Not Quite Bangers and Mash...

Bangers and mash is a very popular dish in the UK. It is basically sausages served in or on top of mashed potatoes. This dish is sausages served on crushed - as opposed to mashed - potatoes but probably looks a great deal different to most people familiar with bangers and mash.

The principal reason why this dish is so different from bangers and mash is that the sausages used in it are Lorne sausages, a type of sausage peculiar to Scotland and certain parts of the North of England. These are sausages where, rather than being stuffed in to skins, the sausage meat is compressed in to large blocks which are subsequently sliced to form the sausages. Although Lorne sausages were not around in the time of Rabbie Burns, they are a hugely popular item in Scottish cuisine today.

The following recipe is in the quantities required per person.

Ingredients

2 Lorne sausages
6 to 8 small new potatoes
Handful of frozen peas
1 clove of garlic
A knob of butter
Half a tomato for garnish (if desired)

Method

The new potatoes should be left whole and unpeeled, placed in to a pot of boiling, salted water and simmered for twenty-five to thirty minutes until soft. The Lorne sausages should be grilled and will take around three minutes each side under a medium to hot grill in order to cook. This should be timed so far as possible to coincide with the potatoes being ready.

The peas will only take about three minutes in boiling water to cook and should therefore be put on immediately prior to draining and starting to finalise the preparation of the crushed potatoes. When drained, the potatoes should be placed in a bowl and crushed with a fork. The butter and crushed or grated garlic clove should then be added and the mixture stirred. The potatoes should then be arranged on a plate, the Lorne sausages sliced in half diagonally and arranged on top as shown in the photograph and the peas drained and arranged round the edges of the plate. The tomato may then be placed on top as a final garnish.