I totally understand if the headline, “fat free sausage” caused a wrinkle in your brain. After all the very idea of a fat free sausage is practically an oxymoron. Personally I never thought I could use those words together in a spoken sentence, let alone actually taste one in reality but that day has finally arrived.
To understand the genesis of this wonder food I have to take you back several weeks when I finally decided to do something about my weight. Weight isn’t an easy subject to discuss for anyone and particularly for men. You see weight loss and diets seem to be a largely female domain. While overweight men are equally conscious of their health and body image, we don’t find it easy to join a group or a club that can help us. We tend to join gyms or see personal trainers and while some succeed, many fail for lack of human interaction and support, something women recognised years ago. The interesting thing is that all the popular weight loss programmes and groups are open to men as well as women, yet it is largely women who attend. Having spoken to a number of regular customers who were visibly getting slimmer by the week I finally decided to pluck up the courage and join a popular weight loss programme that has a weekly meeting and weigh in.
I will admit that the first night was beyond daunting and I thought about not going many times during that first day, but it didn’t take me long to realise that no one else was bothered by my presence. Thankfully, my lovely wife came too, so it was something we could do together and that has genuinely made it so much easier. The programme is proving to be a life changer for us in so many ways. It is a sensible regime that revolves around real food, generally unrestricted eating with little or no fiddly weighing and measuring and the opportunity to indulge every now and again. Within a very short time I found that it really suited me and I was enjoying it in so many ways. Rather than being ‘on a diet’ per say we are reinventing the way we eat and cook and largely going for that long term lifestyle change rather than a short sprint to a meaningless goal on a scales. This is also having an impact on the family. We cook healthy meals for everyone so without even realising it, the children are benefitting also and hopefully, into the future, they are learning to eat well naturally, by the example we are setting. Our aim is to promote health, fitness and long life and not to create that tense and negative atmosphere of dieting or depravation. Never once has anyone said, “We can’t have such and such because Daddy is on a diet”. So all was going well, I was adjusting more easily than I had anticipated and, believe it or not, within 5 short weeks I had lost over 1 stone in weight. Result! However I was missing one thing and that was the humble sausage; banished from my diet because of its high fat content.
They say necessity is the mother of invention and, to be honest, I felt that I needed a sausage. Alternatives were suggested. There are several low calorie and meatless options on the market and I duly tried them all, but not one of them passed the taste test in my opinion. Each one lacked something and none of them reached a decent mark on the satisfaction scale. As a butcher if there’s one thing I understand, it’s what makes a good sausage and so eventually I was forced into my own test kitchen. I donned the apron, feeling like Thomas Edison, when he invented the light bulb. Now I knew that Edison had many failures before he hit on the right idea and so I was prepared for a few non runners in the fat free sausage stakes. I was a man on a mission, driven by my cravings and determined not to unlock that door until I could shout “Eureka, the fat free sausage is here”. And so the great experiment began. I took all the various elements that make a great sausage and began to make substitutions. Having stripped out all the fat and only using 100% lean pork meat the biggest challenge was a replacement for the bread rusk ingredient. I finally found the right balance using cous cous. While I didn’t actually cry “Eureka”, I believe that my taste buds did. It was great. Admittedly a slightly different texture than your average sausage but the all of the flavour is still there and yet none of the calories.
To date I have tried them on a cross section of people that have included friends and family. I have made a few tweaks here and there and now feel that my quest is at an end; the James Whelan delicious Fat Free Sausage is on the market. I get a great kick out of the flavour but an even greater burst of pleasure knowing that as I am indulging I am still staying well within the parameters of my programme. These are truly fat and guilt free sausages. On the particular programme I am on they give food what they term a ‘syn’ value. Well I am giving my sausages a ‘SIN’ value and on my virtuous scale they are SIN-less! A big fat (or thin) 0% fat sausage! It truly is a miracle and so whichever programme you are on, whether it is one of the famous branded ones and you are counting points at WeightWatchers or syns at Slimming World or yums at Unislim or you are just cutting down on your own, this healthy fat free sausage will fit in with what you are doing. The even better news is that it is produced with local pork.
Of course you don’t have to be on a diet or trying to shift the pounds to try them. Give them a go as a healthier alternative to the full fat version. If nothing else they certainly give you another option when it comes to sausage choices. Drop by the shop any time and give our sinless sausages a try. With my new found zeal I’m also looking at developing a full sinless range for all those out there who, like me, have struggled with their weight for far too long. Watch this (diminishing) space.
This post was written by me, Pat Whelan, owner of James Whelan Butchers and a passionate advocate of local artisan food. My family have been producing quality Irish Angus beef for generations using a traditional dry aging process. This tradition is one that I continue to practice at our abattoir on our family farm in Garrentemple, Clonmel. These posts aim to impart some of the wisdom to readers and help them get the best out of the meat they eat! Our meat is available online here! I welcome your feedback to [email protected]
We hope you enjoyed reading this post by Pat Whelan of James Whelan Butchers. Pat is a 5th generation butcher, cook book author and the director of James Whelan Butchers with shops in Clonmel, the Avoca Handweavers Rathcoole and Kilmacanogue, Dunnes Stores Cornelscourt, Rathmines and Swords in Dublin. Sign up to our newsletter for more updates from James Whelan Butchers
Tags: fat free, foodie articles, James Whelan Butchers, Pat Whelan, sausage
