Cudighi Recipe
Explore the essence of Northern Michigan cuisine with the Cudighi, a traditional Italian sausage celebrated for its unique spice blend. Uncover the authentic Cudighi experience in our recipe, featuring seasoned pork, garlic, and distinctive spices. Whether enjoyed on its own or in a hearty Cudighi sandwich, savor the taste of regional charm with this cherished Cudighi recipe.
Ingredients
For the sausage stuffing (optional)
- 1 meter beef casings for 2 lbs ground pork making 6-8 patties.
For the ground pork mix
- 9 1/2 ounces pork shoulder spalla di maiale
- 9 1/2 ounces pork neck capocollo
- 9 1/2 ounces pork butt fondello
- 3 ounces pancetta
For the spice blend
- ½ cup dry wine red or white
- 1 tbsp salt fine *less is needed if you want to consume fresh sausage, while you need slightly more if you intend to season it(
- 1 tbsp black pepper ground
- 1 clove garlic
- ¼ tsp nutmeg ground
- ¼ tsp cinnamon ground
- 1 cloves toasted
For 8 sandwiches
- 8 Bread Rolls
- 8 Cudighi patty
- 16 slices Mozzarella Cheese
- 8 Sweet Peppers
- 2 Onions
- 8 Garlic Cloves
Instructions
Cudighi Sausage
- Cut the pork into coarse cubes just the right size to fit into the mincer. Spread everything out on a work surface, mixing the lean parts with the fat ones.
- Combine all the spices to a bowl.
- Spread the spices on the ground pork , mixing well, so that the ingredients blend well with each other.
- At this point, grind everything with the meat grinder choosing by how much you want the dough to be chopped more or less coarsely.
- If you want a very fine minced mixture you can brush the meat twice, otherwise just once, it depends on personal tastes. You can also leave a part of the bacon to be ground separately, which is coarser.
- Now add any other ingredients , such as wine or pepper or juniper grains, which could not be passed through the meat grinder. Mix well with your hands, or in a planetary mixer , to obtain a homogeneous mixture.
- The sausage is ready
Cudighi Sandwich
- Heat the marinara sauce and slice the sweet pickles, onions, garlic or any toppings you like for your sandwich.
- Put the mozzarella cheese on top of the Culighi sausage and put it back on the grill to melt the cheese.
- Pour the marinara sauce covering the meat patty and top with the pickles, onion and garlic.
- Enjoy!
Notes
How to Make a Cudighi Sandwich
For the meat
- Cut the meat into small pieces and mix with the wine and spices
- Combine well and then pass through the mincer. If you don't have a mincer then you can use the food processor.
- Shape the sausage paste. Now you can either fill the paste into the casings or otherwise divide it into small pieces to freeze or cook as patties.
- Optionally, if you want to stuff the sausage into casings then you need around 1 meter casing for every 1kg sausage meat. Beware that the casings need to be soaked in warm water and a glass of wine. If you're using a meat grinder, the job is easier by putting them in the tube accessory. The casine must protrude around 3 inches and then be tied with a knot before inserting any meat.
To Cook the Cudighi Patties in a Skillet
You can cook the Cudighi either on a grill, a burner, or skillet. Turn on the burner to medium to high warming it up. Then only once it has warmed up you can gently place each patty in a roundabout fashion on the skillet. After roughly about five to eight minutes go ahead and flip the patties you should see some good char marks here and make sure to cook this entirely the way through or until the middle of the pork patty itself reaches approximately 160°F / 70°C.- On the burner, heat the skillet on medium to high heat. Leave it warm up well before putting, the sausage patties to cook.
- Leave to cook for 5-8 minutes before flipping the patty. Make sure it's cooked throughout.
How to cook the Cudighi sausage in an oven
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- To cook Cudighi sausage in the oven, preheat it to 375°F (190°C), arrange the sausages on a baking sheet, and bake for 20-30 minutes or until they reach an internal temperature of 160°F (71°C), turning them occasionally for even cooking.
How to prepare the cudighi sandwich
To prepare this Michigan sandwich, start by cooking the pork patties and heating the marinara sauce. Then, assemble the sandwich by placing mozzarella-topped sausage patties in bread rolls, adding warm marinara sauce, sweet peppers, and optionally, grilled onions and garlic, before closing and pressing it gently to hold everything in place.- Heat the marinara sauce and slice the sweet pickles, onions, garlic or any toppings you like for your sandwich.
- Put the mozzarella cheese on top of the Cudighi sausage and put it back on the grill to melt the cheese.
- Pour the marinara sauce covering the meat patty and top with the pickles, onion and garlic.
- Enjoy!
