Learning to Make Medisterpølse

Special Program held at the Danish American Center in Minneapolis – 

Story by EJ Gurley & Susan Loschenkohl – 

Every culture has their traditional foods. In a melting pot culture like ours, the most beloved risk getting reduced to food court cliches. No doubt the Chinese eggrolls, Italian pizza,or German bratwurst you find at the mall pale in comparison to their old world counterparts. But what to do if your culture of choice (or birth) is a small one without mainstream dishes embraced by the whole world?

You make it yourself.

If we had to name the top dishes we learned to love growing up Danish in the US in the 1970s, it would be leverpostej, flæskesteg (helst med svær), frikadeller, and medisterpølse. Let’s face it, pork looms large in the Danish foodscape. Lucky for us, elements of the Danish foodscape can be found in the different events the Danish American Center in Minneapolis puts on each year. The events that serve these dishes are familiar to all, be it Christmas dinners or smørrebrød luncheons. Less familiar are the opportunities to donn an apron and learn the basics first hand.

A Sausage Making Class with DAC member Joel Mortensen is the most recent example. Joel shared his knowledge and experience making traditional sausages with a group of 20 or so eager students one Saturday morning at the end of March.

The great benefit of making sausage at home, Joel explained, is that you know exactly what’s in it. So began our instructive morning. We learned the finer points of fat to meat ratios, the importance of grinding spices at home, and how to work with natural casings. Everyone got a turn feeding meat down the tube to be ground. Then, recipes in hand, we were set loose to chop onions, grind spices, and mix our batch of medisterpølse nirvana (or other sausage option) by hand. One by one, we stood in line for the final step: filling the meat mixture into the casing.

By noon that day, we each had three pounds of sausage to take home. Better yet was the knowledge that with a bit of time and the right tools, we could now go forth and make our own.

Thanks Joel!