Saucisson de Lacaune

Appearance & taste

The Saucisson de Lacaune is a cylindrical sausage of more or less regular shape weighing from 200 g to over 2 kg; it is sold loose, in nets or in bundles. The Saucisse de Lacaune comes in three shapes: as the U-shaped “Saucisse pli” and the straight “Saucisse droite”, each weighing 200 to 500 g, and as the “Saucisse à la perche”, which is wound several times around a pole to dry and is therefore spiral-shaped.

Both are soft to firm and compact. When cut, they show coarse pieces (at least 8 mm) of red to dark red lean meat and firm white fat, clearly separated from each other; they contain no sinews or cartilage. They smell and taste typically of dried meat with a distinct peppery note, moderately intense and hardly fatty. The fat content is at most 20 %.

They are sold whole with a label, unpacked, in film, in a protective atmosphere or vacuum-packed, and also in slices.

Production

At least 60 % of the fattening feed for the pigs and the feed for the sows consists of cereals, cereal products and grain legumes. The matured meat comes from sows or heavy fattening pigs with a carcass weight of over 120 kg, the rest of the meat from pigs of at least 80 kg. At least 30 % of the meat is matured lean meat. The fat comes from the back fat, and for the Saucisse also from the breast. Fresh meat is used; frozen meat or fat may have been stored for at most four months at –18 °C or colder.

Each sausage maker cuts up and minces the meat and fat according to their own recipe into an even, coarse-grained mixture. It is seasoned with salt, pepper and nutmeg; nitrate, milk ferments and sugar are also permitted. The mixture goes only into natural casings. The sausages are then warmed and dried. The maker checks that ripening is proceeding properly by pressing with the hand; the sausage must be firm. The drying room is checked daily for the appearance and smell of the sausages, and temperature and humidity are adjusted to the changing outside air. All steps from selecting the meat to the end of drying take place in the area.

Origin & history

The area covers eleven municipalities in the department of Tarn: Barre, Berlats, Escroux, Espérausses, Gijounet, Lacaune, Moulin Mage, Murat-sur-Vèbre, Nages, Senaux and Viane. It is a basin running from east to west in the Lacaune mountains, the catchment area of the Gijou. To the south it is bounded by a ridge from Montgrand to the Montalet, which is over 1,200 m high, and to the north by a second from Roquecézière over the Col de Sié to the Merdélou, which is about 1,000 m high. Oceanic, Mediterranean and mountain climates meet here: it rains a lot and throughout the year, temperatures are rather low, and changing winds make temperature and humidity vary greatly over the course of a day. According to the specification, this has always given the area good conditions for drying.

Production goes back to the trade of the “mazelier”, widespread in Lacaune in the Middle Ages. In Occitan this was the name for someone who slaughtered cattle, sheep and pigs; from about the 15th century the name stood for someone who processed pork. This gave rise to a dense network of curing businesses that pass on their know-how from generation to generation. At the beginning of the 20th century an author praised the charcuterie of a hotel in Lacaune in the “Voyages gastronomiques au pays de France”; in 1980 and 1986 the sausage is described in the “Code de la charcuterie, de la salaison et des conserves de viandes”.