A few weeks ago we wrote about Hungarian paprika, and a reader left a question: "Where can I find gurkha also known as blood sausage? I live in Phoenix area."
While blood sausage is found in every cuisine from Asia to America, we could not find a name reference for gurkha. In French and Creole cuisine boudin noir and boudin rouge refer to types of blood sausage. Germans have blutwurst, the Spanish- morcilla, the Scots- haggis, the English-blood pudding, or black pudding, and Italians biroldo. There are ingredient differences in each of these sausages, but all traditionally contain meat, animal blood (pig, cow, lamb, sheep, duck), animal fat, breadcrumbs or grain, and seasoning.
Before you turn up your nose and freak out about the use of blood in sausage making, consider historically we humans used every edible part of a slaughtered animal for reasons of economy. Nose to tail eating, which some consider a recent culinary trend, was a means of survival.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: The Phoenix New Times
