Mortadella Bologna
Mortadella Bologna is Italy's most famous IGP cooked sausage, originating from Bologna in Emilia-Romagna. It is made from finely emulsified pork mixed with cubes of lard and enriched with green pistachios. Slow oven cooking gives it its characteristic pink color, tender texture, and unmistakable, mildly spiced aroma.
Ingredients(for 1 kg)
Instructions
Pre-grinding
30 minutesGrind the lean pork and jowl fat separately through a 3 mm plate. Then freeze the meat for at least 30 minutes so it is sufficiently cold for the bowl-cutting process.
Bowl Cutting the Emulsion
10–15 minutesPlace the pre-ground meat and jowl fat into the bowl cutter. Add curing salt, coriander, and black pepper. Add ice water in small portions and cut until a homogeneous, shiny emulsion forms. The mixture temperature must not exceed 12 °C.
Folding in Fat and Pistachios
5 minutesFold the diced pork back fat cubes (8 mm) and pistachios evenly into the emulsion by hand, without warming the mixture too much. The cubes should retain their shape and be evenly distributed.
Stuffing and Cooking
4–8 hoursFill the emulsion firmly and without air pockets into pork bladders or large artificial casings (caliber 90–150 mm). Cook in a convection oven at first 60 °C (1 hour), then 70 °C (1 hour), and finally 80 °C until a core temperature of 70–72 °C is reached. Shock in ice water and refrigerate.
Pro Tip
The meat temperature must never exceed 12 °C during bowl cutting – otherwise the emulsion breaks and the mortadella becomes grainy and greasy. Keep adding ice cubes regularly!
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