noticeable and is not masked by the other ingredients; marjoram also dominates the taste.

The sausage contains 10 to 25 % fat, at least 10 % protein, at most 3 % starch and at most 1.8 % salt. Traditionally it is eaten cold and in slices, sometimes as part of the “drèssêye”, a typical Liège platter of cold meats. If it is sold unpackaged, the name and the PGI reference appear on the price tag.

Production

The sausage meat consists of pork muscle meat and fat from the cheek, shoulder or back; other parts of the pig are not allowed apart from the casings. A mandatory ingredient is dried marjoram of the species Origanum majorana. It is grown in the field and harvested before flowering. Within 24 hours it is placed on racks in a closed, unheated room at no more than 40 °C, protected from direct sunlight. It must not be irradiated, as that would markedly weaken its smell and aroma. Only the whole leaves are picked from the dried sprigs and stored airtight and in the dark.

The whole leaves are mixed into the sausage meat together with the other ingredients, at least 1.5 g per kilogram. An infusion of marjoram in hot milk would make the marjoram invisible in the cut. The sausage meat is filled into desalted natural pork casings, and the sausages are cooked in steam or stock until the core reaches at least 68 °C and immediately cooled with cold water. According to the specification, this preserves the smell and aroma of the marjoram. Making the sausage meat, filling, cooking and cooling take place in the province of Liège.

Origin & history

According to the specification, marjoram belongs to the cuisine of the province of Liège; it also seasons crayfish Liège-style, calf’s head and meatloaf. It has been grown there since at least the 19th century. Butchers grew it in their own gardens and dried the sprigs in the attic; market gardeners sold it at the markets. From the 1950s and 1960s they supplied spice companies, and gradually part of the marjoram came from abroad. In 2015 a sensory analysis by the University of Liège found that a white sausage seasoned with marjoram according to these rules differs markedly in taste from others.

Marjoram has been documented as an ingredient of the Liège white sausage since the beginning of the 20th century, for example in a cookbook from around 1903, in newspaper recipes from 1914 and 1916 and in a Liège dictionary from 1933. The craft arose before the 20th century and is passed down from generation to generation in the butcher’s shops of Liège.