Butifarra Soledeña (Colombian Pork Sausage)
The pork sausage of Soledad, on the Colombian Caribbean coast: pork and bacon seasoned with a pinch of cinnamon, stuffed, boiled and then grilled. Eaten with lime and bollo de yuca, and sold from buckets in the street. Makes about ten.
Servings: 10
Calories: 339kcal
Ingredients
- 1 ½ lb pork shoulder or a cut with some fat; lean pork alone makes a dry sausage
- ½ lb bacon half goes minced, half ground with the pork
- ½ meter pork casing sold salted or in brine; soak it in water before using
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- 1 pinch cinnamon small, but it is what makes a butifarra taste like one
- Lime juice for cleaning the casing, and for serving alongside
Instructions
- Divide the bacon in two. Chop one half into tiny pieces and grind the other half together with the pork.
- Add the salt, pepper and the pinch of cinnamon to the ground meat, along with the chopped bacon. Knead thoroughly until everything is evenly mixed, then roll the mixture into small balls.
- Rinse the casing well with plenty of lime juice, inside and out, to clean it and take away the smell. Stuff the balls into the casing and tie it off at the length you want, leaving a knot between each sausage.
- Boil in plenty of water for 15 minutes. Lift them out and prick each one with a needle or a pin so the water inside runs out.
- Hang them up and let them dry.
- Grill them on a hot iron or griddle to serve.
Notes
Butifarra is the sausage of Soledad, in Atlántico, and it is street food before it is anything else: sold from a bucket, cut into pieces, and eaten with lime squeezed over it and a bollo de yuca alongside. The cinnamon is the detail that separates it from any other pork sausage, and a pinch is genuinely all it takes. If you cannot get casings, the mixture can be shaped into balls and boiled without them, which is not traditional but works. They keep several days in the fridge once boiled, and the grilling is done just before eating.
Nutrition
Calories: 339kcal | Carbohydrates: 1g | Protein: 13g | Fat: 31g | Saturated Fat: 12g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 4g | Monounsaturated Fat: 14g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 67mg | Sodium: 311mg | Potassium: 231mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 1g | Vitamin A: 1IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 10mg | Iron: 1mg