About

Sausagefest is about enjoying the diversity and artistic efforts involved in making and eating sausage. Sounds pretty simple, but consider how ubiquitous sausages are in all in our nations and how little time, history, or discussion there is about sausages.

We think it’s time sausages take a respectable place at the major table in our culinary tradition.

Sausages have been enjoyed for more than a thousand years. If you go to Homer’s the Odyssey (book 20, verse 25) it talks about blood sausage being grilled. Here at sausagefest.com we saw that sausage – in all its variety – needed a main stage where one of our oldest food traditions could have a home. And, it’s too much of a major economic part of our food economy to be ignored.

Sausages play a substantial part in our world. In the United States, according to figures for 2010, dinner sausage sales increased 2 percent, to tallied $1.89 billion. Breakfast sausage/ham sales increased as well, at more than $9 million in sales (Source: National Hot Dog & Sausage Council).

The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council’s 2011 annual report projects that MLB ballparks around the country will serve 22,435,400 hot dogs this season. That represents 1.06 million more hot dogs than 2010, or a 5 percent increase, the first increase in three years.

In addition, the Council predicts ballparks will sell 5,161,370 sausages this year, more than 227,000 than in 2010, an increase of 4.6 percent. The US alone consumes 6 billion pounds per year of sausage

Even from an international perspective, sausages are part of many nations’ history and identity.

Consider:

Sausage Bake
  • Could England be England without Bangers? No!
  • Could Germany be Germany without Wurst? No!
  • Could Louisiana be Louisiana without Andouille sausage? No!
  • Would there be a Poland without Polish Sausage? No!
  • Would Chicago disappear without hot dogs? Yes!
  • Milwaukee without Brats? No!
  • Could Toronto exist without sausage vendors? No!

So now that we brought the topic up, lets clear the fetid air of sophomoric humor around the term Sausagefest. Yes, Sausagefest is a term that will trigger a variety of effects: snickers, derision, sneers, laughs, or a raised eyebrow. Still in all, it’s a term that doesn’t strike fear, anxiety or loathing. US slang generally says Sausagefest is a party or event where males are too much in abundance. But, this is not a all male community. I did a recent non-scientific survey and found that all of the following major icons of the civilized world were seen in a more negative light than the terms Sausagefest:

  • Wall street
  • Financial advisors
  • Bankers (from any country with US types the most heinous)
  • Al Qaeda

So Sausagefest is a term, for the most part, for fun and enjoyment and sausagefest.com is going down that road.